November 2004

Emily Grossman is from Soldotna, Alaska.

Biography

Nov. 12, 2004 at 11:45 PM

Thoughts on Speaking the Truth in Love

This has been a somewhat difficult week for me in more areas than one, and a theme seems to be emerging: what does it mean to speak the truth in love? In my lessons, I have three options as to how to approach criticism and instruction.

First, I could love my students without being truthful. Some days, I get wrapped up in not hurting the students' feelings, trying not to be too discouraging in showing them their flaws. I find it a breeze to tell them how wonderful they sound and sugar-coat their efforts. I bet most of my students would initially like this approach as well. A big problem that arises with this tactic is that though they may get warm fuzzies and feel good about themselves, they will go on and make an embarrassment of themselves in front of an audience because of their falsely inflated ego, which gives them the blind confidence of a fool. Other people will see their flaws, but they won't notice when they are out of tune, screeching and clawing for the polite applause of a helpless audience. Or, on the other hand, they will eventually come to realise that they have flaws and need help and will resent me as their teacher for not directing them as they needed. They will come to an impasse and eventually quit. This is the result of my love for the student without truthfulness.

Some days I feel I balance myself on the opposite end of the spectrum--lots of honesty without tact. That is, I am quick to listen with a critical ear and cleverly devise a plan to get them to the next step. I get so caught up in the method of instruction, with tinkering and fixing problems that I almost forget that the student before me has a heart with feelings to hurt. I am so obsessed with accomplishing my goal to create the perfect violinist that I think of nothing else. In this scenario, I can see how a student would leave feeling discouraged and overwhelmed. They would probably be afraid to play for me, afraid to open up and share anything, afraid to have any sort of relationship with me because I am cold and cruel. I speak the truth, but without love.

Now, to speak the truth in love, what does this mean? It seems to be this delicate balance of knowing when and how to say the right thing that will benefit the student most. I have to be constantly aware of how hard I'm pushing and know when to back off. I have to develop a keen eye to spot that teachable moment, when a tidbit of knowledge will fall on open ears. I also have to know how to create the teachable moment when none exists. And for every critical comment, I need to make sure I've buffered the student with enough encouragement to help them bear the yoke of discipline. The truth is at its most powerful state when it is paired with love.

I'm at a loss most of the time. I don't know what's going on inside my students during a lesson. I want more than anything to create an environment where they feel safe enough to share what they really think and play with confidence.

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Nov. 17, 2004 at 6:34 PM

My husband and I had a day off together, so we took advantage of a break between snowfalls and took the 150-mile journey through the mountain pass, over to Anchorage for the day. It had occurred to me that it was Sunday, but I wasn't prepared for three strikes in a row on my shopping agenda. The yarn shop--closed! The Keyboard Cache--closed! Great Harvest Bread CO.--closed! I swore at the ice, swore at the traffic, grumbled at the ill-timed light-changes and friendly neighborhood construction zones. We still had two hours before the sushi joint opened, so we made our way to the used bookstore, which offered less selection in the way of sheet music, but might possibly have a bargain of some use to me.

I leafed through the bins. ...Ooh, Tchaickovsky piano concerto. Ah, who am I kidding? ...This book looks good, but the price, wait, that's a new book! I was looking for a bargain, not a new book for a new price! I flipped through a couple of etude books.

Then I saw it. It was a soft, yellowed and stained book with brown tape for a binding and in dark green words, "Paganini" written on the front. The 24 caprices. I would never be playing these, but what is this book doing at a used bookstore in Anchorage? Does anyone in Alaska play Paganini? If so, why would they drop this book? Did they need the cash to pay their heating bill? To heck with the heating bill; I gave the cashier $4.00 and headed for the car.

Flipping carefully through the worn pages, I examined the fingerings and markings and thought about whose hands may have made them. There was an address stamped inside the cover, somewhere in Munich. The publisher was Austrian. And the date--1929.

The person who bought this book originally is probably now dead, and so is his music. I will never hear it, and I'm sad for this loss. This person lived in a time when Bartok was new, when there was only one World War, before Alaska was even a state! I'm curious. Was he a young virtuoso? Was he actually a she? What did music mean to this person? Were his dreams the same as mine? My imagination takes off like a loose horse when I think of all the possible secrets locked in the history of an old book.

So, now I have a unique copy of Paganini's 24 Caprices to tuck away in my file cabinet in hopes that some day, someone might just happen to waltz into Slow-dotna, Alaska, and can play me some phrases from those musty pages.

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Nov. 27, 2004 at 2:36 AM

There's nothing like a 4,500 mile road trip to make you a little more thankful at Thanksgiving. Last Thursday, the second my last student vacated my home, George and I loaded up our chocolate lab, Ben, and headed for the Yukon. We had never driven the Alaska highway this late in the season, and I suspected we would be in for a treat. We were.

We spent the night in Anchorage with my wonderful friend, Nora, who is resting between rounds of chemo for her lukemia. At 4:00 AM, we headed through the first mountain pass to reach Glenallen by sunrise. The roads were half decent, but a freezing rainstorm had just passed through Tok, and although temps were sub-zero, we noticed a wind-polished glaze on the road. At less than forty miles per hour, we rounded a bend to see a herd of caribou migrating across the slick. At least, that's what they were attempting. George started braking and honking, and I laughed. The scene unfolded so lethargically, I remember everything as a slow-motion ballet on ice, with caribou spread-eagled and long scraping sounds as our studded tires clawed the slope. We drifted to a gentle stop directly in front of the last caribou and admired its tip-toe balancing act as he trotted to the other side. Accident number one detoured.

We spent the rest of the long day crawling toward Whitehorse, the happy highlight of civilization deep in the middle of nowhere. Whitehorse is the kind of town where you could leave $20 in the "Tim Horton's" bathroom, come back for it fifteen minutes later, and find it still sitting there. If it wasn't, some nice stranger would be walking around the restaraunt, looking for its owner. I know this because I've done it--acually, more than once. I've also been offered housing by a Tim Horton's cashier, gotten my right front axle changed for pocket change in the time it took me to eat a Canadian Maple glazed donut, had my coffee payed for by a complete stranger, and gotten Alaskan discounts from the friendliest hotel managers, all in Whitehorse. I recommend Whitehorse to anyone.

The next day, we caught up with the culprit responsible for hundreds of miles of glazed ice--The Storm. We had originally planned to cover 850 miles that day, but rain-slicked frozen roads and patchy sanding made for precarious hairpin turns through each mountain pass. We went 55 mph, then 45, then 40, then 25. At this rate we would arrive in Oklahoma on December 22, just in time for Christmas. As my gut tightened into a wad of muscle, I thought about some things. My family. My violin. How would we get out of this country if we wrecked the car? Would anyone find us if we missed that turn and ended up at the bottom of that ravine? Do we have enough Ramen noodles to sustain us if we had to build a cabin at the bottom and wait for spring, or would we have to eat Ben? What do dogs taste like, anyway?

Accidents #2-22 avoided, we finally made it through The Storm and found lodging in Fort Nelson, 300 miles short of our goal for the day. At 3:00 AM, we signed out of the hotel and stepped outside to find that The Storm had caught us again. Our car was covered in a quarter inch of smooth ice. We let out our wiggling dog to feed him his breakfast, and watched as his bowl slid across the parking lot. Ben drooled. He wiggled again, and his back end slid after the bowl. You'd think it would be obvious what the next decision should be, but we debated for twenty minutes before deciding to go ahead an try it out. We got to the end of the town and the end of the sand, and saw a cop car flashing its lights for us to stop. The highway was closed. Accident #23 avoided. We returned to the hotel and begged to get our room back. I lay in bed and wondered what it would be like to celebrate Thanksgiving in a hotel with the Fort Nelson people. Later that morning, fresh snow and sleet actually had made the roads more drivable, and so we set off to conquer The Storm once more. Tractor trailors lay like slain buffalo on the side of the highway, yet we pressed onward, to Animal Pass.

Actually, I don't know the true name of this mountain range, but we all call it Animal Pass, for the obvious reason that it is guaranteed that we will see at least twelve species of animals on the road while driving through it. I recommend this route for anyone who wants to see buffalo, caribou, deer, mountain goats, sheep, and herds of beaver. (I didn't see the last one. George's friend did). Accidents #23-31 were avoided in this segment.

Sixteen hours passed. We crossed into Alberta, where the roads straightened and the sky lifted a little. We had reached the head of The Storm. George handed me the wheel, and I released my pent up anxiety on the road. I knew that if we stopped for the night, we would be caught once more, so I turned southward, to Calgary and beyond. We reached the border by 5:00 AM the next morning. I refused to rest until George insisted, after I missed my turn to the on-ramp and made a U-turn onto the interstate and saw headlights in both lanes. I calmly (okay not-so-calmly) pointed the car into a ditch and waited for the coast to clear. Accident number 32 avoided.

George drove through the rest of the day. We saw pheasant, antelope, and decidedly bigger skies in Montana. We saw where General Custer ended. We saw real cowboys in Wyoming. Night #3 was spent in Cheyenne. Ben got to sleep in the hotel this time; he peed on the floor, and somehow woke me in the night when he crunched a bit too loud on his chicken bone. Chicken bone? I still don't know where he got that chicken bone. Accident #33 avoided.

Then we lost the key to the car. I had time to think about what it would be like to stay in Cheyenne for a week and wondered which would be easier, re-keying the lock, hotwiring the car, selling the car and buying a new one, or taking up residency. The thought also crossed my mind that the key had magically turned into a chicken bone during the night. Luckily, George picked the lock and found our key inside the car, thus avoiding being turned into Wyomingans.

As we made our way eastward, a strong north wind forshadowed what we knew in our hearts would be waiting if we didn't make it to Salina, Kansas, by supper. And as we peeled out of the Subway at the intersection of I-70 and I-35 south, our fears were realised as ice pellets began to ping on the windshield. The Storm had found us. We sped on, The Storm lapping at our heels the entire remainder of the trip.

We were delirious. I was cross. I ate all the prunes I could, but I was losing the battle to remain fully... functional. George finished off the last of the Ramen noodles. Ben made a smell that remains to be explained and will haunt the car for the rest of its career. The sign for the Oklahoma border could not have come sooner.

After avoiding one more accident (#34) in Tulsa, we drifted away from the city lights and the cars thinned to a trickle. The air was thick, warm, and full of familiar smells of fall. I heard crickets for the first time. We turned onto a brown gravel road; a friendly scarecrow greeted us at the driveway of my parents' home.

I thought about my fiddle tucked safely in the back window. I looked at George and Ben. The car's engine was quiet now as we stepped into the night air, and a figure stood, silhouetted by the porch light.

Yes, we have so much for which we can give thanks.

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