Note 11 Reflecting on the Approaching Mother’s Day

April 15, 2008 at 4:06 PM

I opened the paper to the Mother’s Day ads, right after Easter they spring up as sure as grass and robins in spring.
I usually pass over mother’s day as if it were just another day but for this violinist blog I am giving a little more thought to this second biggest retail day of the year. If you think I am heartless to skim over this holiday then I need to tell you that I have, in past years given and thought about my mother and mothers a lot. I worked in retail for a few years, I sold the cards, candy and clothing. Also I was the one to remember and I sent the cards, candy, clothing, jewelry, flowers and teapots to mother, mother-in-laws and friend’s mothers—with out hesitation.
My mother was my biggest advocate. Pictures on the wall, assignments on the refrigerator, letters to me in college and endless lectures about life. She rummaged around and did the homework that found my scholarships for college. My total college liability was $800 at the end of 4 years. How I paid that down is a Father’s Day story.
This blog is about music. My mother played the piano. Although Chopin was her favorite, she took requests. “Rinse the coffee cups!” hollered my dad and she skittered over Rimsky—Korsakov. She banged away at Rachmaninov and The Minute Waltz in much more than a minute. She played “Dancing Dolls; Dum- dittle, dittle -DEEE dum dum- DA-dum--DEE-dahhhh---DUM-little-little-deeee, DUM, little, little, dummmm. That melody is etched in my brain.
Dad would yell, “Hon—play that Barcarolle for me.” She would play that.
Then he would wail “I Don’t See Meeee in Your Eyes any more!!” She played that. It was Fasination---Nay—shun---I know-Ohhhhhh Owww!” Dad would sing from the basement.
She had a piano bench stuffed with sheet music like that from every movie and every pop star of her day. Bing, Perry Como, Debby Reynolds, Patty Page and Rosie Clooney. Around the World in 80 Days, Sally Foster’s “Merry Widow Waltz”: Men with slicked back hair and women whose faces were photographed at 45 degree angles. Also we had piles and piles of solemn thick music books, printed on war-era paper, too flimsy to stand on their own were stacked everywhere else. I couldn’t understand how anyone could comprehend or play anything so black with notes stacked up on top of each other! These were her “classic collection.” These she dug into like a dog looking for a bone and extracted the composition “du jour” with glee.
She played clinically and carefully with her mouth set in a straight line and her glasses perched on her nose, slightly askew. Sometimes she counted to herself, sometimes she screwed up her face into an awful scary expression only to move her sliding glasses back up towards the bridge of her nose.
We had a television set in our home. At one time it was a small black and white built into a wall about 5 feet from the floor and it was only on for Walter Cronkite or Perry Mason if at all. Books took up an entire wall floor to ceiling, however, The Balwdin Piano was the center of it all with a grand etched mirror placed above it to reflect the huge bay window across the room.
Piano music reached every room in the house, outside in the garden, from a perch in the best climbing tree and even in the eves of the attic where we could hide with a stack of books, a flash light and pile of cookies.
No one questioned the music. No one offered a critique. It played on for hours at a time after school, after dinner, Saturdays, Sundays-almost anytime. Didn’t all moms do this? It was much better to hear the piano than to endure her lectures on the importance of ????
I really cannot recall her lectures, I only remember what she did with her life. Her gardening, her work with chemical research, her “contesting” hobbies. knitting crocheting, reading, clipping coupons, her correspondence and wanting 12 children but stopping at 6.
She practiced the piano. An exercise that her entire family participated in because it flowed into our ears, straight to the brain and our heart where it nestled and waited until we remembered and did something about it ourselves: Her Mother’s Day gift to me.

(Aside: Mother died of leukemia and complications of other cancers when I was 22. I have now outlived her by 5 years, no cancer ever.)

From Eileen Geriak
Posted on April 17, 2008 at 1:41 AM

How wonderful that your mom was able to share her love of music with the rest of you....and what a blessing to her that she had a husband and family who supported her love and encouraged it ! What a loving tribute....thank you so much for sharing !

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Note 11 Reflecting on the Approaching Mother’s Day

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