A Song in My Heart

There’s a song in my heart. Unfortunately, it’s stuck there.

Me and my boyfriend,  pre-BS

One of the most infuriating aftereffects of last October's brainstem stroke (BS for short. And I’m no longer saying “my” stroke, like it was some lovely, autumnal gift) is a wacked-out larynx (voice box). Inflammation behind the larynx, probably from reflux caused by a weakened esophagus, gives me perpetual hoarseness that gets more pronounced as the day goes on and fatigue sets in. 

Within the larynx, my vocal cords—those miraculous paired harp strings that vibrate together to produce music—are not cooperating. For most folks, speech and singing cause the vocal cords to move toward each other, meet in the center, and vibrate. My right cord, however, just doesn’t want to come out and play: It vibrates okay, but it doesn’t feel like moving, thank you very much. The result is a breathy voice without much fine control or even tone. I sound like a tone-deaf chain smoker.

I’ve been singing all my life—20+ years in bar bands—so losing my singing voice is a lot like losing an arm. I’m pretty sure I’ve gone through the five stages of grief over it, although I’ve only accepted it FOR NOW.  Yes, I know my singing voice may never come back (one oddity of stroke is that not even the “experts” can say which aftereffects will be temporary and which will be permanent). But the fat lady is not singing yet. 

My friend from junior high, Cindy Kessinger (http://singinglessonsbycindy.com/), a voice teacher in Colorado, consulted her voice association friends. Then she came up with adduction exercises, recorded them in her own sweet voice, and emailed them to me to help strengthen my right vocal cord. Who’d a thunk when we were singing “Our Day Will Come” together in the 7^th-grade talent contest, she’d be helping me heal up from BS today? Bless her heart.

Grow up...these are vocal cords.

In the mornings, when no one’s around, I do the exercises. Then I play my geetar and sing with wild abandon (good therapy for my clunky left hand, too). Then I crank up my house surround system and Joan Armatrading, my personal vocal therapist, works her magic. While I cook or do laundry & dishes, Joan and her playlist waft through the bacon-scented house (day 5 of a no-carb diet), and we sing our hearts out. Well, Joan sings (she’s the world’s most underappreciated musical genius). I croak out harmonies. And by gum, I think all the therapy is working…

Last night, I dreamed I was hanging out with friends in the storage room of a hospital (as you do). Ray played “Cajun Moon” on a geetar that appeared from nowhere, and I couldn’t help it—I started singing. To everyone’s surprise (including me), it was beautiful. I could still FEEL it when I woke up. So I’m declaring this a prophetic dream that my voice will come back. But I’m a realist, too, so I have a plan B: I’ll backcomb my hair into a giant red bouffant, get some sailor tattoos, put on my bustier, satin stretch pants, and steel-toed boots, and croak away in back-alley sleazy, smoky dives. My heart WILL let loose its songs. You may want to bring your earplugs. And some hand sanitizer.

Semester, you're not the boss of me.

Each year, when Semester finally uncurls his white-knuckled fist and lets me loose for the summer, the process of reclaiming and healing my Self begins. This year, the process began with a road trip to Wisconsin the day after I taught my last classes.

Ray and I loaded up the Bug and headed to Milwaukee, for the wedding & reception of the last unmarried daughter of one of Little Henry’s gee-tar players. Little Henry is a band Ray played in back in his 20’s, and they’ve reunited for occasional gigs over the past decade or so. The wedding was beautiful, with a gorgeous grinning bride, a handsome groom, and a sister trying to sing through her own happy weeping. The reception was a joyous celebration in a beautiful rustic lodge, with Little Henry dishing out tunes that kept the dance floor packed. And how many brides or grooms can say their dad’s band played for their wedding dance? The bride and one of her sisters even treated us to a couple of songs with the band. And I got to belt out a few tunes, too, soaking up the amazing healing vibrations of music.

Our next stop was Madison. We had an all-too-brief overnight visit with my two dear friends, Emma & Ruby. The three of us had been nearly inseparable back in the day when they lived in our Little Town, and even after they both moved to Madison, we continued our decades-long business, Sacred Body Jewelry, designing and selling sterling silver anatomical jewelry. We recently folded up the Sacred Body shop for good when we finally admitted that three hippie women combined do not one business mind make. So it was blissful, even for such a short time, to reunite and to remember that our friendship, not the business, is our real connection. It was a 24-hour whirlwind of garden tours, knitting shop & food co-op runs, an incredible lasagna dinner, philosophy and laughter over too many glasses of wine, getting acquainted with Ruby’s partner and re-acquainted with Emma’s partner & beautiful son, and slow morning coffee. And it all points out, again, that my life is infinitely richer, deeper, and more meaningful than simply what I do for a living.

We’re back home now, and I’m so grateful that the Universe, in her wisdom, occasionally kicks my arse and shows me how blessed I am. Yes, I have a huge pile of grading to wade through, panicky student emails to answer, and bureaucratic loose ends to tie up, but my mind (and heart) are slowly unclenching and turning toward the things that define who I really am: music, writing, gardening, reading for pleasure, peacock herding, unhurried gatherings of family & friends, and attention to health, wellness, and beauty. I have a new Shiraz/Zinfandel red wine to start fermenting, a batch of kombucha (fermented tea) to start, daisies to plant, and I’m mixing up patchouli-scented henna today. I’ve got my Birkies and a tie-dyed t-shirt on, and dangit, middle-age or no, I may even braid my hair.

 
You tried hard to squish me, Semester, to grind me into Bitter Schoolmarm Mash. But thanks to the Universe and her sweet reminders of what really matters, I’m still here, and summer is a wide-open door.

Road Trip Reverie

It’s a grey, lazy Sunday at Uncannery Row. We got a couple inches of snow Friday night, but it’s in the 30’s today and melting, a good day to load some Little Feat and Tom Waits into my iPod, catch up on laundry, cut through a layer or two of dust, and think about Thanksgiving dinner.

I can’t begin to name the things for which I’m grateful this year—the list is too long—but just today, I’m especially thankful for one thing in particular: road trips.

Ray and I went to Alejandro MN Friday night so he could play a gig with Small Howard, a band of brothers from Ray’s 20’s. The boys all lived together in an old farmhouse, and they gather every few months or years to do what we all know they really love (in spite of pledges to wives, spouse-equivalents, children, or home fires). I’ve SEEN that look of adoration for a 1970’s Gibson electric—puts stars in a man’s eyes. The boys love each other, too, but talk about it only in private to wives and spouse-equivalents. Women, even prairie women, will tell each other how much they need & enjoy each others’ company. But for men, maybe especially for prairie men, the most they can muster to each other is “good to see you” or “nice licks.”

In spite of a little Norlander stoicism, we had a great time. The boys smiled in and out of moments where the music clicked so perfectly, they were simultaneously in the Alejandro wine bar AND sitting around the living room of the Small Howard House 30 years ago, pushing their long hair out of their eyes and jamming in their holey bell bottoms.

Penelope, Artemis, and I had just as much fun. We sipped wine or Belgian beers, sampled chocolate genache-filled pastry, sang along, and laughed. We celebrated the happy news that Artemis and Byron will dive into the mysterious marital abyss next spring or summer. And we all kept room in our hearts for Betsy, Arnold’s wife, who is home battling cancer. No one said anything, but we were all feeling her absence and aware of the delicacy of our days, somewhere in these middle years where we begin to see the horizon at both ends of life. We did our best to surround Arnold with joy, warm friendship, and music, filling him to overflowing so he could take the extra home to Betsy.

Maybe it’s just a stray drop or two of gypsy blood on my father’s Czech side, a little mongrel wanderlust stirring somewhere, but there’s something about a road trip that restores my spiritual center, re-aligns my emotional compass. Seeing newly harvested fields roll by in black & white striped blurs, or beyond those fields, snow hanging like mist over river bluffs, or beyond the bluffs, the curve of the earth at the edge of my vision, makes me realize not just how small I am, but also that the bigness of the world is a good thing. It puts my puny fears, complaints, and troubles in their proper place, at least temporarily. So today, while I’m worrying that a new green bean recipe (sans the crunchy fake onions) might be a kind of sacrilege, or while I’m coming unhinged because I can’t find the little pilgrim salt & pepper shakers, the prairie will be resting peacefully, healing the necessary brutality of farming, highway traffic, and human need under her brief, beautiful blanket of winter.

This is a man's world...fa la la la la...

It’s just like the Godfather of Soul said: “This is a maaaaaaan’s world.” The world of live music is a good example. Even if they won’t admit it to you or me, any truly honest male musician will admit to himself, eventually, that women who play in bands are still just the “chicks” in the band.

I’m stereotyping, of course. And stereotyping even more, it seems to me that women don’t need an excuse to get together. Men do. They need to DO something if they want to hang out with each other. My take on the live music scene is that for many male musicians, music fills the “getting together with the boys” space that for other men is filled with pro sports, cars, construction/destruction, or power tools. The axe (gee-tar) replaces the axe (hunter-gatherer), so to speak.

I played music with various groups in bars, at weddings, dances, etc. for 20+ years. Musicians love playing music for different reasons. Some love to perform. Some need the acceptance of the crowd. Some want to cultivate a “bad boy [girl]” rep. Some want to cling to youth. Some need the companionship of the band.

For me, it may be all of those things, but it’s also, ironically, the only way I know of (except sleep) to get away from my Self for a while. There’s something about the vibration of singing that makes everything else go away. When I let go and really feel the song, it makes me hum—down to the bone—at an unexplainable, elemental level. Relax. Breathe deeper. Feel something not related to the intellect, the obligations, the reasoning—something pure. I hate to sound all new-agey and ookie-spookie, but nothing else can open my chakras like singing can.

And just so you know, there are women musicians out there doing amazing things, women who never generate the buzz that surrounds male musicians. So I’m doing my itty bitty part, foisting my partial list of essential womensong on the world. Any album by any of these women is great, but here are a few faves:

Joan Armatrading (Hearts & Flowers; What’s Inside)
Jane Siberry (Bound by the Beauty; When I Was a Boy)
Rickie Lee Jones (Flying Cowboys; The Magazine; Pirates; Naked Songs)
Bonnie Raitt (anything)
Joni Mitchell (the oldest stuff is the “baby” Joni, sweet & soprano, all good, but I like the gutsiness of the older, alto Joni--Blue; Court & Spark; Miles of Aisles)
k.d. lang (Hymns of the 49th Parallel; Shadowland; Drag)
Regina Spektor (Begin to Hope--bonus CD version)
Pretenders (anything, especially the oldest stuff)
Kate Bush (The Whole Story)
Aretha (anything)
Maria Muldaur (Maria Muldaur; Waitress in a Donut Shop)
Bette Midler (Songs for the New Depression)
Phoebe Snow (Phoebe Snow; Against the Grain; Never Letting Go)

Edie Brickell (Shooting Rubberbands at the Stars--with The Bohemians; Picture Perfect Morning)