It’s been a long time since I last wrote something. Getting my thoughts together has been difficult. A lot has happened since we moved to New England. We’ve moved twice since then; the second time ended up with buying a house and becoming a dog owner (all since July 2016) — two things I never imagined would ever happen. But, then who could have imagined the United States electing a narcissistic, mythomaniac, sociopathic man-child to be its president? I mean just listen to this man. He resorts to the kind of extreme superlatives that a 13 year old, or younger does. His petulance (another sign of emotional and intellectual arrest) has not only become loathsomely notorious, but profoundly disturbing — at least to those us with a modicum of civility and intelligence. And to those who still to this day follow and believe in him, well, as Martin Luther King Jr. said: “Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”
This turn of political events has affected me in a way I have never experienced previously in my life. Not even when “W” was “elected” by the Supreme Court in 2000. I thought then (still do) that he was an awful president: not very bright and lazy. However, he did manage to behave himself as an adult and at least tried to understand the fundamentals and gravity of the office. This unscrupulous, jejune, sociopathic martinet doesn’t have, or will ever have, any respect for the office in which he sits (when not in Mar a Lago), or its nation and its people — only himself, in true narcissistic character. It’s monumentally depressing: almost paralysingly depressing.
Distressingly, it has been one of only numerous reasons for what I can only describe as a depressive malaise or ennui into which I have descended leaving me feeling isolated and otiose. As for the other matters concerning my lugubrious state of mind, I do have conflicted feelings about moving up here to New England, not the least of which is having left behind a perfectly adequate (and gradually improving) organ upon which to practise. I have not been able to access such an instrument — not even an inadequate one. I’ve tried to compensate by concentrating on those aspects of the piano which I find the least unsatisfying: art song accompaniment, ragtime, Bach and composing (yes, I do use the piano occasionally for composition — so, sue me); but, the piano is not the organ (more about my failing as a musician later).
Then there’s the new environment. I become terribly isolated. Not that I haven’t met some very lovely people up here; my neighbourhood is full of very friendly, agreeable people as are so many others I’ve met. The problem is almost none of them have any association with fine arts, music in particular and, therefore offer little with which I can truly identify. This isolation can be depressing. This past four years I have nobody (outside of Rosemary) who can call a friend. Especially anybody who is a musician or in any way associated with fine arts. What few friends I still might have are far away and have gradually become more and more distant.
It’s not easy starting your life over at 68; especially since it was an unaccomplished life up to that point anyway. Don’t get me wrong I love our new home. Quincy, is lovely well managed New England city and I couldn’t ask for a more idyllic neighbourhood that has woods and hiking paths, stretches of wetlands, scenic views of the Boston skyline across Quincy Bay, a conjoining cove that is so shallow that at full moon tides you almost walk across, birds and wildlife in abundance; all of this within a five minute walk from my perfectly sized house (what they refer to up as a cape cod) in which I dwell with my perfect love Rosemary and my simply adorable dog Blaze. Yet, for some reason I simply can’t seem to get my life in order. It’s a gilded cage of my own making. It’s the frustrating matter of knowing why, but not knowing how, and maybe, even worse yet, of not knowing how but feeling why bother? It’s too late now. I figure, okay, I have maybe a good twenty years left, if I’m lucky; so, what’s left of the dream? Why bother? Starting life all over as one approaches the sunset of one’s years is not an easy task. I may have some ideas, none of which are musically related. That much I’ve come to appreciate. It’s at the very least problematic to look back at the life decision one made over fifty-five years earlier and recognise the folly of it.
Now, I guess, it’s time to start something new; with a little hope and determination I can still find something in which I can feel I will have, in the end, contributed something, even as a curmudgeon, of value to this sad, sad world.
