De-frazzling

[firstfrost]

This was, perhaps, not the best of times for my mother to visit. I am not at my best as a host, as I am bouncing between prepping for the Oath season finale on Saturday, finishing shumashi's pre-finale plots in a four-day blitz, fussing over the Easter Egg Hunt on Sunday... Ah well. One thing at a time.

Several weeks ago when 600 users needed their passwords changed, by the end of the day, I was sure I needed a drink. So I stopped at Tosci's, and had a hot chocolate with a scoop of ice cream in it. As I sat at their uncomfortable table and tried to shake off the stress of the day, I started paying attention to the music they were playing. A cello? Something like that, just one instrument, surrounded by silence, following its own path, note by note. Each sonorous tone felt like a long stroke of a wood rasp, smoothing me, shaving away the encrusted roughness on my soul. I just sat there, eyes shut, letting everything be pared away, note by note. I don't know why it affected me so strongly. I like Wagner and Mahler and the other brass-heavy composers. I tease harrock for listening to "wussy strings". But yet this one cello was wringing me nearly to tears.

Anyhow. I asked the Tosci's guy what it was: Bach's Unaccompanied Cello Suites 1, 2, and 5, as played by Edgar Meyer on the double bass (not a cello after all). And now I own it, and it is playing now, and even in the ten minutes it has taken me to type this, I have gone from frazzled to calm, as note by note, I am straightened and smoothed and unbent.

Comments

[mijven.livejournal.com]

ahhhh, music. :)

[jadia.livejournal.com]

That's really awesome. I really need something like that too. :)

[astra-nomer.livejournal.com]

Mmmmmm, Bach Cello Suites...

maybe that's what I needed when my own mom visited last month, under similar circumstances...

[greenlily.livejournal.com]

Ooo. Thanks for the rec. I could use some more soothing music in my collection too. :)

[countertorque.livejournal.com]

That's a very descriptive post. I can imagine very clearly the cello notes sounding like a wood rasp. And the image of the music shaving rough spots off of someone's psyche is very compelling.

[cfox.livejournal.com]

I'm just a teeny bit disappointed that that whole thing never resulted in 5000 slashdot morons telling us how to do our jobs.