March 5, 2022
There’s so much misery, uncertainty, and fear in the world right now, all I want to do is listen to Scott Joplin.
Last night, his iconic and melancholy tune called Solace came on the radio. I sat and stared at nothing and focused only on what was entering my awareness via my ears. Russia, Ukraine, and Covid sank beneath the gentle onslaught of tumbling, familiar and beloved musical notes.
The days when many middle-class homes in America boasted an upright piano in the parlor are long gone. A pity, I think now. If I had been born in the early instead of mid twentieth century, I’d likely have taken piano lessons and be ready to entertain family and guests at any moment.
If I was really lucky, I would’ve gotten hold of some ragtime sheet music, and learned to play it all by heart.
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To me, and to many who have played and studied it, music is a highly spiritual expression of art and celebration of life. Being able to make music as a performer is something I believe every person should have the opportunity to experience. Becoming a performer can lead to composing, and composing can lead to the capture of aural magic.
In thinking about all this, my yearning to learn piano is rekindled full force. I learned how to play violin and guitar, and to sing, but piano felt “too hard“ and I never pursued it.
We as spiritual seekers are frequently encouraged to sharpen up our manifesting skills and imagine the world we want. For ourselves and for Earth and for humanity as a whole. But first, and most fervently, for ourselves. If we don’t imagine what we want our lives to be, who will? Or more ominously, what dubious manifestations might be imagined for us?
So I dream of ragtime. I dream of a splendidly polished upright piano holding pride of place in the modern-day parlor. These days there are portable keyboards that can be folded up and put away when your musical magic has concluded for the day.
My personal New Earth, that which I want to be in place for myself “after,” must include music. Not just listening to it on whatever etheric sound system exists in our future—maybe something like Matthew Ward describes as available in Nirvana—but playing that piano.
I want to play “Solace” for myself. I want to lean into it and close my eyes and feel the truth and the purity of those notes filling the air around me, generated from the touch of my fingers on the keyboard and manifested into sound by my action. What could be more magical than that? (1)
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That future with my folding keyboard and mysteriously knowing how to play piano—perhaps instantly—seems very far away most of the time.
I’ve noticed a few commentators lately, at least those that I’m currently paying attention to, withdrawing to some degree from the hurly-burly of world events. They’re still reporting intel. They’re not abandoning their followers and leaving them adrift in the sea of confusion.
But in a couple of recent podcasts in particular, they have been speaking of their lives. What they’re doing right now. How they are enjoying that which already is, and imagining that which they wish to be. (2)
This seems to me like a mature approach to our current times. We are not ignoring the explosion of events, bits of information scattering like electronic confetti all around us. We’re still paying attention.
But the engagement with events and information does not have to be so tightly intertwined that it becomes a rope binding us into immobility.
I felt a tiny bit guilty a week or two ago, wishing to disengage and observe more rather than become enmeshed.
That little fog of guilt dissipated pretty quickly. I think paying heed to what we feel comfortable taking in and setting aside that which does not resonate is a primary tenet of self-care.
And for me, another primary tenet is remembering to immerse myself in that which I love. The magic of music. The scent of the pine trees at the end of the block. The gurgle of the small creek that runs next to the avocado orchard.
These things are my New Earth, right here, right now. I have a sense that the more time and attention I lavish upon the magic that already is, the more quickly the magic of what will be, will be.
(1) Scott Joplin’s “Solace” performed by Phillip Dyson, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKNHp-daefk
(2) Tarot by Janine Chats with Megan Rose: Current Events, Starseeds and Being a Spiritual Warrior, 3/1/22, https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QhKzRQPnZS0
Tarot by Janine with Catherine Edwards: Letting Go of Fear, and Conscious Creating, 3/2/22, https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WcVF3z8vbCE
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We keep our radio set to classical KUSC out of Los Angeles (also available on the web and via free app): https://www.kusc.org. Although it is a classical music station, their playlist includes Broadway, television, and movie music, too—and, of course, ragtime. The station is listener-supported through donations and there are no commercials.