Acceptance

I had another recent poetry acceptance, this time for a poem about my mother that is also about the time I played Marjorie in the play Marjorie Prime, a few years back. I played an 80-year-old woman, and afterwards 1) everyone mistook me for my mother 2) I cut off my long hair streaked white that I wore in a braid (just like my mother) and 3) people asked what I did with makeup to look 80. Basically, the answer was "no makeup." For those not so familiar with theatre, the stage lights will wash you out, so wearing no makeup did make me look 80! But still. So now it helps me 1) understand my parents and 2) brace myself to be reading Successful Aging, by Daniel J. Levitin! I like it a lot, and I hope I am aging successfully!

I found this book, and got it through interlibrary loan, after I read his book This Is Your Brain on Music, which I discussed with the Stranger Than Fiction non-fiction book club. It meets in a wine bar! Our next book, already in progress, is I Live a Life Like Yours, a memoir by Jan Grue, about living with a disability...and just living his own life, which is like...yours, or mine. The Levitin book on aging is delightful in its examples, many of whom are musicians that he met in his other work! Joni Mitchell, Sonny Rollins.

Also in progress is another memoir, this one by musician Bill Harrison, a bass player I met in Chicago! Making the Low Notes. I think all these connections make it a Random Coinciday in the blog, as well as a Poetry Someday, not to mention Father's Day. (I'm glad I remembered to make a reservation for dinner tonight for Dad!) I love having a book at hand in any room, or to take in a cloth bag for any waiting room. Two medical appointments coming up this week for my mom. Successful Aging recommends learning new things: I am learning proper wound care and wrapping. I doubt I can learn a new language or a new musical instrument at this point, but I am making new crafts occasionally, and playing the piano a bit more, now that I am tuning it regularly. 

Coincidence: Levitin says in the Acknowledgements for This Is Your Brain on Music that one of his favorite songs is "Joanne" by Michael Nesmith (of The Monkees!). When I read that, I thought, "I have that sheet music" and ransacked my piano bench for it. Success! Plus a bit of stumbling around on the keyboard. But it was fun to find some of the elements of music that Levitin describes and admires immediately evident in a song he likes!