Ancient Airs

Ancient Airs

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How is is that a piece I’ve heard for years suddenly amazes me? Have I just grown into it? Have I never truly listened to it before?

Respighi’s “Ancient Airs and Dances” has reached up and grabbed me by the lapels. It’s seducing me with its melodies, calming me with its chords. It’s leaving me wanting more. 

There are three suites, I learn. Respighi, a musicologist, based the pieces on Renaissance lute songs. But what is old becomes new in the hands of this brilliant orchestrator. The sprightly opening of the first, the second with its expansive denouement, and the third, described as the most melancholic. Yes, I hear those minor keys. But I also hear grandeur and joy. The recording I find orders them 1, 3 and 2, a suitable reordering, I think.  

I read more. Respighi died in 1936 at age 56. His wife, Elsa, a former pupil 14 years younger, outlived him by 60 years. A friend said their marriage “functioned on an almost transcendent level of human and spiritual harmony.” Elsa made sure that her husband’s legacy was secure. She died in 1996  at age 102. 

Quiet

Quiet

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As a walker in the suburbs, I thrive on the noises I hear along my route. On the beach, which I leave today, these may be the squawks of a gull or the pounding of the surf.  

But this week I’ve also spent much time in a pool, and I’m reminded what a silent world that can be, what a different form of exercise, floating or treading water, or doing the crawl or breaststroke, head submerged, ears closed to the sounds of the day. 

It’s a meditative space, the world of water. And above all, it is quiet. 

Chariots of Fire

Chariots of Fire

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It’s pretty corny, but I did it anyway, played “Chariots of Fire” on my i-pod as I made my way down the beach yesterday. I was looking for an inspiring piece, one that would pump up the pace a bit, and that one did the trick. 

There was the familiar opening salvo, the electronic pulses, the melody itself. In my mind’s eye I saw the 1924 Olympic athletes splashing through the surf, recalled their stories, their motivations for running, each of them different, each of them their own. 

While I can’t claim any speed records I did feel the thrill of that music. And since I was running — well, mostly walking — on a beach then, too, well … you get the idea. It was fun, it was exhilarating, it was a movie-lovers beach walk.

(A still from the beach-running scene in the film “Chariots of Fire,” courtesy Wikipedia.) 

The Sandbar

The Sandbar

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A sandbar is a curious thing — part land, part water, and, in the afternoon light, almost mirage-like in the way it shimmers near the horizon. 

Beachcombers use it to search  for shells. Gulls land on it to look for food. Sunbathers lie flat on the soft sand, refreshed by its coolness. 

I waded through still water to reach it, too, because it looked like a new way to experience the beach. I ignored the minnows and the seaweed, both of which remind me why I’m more of a pool swimmer.  

But it was worth it. Out there I felt even more a part of the wind and the waves and the sea. 

The Return

The Return

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A visit to the beach is a return to the cadence of waves hitting the shore, the predictable antics of shore birds, a big sky filled with clouds.

It’s a return to days defined not by the clock but by tides and light.

It’s a return to motion within stillness …. and stillness within motion. 

The Deep

The Deep

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The sounds of a party filled the place: laughter, conversation, the clink of glasses. But step away from the main room and it was another world. 

Sharks patrol their waters with ruthless intensity. Rainbow fish flit to and fro, a blue starfish pulsing in their tank. Porcupine fish bristle. And stingrays glide through the water like so many fluttering handkerchiefs. 

At the entrance, schools of sea creatures swim to the left of us, to the right of us, and above us, too. It was a dramatic entry into another world, a world of the deep.

Accidental Tourist

Accidental Tourist

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A novel that I still remember years after reading it is Anne Tyler’s The Accidental Tourist. The protagonist writes travel books for people who find themselves in a place they didn’t expect to be. Yesterday, I found myself in a similar position: stuck in Charlotte, North Carolina, for the night. 

I was not alone. Hundreds of stranded passengers lined up at the American Airlines kiosk, frantically searched for hotel rooms, a task made more difficult by the fact that Garth Brooks was performing and there were basically no rooms in town. 

Luckily, I snagged the last room available in a marginal motel in an outer burb,  found a taxi willing to take me there, and slept on a queen mattress rather than the airport floor. 

Which meant that today I was an accidental tourist in Matthews, North Carolina.  

Different Shores

Different Shores

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Yesterday, a trip to Virginia Beach for a wedding. On the way, a bridge and tunnel, with views across the Chesapeake Bay all the way to the Atlantic. 

It looked gray and cold, this ocean, although it was the same one I saw only a few weeks ago from the other side. 

There, I could look down on it from above, could see the shades of turquoise, navy and cerulean.  I could walk a trail up and down cliffs that hugged the coves.  I could see the flowering cactus up close. Here, I could sense the vast expanse, waves lapping all the way to the Old World.

The same sea, different shores. 

Heavy Metal

Heavy Metal

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As the world economy continues to slump, the dollar and euro have nearly reached parity. Although this may be good news for American travelers in Europe, it’s hardly a happy situation. It does make me think about the euro, though, and how I felt about it when I was over there. 

The smallest paper currency is, of course, the €5 note, which means that denominations smaller than that, including €1, are coins. 

I felt the weighty difference when I was traveling. Does it cause one to spend more or less? The former, I think, since one might be tempted to treat the €1 as a quarter.  But it is more honest. The dollar buys so little these days it may as well be a coin.

So it gave me pause, these differences in currency. Think how much heavier our pockets and purses would be if we were to adapt a similar model. But would it make more sense in the long run? I think so. 

After the Deluge

After the Deluge

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The forecast had been warning us of severe thunderstorms. But they didn’t have to. The weight of the air and the persistence of the breeze foretold a system building, gathering strength, ready to unleash its full force.

Though there has been rain this season there haven’t been many thunderstorms, the kind of skies-darkening, wind-whistling tempests that for some of us are part of summer. Yesterday’s storm made up for it. Trees bent from the wind, branches fell, hail did, too. It didn’t last long but it was dramatic.

In the end, we were left with a mess to clean up … but much of it is already in the bin.