A half taken breath.

Tags

aging, birthday, life

I turned 45 this past week.

I’m not sure why, but this number is landing in a way that no other number has. And I think, ‘How can that be? It’s just a number, right?’

I’ve been reflecting on what my parents were up to when they were 45:

In 1984, Mom was still packing her eight year old daughter’s school lunches in the mornings and working at the Academy, knitting afghans and dish cloths, baking lots of birthday cakes, and worrying about everything. She hadn’t yet opened the pizza shop, and she was not yet mourning the death of her own mother, which would follow just four years later.

In 1992, Dad was still a machinist at MMPCO by day, delivering Edie’s Pizza in the evenings, driving me to school in the morning in the little ‘shitbox’ Nissan (his words) as we listened to The Allman Brothers at Fillmore East over and over and over again, and then watching me graduate from high school rather unceremoniously (a year early, no cap and gown/marching to Elgar stuff–I just picked up my diploma from a secretary in the office, and that was that).

For my 45th, I was home with Shawn in the midst of a pandemic, in front of a screen, eating homemade pizza (imagine that) and uttering the most commonly used phrase of this time in human history: ‘You’re on mute.’ I had a really fun virtual hangout with friends and family. Some folks Zoomed in for a few minutes, some stayed for the whole two hours. There were beautiful songs, hilarious stories, moments of joy and grief and cheer. It was, in some sense, a microcosm of what my life has become—an opportunity to shared and be shared, to connect and be connected, to remind myself of the beautiful people in my life and also of how much joy, love, music, and mirth have passed through so many beloved hearts and hands in my life.

I do wish my parents could have been there, and that they had lived to see what I’ve done with my life. Would they have looked at the life I have built at 45—very different from theirs—and given their blessing? Or would my mom have worried herself sick about, well, everything, like she always did, while Dad stayed quiet and kept leaning into his work ethic and his love of music and his fantastic jokes? It’s likely that it would be a mixture of all those things.

When Mom turned 45, she still had another 22 years to go. When my father turned 45, he had just six years left.

These milestones are growing more significant—and more frequent—as I get older. A little more silver up top, and—hopefully—a little wiser, a little less prone to reactivity, a little more careful with food and language and my heart.

It all brings to mind that lovely quote from Rumi:

‘With life as short as a half taken breath, don’t plant anything but love.’

(insert adjective here) New Year

Tags

Capitol riot, life, New Year

Remember when you felt really hopeful about 2021? Like, a week ago?

Holy moly.

I was at the dentist on Wednesday when the news of the events at the Capitol exploded into awareness. Thankfully, I was up and out of the chair and not being poked and prodded and scraped any longer. (Can you imagine learning about the attempted coup while a dentist is working on your teeth? I actually don’t mind going to the dentist – I really like my dentist – but wow, for a lot of people, that’s the stuff of nightmares!) Dr. C. has NPR playing throughout his office 24-7, and a discussion about vaccine rollout in the state of Maine was cut short with an abrupt sentence from NPR headquarters in Washington, something about ‘the Vice President is safe’. He and I both froze in our tracks as he was handing me my next-time appointment card.

I got out to the car and called Shawn. ‘What’s going on?’ My heart started to race.

After a brief exchange, trying to make sense of things, we hung up and I turned on the radio for my drive home. As I drove along roads that I hadn’t seen in months – the bright, beautiful, frozen landscape of Western Maine in early January – the horror of what was happening in D.C. was sinking in, and I couldn’t stop shaking or crying.

I couldn’t wait to get home, and see and hug my best friend.

Wednesdays are live-stream days for us, so the question bubbled up: Do we go on with the show? Will it seem tone-deaf to start up Facebook Live and sing songs like ‘Pennies From Heaven’?

We did go on with the show. We would have picked up our instruments and played anyway, even if there was no stream scheduled that day. So, why not do it, and share it, and see what happens? We started with a rendition of Horace Silver’s ‘Peace’, and the hour unfolded from there. And we put our hearts into every note, every word, and the folks who tuned in thanked us for it, for giving them a respite from the shock and sadness of the moment.

Using the turning of the year as a pivot point for one’s outlook and plans is a time-honored tradition. There is this sense that we can shape the New Year into anything we want. ‘Happy’? Sure. ‘Peaceful’? That sounds good too. ‘Joyful’? I’m all for it. When we look more deeply into this tradition, this exercise of renewal, we can see that every day, every hour, every moment is the start of a new year, the start of another chance to set things right.

I am no pundit. I just want to live in a world where people don’t believe that they have to resort to violence – ANY kind of violence – to be heard and understood. I don’t want to write anyone off. I want to listen and learn and understand and have compassion and empathy. Boy, is that tough when you don’t agree. But I’m here, and I’m trying. Holy hell, am I trying.

Charlottesville.

Tags

Charlottesville, compassion, life, love

I’ve just finished spending the last two days working in the studio with a very dear childhood friend, helping her to record some of her original songs. Every moment I spent with her was a gift.

When she and I took breaks from our work, the turmoil that spilled over from Charlottesville into the world weighed heavily on our non-musical conversation, and on our hearts.

To say that all sides are to blame for the violence might be true in a very literal sense – people on all sides of this ideological divide were throwing real, bloody, physical punches – but to blame them all equally strikes me as myopic and knee-jerk, and revealing of a profound misunderstanding.

In human interaction, it seems that there are two choices – conversation and violence. Conversation can take time. Violence can be perpetrated in just seconds. Conversation can fail, and violence can dominate. Self-defense, both with words and with violence, is sometimes terribly necessary.

These last two days, while I did the work that I love, I kept coming back to this: The right answer to hatred is compassion. Though it is hard, I want to take this love I have of making music and point it in every possible direction. I want to open my heart and bear witness to another’s anger and fear, no matter their ideology, and to *really* hear what is being said. Yes, I will fail, over and over again. Yes, I will sometimes succumb to my own anger and fear and impatience and misunderstanding. It takes longer – much longer – than to compose a tweet or write a song or live a lifetime – but little by little, doing the difficult work of loving other human beings, especially the ones with whom I disagree the strongest, is the only hope for peace.

I’ve got a ticket to ride.

Tags

gratitude, life, Thanksgiving

Good morning, and Happy Thanksgiving to my American friends. I haven’t posted anything personal in a while and would like to bend your eyes and ears for a moment in that regard.

I’ll be spending the day today playing piano at the White Mountain Hotel in North Conway, New Hampshire, for folks who are perhaps smarter than most and leave the cooking and the cleanup to other people – people who are, at least in part, giving up spending Thanksgiving with their own families. The almighty dollar looms large, as it must for many. Music is my living, and I’ll be happy to see my jar fill up today as well.  

To be truthful, Thanksgiving is just another day for me. When I was a kid, I loved it – it was just me and Mom and Dad, eating lots of food, and watching football. Dad would drink his Budweiser, Mom would drink her Boones Farm, and the dogs would beg for scraps. 

Dad died the week before Thanksgiving in ’98, and the holidays, and the rest of life, were never quite the same after that.  

Fast forward to January of ’07, and then Mom died one night in her bed, alone, surrounded by the memories of Dad of which she never let go.

I have to admit I feel a pang of sadness when I see social media filling up with photos of happy families gathering together on this day. But that feeling never lasts long. Life is too good for that. 

The last couple of years have been the best in my entire life. My music is making its way into the world, and I’m lucky enough to make my living entirely from it.  

All of this is a long winded way of saying two things:

1. I am so grateful to you, one and all, for being a part of my life and for cheering me on during this one way wild and crazy ride.  

2. Treasure your own one way ticket and the bumps in the road and enjoy the smooth stretches. And the scenery is great too. 

Oh and stay home tomorrow if you can. Black Friday totally sucks.

A boy and a beetle.

Tags

death, life, perspective

This past weekend at one of my hotel gigs, I had an interesting interaction with a kid named Alexander, a boy of about 6 or 7 years of age, with thick curly red hair, dazzling green eyes, and an insatiable urge to ham it up. He was seated at the table next to the piano with his parents and what I guessed to be his maternal grandparents. His back was to me, and upon my arrival, his father, seated across from him, remarked, “Oh look, we are going to have some nice relaxing piano music” to which the boy replied, after a quick glance in my direction, “I don’t want relaxing piano music.” He quickly changed his tune, so to speak, and as my first set progressed, I noticed him moving his arms and fingers as if he were the one playing the songs, in hyperbolic gestures that young kids can pull off in such a comedic and endearing way.  

Towards the end of that set, he stepped up beside me, put a tip from his father in my jar, and we struck up a conversation. We introduced ourselves and, after complimenting him on his very fashionable train conductor’s hat and the snazzy toy train he had at his place at the table, I asked him if he had been on the Conway Scenic Railroad that day. He said he had not, but then told me that he had been to the top of what he called “George Washington” and that he could “see this hotel and your piano from up there”. His mother turned around to tell me that they had taken the auto road up to the top of Mount Washington and what a picture perfect day it had been. I joked to Alexander that he must’ve had some pretty powerful binoculars to have been able to see the piano! He blushed with excitement and slight embarrassment that I had seen through his fib. 

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw two friends entering the tavern. They waved and I waved back.  

“Is that your mom and dad?” Alexander asked.  

I smiled and said, “No. Those are my friends Steve and Roberta.”

“Well, where is your mom and dad?”

I paused, not knowing how most people talk to their kids about death, and chose my words of reply carefully: “They’re not around anymore.”

Alexander took this in for a moment and then said, “They died.” It was a statement of fact and not a question. He understood. “Yes,” I said softly.  

“Oh,” he mumbled, shifting his weight and looking at his feet. Then he pointed towards his grandparents behind him and said, “They’re probably going to be dead. Soon.”

I brought my hand up to my mouth to suppress what would have been a howl of laughter and then said, “That could very well be.”   

On a hike that Shawn and I took on Monday afternoon, we found on the ledges a large beetle that was on its back, its many legs flailing in frantic motion. At once I grabbed a nearby twig, held it gently against the beetle’s legs, and it latched on. I placed the twig back on the ground and away we all went. A few paces later, Shawn wondered aloud if the bug felt any gratitude to “the giant who saved him.” I chuckled and said, “Maybe a bird has already swooped down and eaten it.” 

Maybe so.

Maybe Alexander’s grandparents will die soon. Or maybe I will. Maybe my parents died too soon. Maybe that beetle is hiding under a rock on top of that mountain, or maybe it’s already in the belly of some bird that would’ve died otherwise.   

Like Joni Mitchell once sang:

We can’t return

We can only look behind from where we came

And go round and round and round in the circle game

And, as George Carlin once put it: “Oh, by the way, you’re all going to die. I didn’t mean to remind you of it but it is on your schedule.”

So, with all of that in mind, I intend to keep on, for as long as I’m able, playing music and writing songs and hiking mountains and having interesting conversations and waiting for the hummingbirds to visit my petunias. 

Ghosts real and imagined.

Tags

family, life

I can’t remember the last time I spoke to anyone I’m related to.

That realization came crashing down on me after talking to a dear friend last night about the vagaries of family.

Then, as I thought about it, I did remember the last such occasion. On a cross-country adventure in January 2013, I mentioned on Facebook that I was going to be passing through Houston, where there are a lot of Piersons. An impromptu family reunion of sorts was quickly organized, and I was able to spend a few short hours with several of my cousins, their spouses, and their children. I even got to spend a couple nights with one of my uncles, with whom I’d been close as a child and then the connection somehow was diminished.

It really was an awesome time.

The word ‘family’ has always felt like an oddity to me. More to the point – I’m not sure how I relate (no pun intended) to the word at all. I’m the only child of two deceased parents (Dad died in ’98, Mom in ’07). I grew up in Maine, thousands of miles from the nearest next of kin. Holidays were always just the three of us. Other family members only appeared to me on rare occasions throughout the year, their voices coming through the crackling of the telephones in the kitchen or the living room, or through their hastily written Christmas cards arriving in our mailbox. My mother’s mother and one of my British cousins visited us in Maine a couple of times, as did my father’s father and one of my uncles (the same one that I stayed with during my Houston visit). Sure, there have been Facebook exchanges and a very rare email now and again between me and one of my uncles and a couple of my cousins, but aside from these few-and-far-between digital communications, there’s been no other contact between me and my family.

Last night, my friend said, ‘I’m so close with my family. I can’t even imagine that.’

Another friend once said to me years ago, ‘There is the family you’re born into, and then there’s the family you choose, and sometimes they’re the same.’ These days, I do have what I think of as a very loving family: a scattering of people, yes, but dear friends all, complete with their own idiosyncrasies, with whom I feel a mutual and unconditional love and support.

Even though many of them are still among the living, I have often thought of my blood relatives as ghosts of a sort, drifting along the edges of my awareness. Yes, they’re out there, and I do love them and care for them, even though, sadly, many of them really are strangers to me.

And I’m not alone in feeling this way. After bringing it up once to one of my cousins, he agreed, saying, ‘The Piersons just aren’t close.’

So, maybe it’s in our shared genes. A propensity to go it alone, to find our own stubborn way.

But on both sides of the family?

Aside from encounters when I was an infant of which I have no memory, I’d never met or even spoken to my mother’s brother until she died. He traveled to Maine from England for her funeral – his first trip to the US – and though I did spend some very informative and all-too brief time with him in the sanctuary of the church after the service was over, we’ve not had any contact since then.

Then there are the very real ghosts of my parents. No, not their disembodied spirits (I tend to not believe in supernatural things). But it’s the memories of them, the unfinished conversations with them, the never-to-be-had second chances with them, that do truly haunt me.

Tomorrow is Halloween, and it is the birthday of one of my uncles. I probably should call him, but I know how this narrative goes. It’s the one I learned from my parents (especially Dad, from whom I inherited my distaste for talking on the phone), both of whom were at odds in their own ways with their own families, both of whom were haunted by ghosts of their own. It’s the narrative in which I’ll wish my uncle well in my thoughts and think, as I often have, ‘I really should call my grandmother one of these days.’

Here’s to family, and to whatever that word actually means here in the real world outside of Webster’s dictionary.

A few thoughts on Father’s Day.

Tags

father, Father's Day, fathers, life, parenthood, parents, perspective

One of my father’s favorite sayings was, “If I can’t make you happy, I can damn sure piss you off.”

He was a man of few words, but boy, did they pack a punch when they needed to.  He wasn’t, as the saying above suggests, a neutral guy.  No, he wasn’t chatty or even all that sociable, but he had strong opinions and, given the right circumstances, he let those winds blow.

And oh, how he made me happy: bringing the love of music into my life, into my tiny little five-year-old hands as he guided them across the keys of the first piano that he’d brought home; that surge of excitement that first time when I realized he’d let go after pushing me on my bike after taking off the training wheels; the sweets and treats he brought home to me and Mom every Friday afternoon after he got his paycheck; those incredible steaks he used to cook on the grill in the summertime; his unending litany of jokes and one-liners.

So many precious memories.

And yes, there were times when he pissed me off, too — most memorably (and humorously) when I was in fourth grade and, after getting into a raging alcohol-fueled argument with my mother about the state of his beard, he went into the bathroom to trim it with a pair of dull scissors.  She was always after him to keep it short, while he preferred it a little more unkempt.  I escaped most of the drama and went to bed.  When he showed up at my school the next morning to chaperone my class’s trip to the Portland Symphony, his beard had vanished.  Though he later explained that he’d “screwed it all up” and had needed to shave it off, I refused to speak to him for a couple of days and even wouldn’t sit next to him at the symphony.   I really liked his beard.  (And I can still recall the deeply apologetic glances he gave me over his shoulder from the row in front of me and just a few seats to the right.)

But then, there were more moments of genuine pissed-offed-ness: his stage fright — how could a man with that much musical talent get stage fright?!

Then there were all those times when he took my mother’s side in everything, no matter what crazy thing she said.   Those really hurt.

And I was really pissed off after he died.  Pissed at him for not taking better care of himself, for not ever exercising or eating better or drinking less or giving up those damned Camel straights that he loved so much, all of which certainly set him up for the terminal cancer that beat him just a few weeks after his fifty-first birthday.

But I’m not angry so much anymore.  It doesn’t feel good to hang on to the anger, to any anger, really.  A dear friend said that sort of thing is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.

I’m lucky that I get to complain about missing my dad.  I’m lucky that I got to help the girls upstairs today in getting their Father’s Day cards and gifts ready for tomorrow’s celebration.  I’m lucky to have all those traits of my dad’s that always frustrated me: the stubbornness, the tendency towards shyness, the propensity for unhealthy choices.  But I’m also lucky that I got a sliver of his sense of humor, and his undying love of music.  We’re all lucky to be here, to have a chance at anything.  Happy Father’s Day, everyone.

 

A very special five year anniversary.

Tags

abusive relationship, domestic abuse, emotional abuse, gratitude, life, love, perspective

Five years ago today, I finally summoned the courage to leave an abusive relationship.  I’d been with him for seven years.

“Why don’t they just leave?” I used to say of women who stayed with abusive partners. I thought I was too smart to fall into that trap.

I learned the hard way how wrong I was.

He was older and seemingly wiser.   His charms slowly tarnished over time, until words that I’d once used to describe him – like smart, quick-witted, observant, attentive – became what they really were: sarcastic, harsh, cynical, obsessive.   Throughout our relationship, I felt my identity slowly slip away from me, until I was merely a means to his end.  I was not as important.  He made that clear.  I stopped caring about myself sufficiently and considered only him and his opinions, his feelings, his plans.  I believed that he was the most important person in my world, and that I was secondary.

There were no telltale bruises, marks, or scars.  All of my wounds were on the inside.  Words were his weapon of choice, and he was a master of manipulation.

Even with my two closest friends beseeching me to leave him, I stayed. “I can’t leave him — it would devastate him,” I would say, giving very little consideration to how terribly depressed and unfulfilled I was.

One day — five years ago today — with the help of a friend in whom I’d confided my fear, I did finally leave, knowing that it was necessary to preserve my sanity, but feeling terrified that I was making a mistake.

It was no mistake — it was the wisest choice I’ve ever made in my life.

Since February 26, 2010, I’ve accomplished some pretty awesome things.  It’s a long list, but here are some highlights:

I’ve recorded and released 4 CDs of my music.  I’ve toured all over the US in a Winnebago with my bandmates and closest friends.  I’ve learned to how to ride a motorcycle.  I’ve hiked the Grand Canyon.  I’ve been brought to tears by the wonders of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.  I’ve watched the sun set on the Pacific Ocean.  I’ve played jazz on Bourbon Street.  And I fell in love and built an amazing life with my best friend, someone who encourages me everyday to be me.

Every single one of these things was a lifelong dream of mine, and every single one was unthinkable in my old life.

Take it from someone who usually learns things the hard way – don’t ever let anyone tell you that your dreams aren’t worth following or that you are selfish for even wanting to do so.  Such sentiment is a poison.  Those admonitions still occasionally haunt me, and yet I wake up every morning feeling grateful for another opportunity to continue living life in full pursuit of such dreams.

Life is beautiful and tragic and, most strikingly of all, it’s far too short.  Get out there and live your life! — because when you do, you smile, and then everyone around you will start smiling too.

Halloween 2014

Tags

Halloween, Heather Pierson, life, perspective

Regular hotel night tonight.  A quiet Halloween night, which has its own eerie quality.  I overheard a man, who had been applauding me all through dinner, say as he and his wife walked away from tipping me:

“What is she doing playing here?”

I know what they mean when folks say things like this.  They were both very sweet.

I kinda wish he’d asked me that question directly.  I would’ve said, “Playing for folks like you who listen and appreciate it.”

That man and his wife only want what’s best for me, of this I’m sure.  And once I figure out what that is, I’ll go after it, too.

And even though I’m quickly approaching forty, I still feel like my life is brand new.  In a lot of ways, at least in the last five years, it is brand new.  A whole new set of circumstances and goals.  Sure, I’m happy, and things are moving onward and upward, and sure, I get sad and blue as hell sometimes, and I’m working on that stuff.  Trying, anyway.   And sure, everything feels uncertain and downright scary sometimes, even when things are going well.

I’m finding that both the bitter and the sweet stuff is in the searching.  That old saw about the journey, and not the destination, blah blah.

And all the while, the clock is ticking, and friends and strangers alike are cheering me on.

Who knows how and why we end up where we do, doing the things we do.  Some people have strong convictions about that sort of thing.  Some have faith, others don’t.  Everything from “It’s all pre-determined” to “It’s all a crap shoot.”

Me?  I don’t really know a damn thing, except that I intend to get up tomorrow morning and keep trying to figure it out.  Of that, I’m as certain as I can be.

So, on this spookiest of nights, when it’s okay to be scared and uncertain about what’s lurking behind the corner, I admit that I am – and I’m smiling about it.  Happy Halloween.

Robin.

Tags

depression, life, Robin Williams, suicide

When I was ten and eleven years old, I wanted – or so I thought at the time – to be a stand-up comedian.  In the privacy of my bedroom, I would arrange every stuffed animal I’d ever snuggled or otherwise kept close in rows on my bed to face me as I stood, with hair-brush-microphone in my hand, reciting, word for word, the routines from my two favorite albums at that time: Bill Cosby: Himself and Robin Williams: A Night At The Met.

I knew every single syllable of these recordings and I never tired of repeating them, word for word, before my beady-eyed, non-responsive audience.

Bill’s rhythms were slow, steady.  They would build, and then they would relax, and then they would build again.  Himself felt safe, warm, friendly.

A Night At The Met, however, exploded like a bolt of lightning, even after thousands of repeated listenings.  The rapid-fire frenzy of Robin’s routines were, to me, absolutely heart-stopping genius.

I’d loved Robin since I was a young child, when I, too, had a pair of rainbow-striped suspenders and would chant “nanu nanu” and “Earth to Orson!”  We even had two cats named Mork and Mindy.

I amused friends – and, I’m sure, often drove them crazy – with my incessant quotes of Robin’s material, both from his stand-up and from his movies.  I really wanted to BE him – to be able to create so effortlessly (or so it seemed) – and to somehow bring electrifying, manic, child-like joy into the world.

Eventually, my obsession with Robin faded, but I never lost my reverence for his genius. Oh, and how deeply I imbibed Dead Poets Society from my seat in that dark, crowded movie theater where I first saw it.

And to think that a man who brought that much happiness and laughter and light into the dark world couldn’t hold onto enough of it for himself to see him through.

When I first heard the news about Robin’s suicide, I couldn’t hold back the tears.  Is there really a world in which he no longer exists?  Unthinkable.

And then… I started to get very angry.  How could he do this to his family, to all of us?

It’s always the ones you wouldn’t suspect.

Though he rarely spoke of it, my father was completely devastated by his brother Roger’s suicide on New Year’s Eve of 1981.  Dad was so angry that he refused to attend the funeral services.  He simply bottled up those feelings and never brought them out again.

Roger was a brilliant musician, a father, full of that same manic joy — and yet he fell prey, quite surprisingly, to the same demons of drug addiction and despair.

And those same poisons taint my blood, too.

Life really sucks sometimes, you know?  It’s hard friggin’ work.  I know exactly what it feels like to despair, to lose hope – to feel like, “You know, I just can’t do this business of waking up every morning anymore.”  I really do.

The sun sets and then it’s dark – too dark for some.

Poor Robin.  His poor family.

I’m not angry anymore – just devastated by the loss.  Aren’t we all – all of us who felt like Robin was in our close circle of friends, who were immeasurably and irrevocably shaped by his influence?  He was one of us – one of so many beautiful, mournful, lovely people trying to get along in a big, crazy world.

Yes, there is more darkness than light when you look up at the night sky – but it’s the stars, the givers of light, that persist.

So, for as long as we can stand to do it, let’s choose to remember the light and the joy.

So long, Robin.