My mother was not, strictly speaking, “musical.” She played no instrument, and her record collection was full of Carole King, Carly Simon, Barbra Streisand, James Taylor, and Stevie Wonder. But she was encouraging, and she exposed my sister and me to a broad array of stimuli. She did pretty well for someone who got married right out of high school to a man who could have stepped out of an Elia Kazan movie. But she was into painting and crafts and told me she mooned over a poster of Rudolf Nureyev that hung in her room when she was a teen. And when it came to her children, of course, she was very, very supportive.
When I latched onto classical music in the wake of “Star Wars,” around the age of 11, she encouraged me to build my record collection. Had she only known how successful she was. With no children of my own, I wonder who will be interested in my 10,000+ records and CDs! We attended piano recitals and string quartet concerts at the local college and at the town theater. I scribbled furiously through many of these, as music filled my head with plentiful images and ideas for stories. And she saw to it that I got piano lessons. Yet somehow, for all my enthusiasm, I never heard a live symphony orchestra until after I left for college.
My parents weren’t really classical music people, especially my stepfather. They got me out of school several times a year, usually on a Friday, so that we could spend the day or get a start on a weekend in New York City, but generally we would wind up catching a Broadway show. We hit the museums too, and caught the occasional foreign film, and we all read a lot, but that was about the extent of our “culture.” Once or twice a week, my parents would hit the disco. There was a Village People 8-track in the car (eventually stolen by an NYC parking lot attendant). My folks were great about letting me put on John Williams or the “Eroica” Symphony on our trips in to the city, my mom at the wheel and my stepdad reading the sports page in The Daily News. They would switch seats before we got to the Lincoln Tunnel.
One of things that was great about my mother was that she always aspired to better herself. And she wanted the same for us. Hence, I was enrolled in Little League, intramural basketball, tennis, Cub Scouts, and Community Art League, none of which I really cared for.
When I went to college, she too went back to school. She was enthusiastic about her music appreciation class, among other things, and I helped direct her listening. I was close to home, and would often be there on the weekends and always on holidays. I would be sent to the mall to pick up inexpensive recordings for her latest assignment. For Christmas or birthdays, she would be interested in a Baroque cassette for the car, or some Sousa marches to keep her energy up her while she jogged. Later, an opera highlights disc was a big hit.
Of course, she repaid these gestures a thousand-fold. My birthdays and Christmases were full of opera and orchestra recordings. One memorable Easter, there were some Vivaldi LPs propped up next to my Easter basket. I hasten to add, I got Easter candy until I was about 40! She was particularly fond of the Vivaldi Guitar Concerto in D. A later Christmas brought me my first Ring Cycle. Now that I think about it, I had taken “Die Walküre” out of the community college library when my mom was taking courses there when I was a teen. I was too young for it to catch me by the throat yet. Gilbert & Sullivan was more my speed. My mom used to accompany me to the excellent Muhlenberg College summer productions of G&S too.
During my stint as an intern with the Opera Company of Philadelphia, my parents dropped by for a couple of acts at the dress rehearsal of “The Marriage of Figaro.” They got to see me standing in the wings of the Academy of Music with my headset. They claimed never to have been to an opera before. Strictly speaking, I know that wasn’t the case, because we had attended a production of “Carmen” once at the local community college, but it was with piano. Granted, not the full opera experience! The only time we ever attended a full opera together was for a threadbare production of Boito’s “Mefistofele” at New York City Opera, by then a pale reflection of what it had been when Samuel Ramey was the reigning Dark Lord. How I wish she had gotten to attend the Met.
My mother died 15 years ago today. She was only 59 years-old. Hard to believe she would have been 74 now. Her death was sudden and there was probably no pain. We had a very good relationship, so I have no regrets on that count. It’s only when I think that we could have had maybe another 30 years together that I feel as if I’ve been robbed. And with the erosion of that early support system I enjoyed when I was a kid, between my parents and my grandparents and my aunts and uncles, as my elders die or fade into dementia or become different people, I feel a curious sense of drifting unmoored.
But I’ll always have those bittersweet memories of a largely happy, if not always ideal childhood. I was very, very lucky to have had my mother’s love to shield me and to guide me through a sometimes confusing, often rocky start.
Thanks for everything, Mom. You were a woman of remarkable kindness and patience. I miss you very much.
