I love the salon where I get my hair done. It’s like… It’s like… OH! I know! It’s kind of like that salon in the movie Steel Magnolias where everyone knows everyone and it’s the place to catch up on what’s going on around town. That’s what my place is like, sort of.

It’s fun at this salon. There’s always something entertaining going on. I like going to get my hair done. Patti’s my stylist and I met her several years ago when Pam, the person who had been doing my hair for something like fifteen years? QUIT! I was so devastated that I went about seven months without a haircut. I told people I had made a choice to grow out my hair, but the reality was, I didn’t know what to do without Pam!

Several friends of mine suggested the salon I now patronize. They recommended a particular stylist and I called to make the much-needed appointment. The recommended stylist wasn’t available, but Patti was. And I desperately needed a hair cut. And it was fate. I loved Patti from the first moment she sneezed and announced, “WOO! That one was a leg-crosser!”

And she did exactly with my hair as I had asked. And the rest is history. I’ve been going to Patti ever since. She’s easy-going. She knows her customers well, because she takes the time to ask questions about their lives. And she remembers what they tell her about their families and jobs and hobbies and lives. And some of her customers are people she’s known throughout her life. Patti listens when her customers describe what they want and she always seems to come through with exactly what is asked.

The salon is a welcoming little local place, with bright aqua walls alternated with brown walls and coordinating decor. There are inspirational sayings on the walls in a few places and there are always flyers for local fundraisers and benefits on the glass door. Sometimes there are old ladies having their hair set, but you’re just as likely to see high school girls, middle-aged women, men or children in the chairs at each station.

When I walked in tonight the place was nearly empty. Patti poked her head out from the back room and said, “I haven’t mixed your color yet, so if you want something different, now’s the time to say so.”

“Nah,” I said. “I’ll just go with the usual.”

“Okay,” Patti said. “Just give me a sec. Go ahead and sit in my chair.”

As I plopped down in Patti’s station, she poked her head out again. “Can I do something just a little different with your color this time?”

I didn’t even think about it. “Sure!”

Patti smiled and said, “Cool. I’ll be right out.”

When she came back with my color, I asked, “So what are we doing different with my color?”

“I’m just going to put in some accent color between the chunks of blonde.”

I shrugged. “Okay,” I said. Patti wasn’t very specific, but I’ve learned to trust her like that. And besides, it’s just hair. Even if I hated it, it can be colored or cut or grown again. But I’ve never hated anything Patti has done with my hair.

Another stylist was in the shop when I got there and her two little boys were running around. One of them, Evan was “five and one years old,” he told me. The other looked to be about three years old and they were eating the Dum-Dum suckers from the jar on the front counter like they were going out of style. Evan came over and asked me if I’d ever played paper toss.

“You try to throw a wad of paper in the trash basket and try not to let the fan blow the paper back at you,” he said.

“I’ve never played that, but it sounds really fun,” I told him!

“I played it on my aunt’s phone,” he said.

“Oh, it’s a cell phone game,” I said, realizing it wasn’t a “real” game.

“Yep,” he said, skipping across the laminate floor making thumping noises with the winter boots he was wearing. I was kind of disappointed about the game. Evan was too busy working off his sugar-high to notice.

Evan and his brother explored all of the drawers at the empty hair stations and played with the phone at the front desk. They ate more suckers and Evan told us he had already eaten ten or twelve. His mom finished what she was doing in the back and announced they were leaving. Suddenly it was quiet and Patti and I were the only ones left in the salon. We talked small talk for a while until another customer came in.

“Oh, hey Greg,” Patti said, turning to the man who had just walked in. “Greg, this is Terri. Terri, this is my friend Greg. We went to high school together.”

Greg and I said hi to one another and then Patti said, “Terri and I were thinking we were kind of thirsty.”

I raised my eyebrows, wondering what she meant. Greg said, “You want me to go grab one?”

“Yeah, if you don’t mind,” Patti said. “Terri, you like beer, don’t ‘cha?”

Ah! BEER is what she meant! I thought she was kidding the last time she mentioned it. I guess not. “Um… yes,” I said.

“Ok, I’ll go get some,” Greg said and he turned, apparently to walk a couple of doors down to the liquor store. When he returned, he had a twelve-pack of my favorite kind of beer. Greg pulled out a bottle, twisted one open and handed it to me. I smiled, a little hesitant. This was odd, but I wasn’t opposed. He went to hand one to Patti but she said she thought she would wait until she was done coloring my hair.

“Oh, have one now,” I said. “I trust you.”

“I’ll just sip mine, then,” she said while Greg grabbed one more for himself and sat down to talk, sip his beer and wait his turn to have his hair cut while my color set.

So we sipped our beers and Patti foiled my hair and she and Greg talked about their 30-year reunion coming up this summer. When she was done with the foils, she said, “Okay. You just need to set for a while, so I’m going to cut Greg’s hair while we wait.”

And so she did. I picked up my book and relaxed, enjoying being able to read for a while. I turned the pages, reading the story, vaguely aware of Patti and Greg chatting at the next station. And every once in a while, I’d reach over and enjoy another sip of my beer, laughing a little to myself!

I think Patti may be onto something here! Oh, and the something different was something fun – just a little streak of really dark hair, here and there among the blonde. Subtle, but not too subtle. Patti knows I don’t do drastic with my hair. It was just enough to mix it up a bit. I love it!

Really thought she was kidding about that beer though!

When I’m walking from my parking ramp to the office, I look at feet. If people could hear the thoughts in my head, they’d hear judgments.

I LOVE those boots! Wonder where she got them!

I can’t believe someone would actually spend money on those shoes!

Dude, brown shoes do not go with a gray suit. Black shoes, dude! Black!

By the way, I realized today that I would never refer to someone as dude out loud. For some reason though, dude is a part of the vocabulary used in my internal dialogues.

Everyone has tall boots with low heels this year. Why don’t I have tall boots with low heels? I need to shop more.

Those heels are ridiculous! Who would willingly spend eight plus hours in heels that high?

Considering my awareness of footwear, it’s no surprise that I have my fair share of pairs. I was going to go around the house and count them, but I just don’t feel like it. I can tell you, off the top of my head, that I’ve got four pair of fashion boots, three pair of athletic shoes, three pair of slippers, (some of which are actually worn outside of the house. I say if they have a rubber sole, they qualify as shoes.) There are several varieties of slip-on, slide-on type shoes, a few pair of heels and I won’t even try to count the flip-flop and sandal varieties.

You’d also think, considering my awareness of footwear, that I’d not make the mistake of breaking footwear fashion rules, such as wearing brown shoes with black pants or white socks with dark shoes….

…or wearing two different shoes to work. All day long. Without noticing. Without anyone noticing, or at least admitting to noticing, thank goodness. I’d have obsessed and died of embarrassment a thousand times over if I thought anyone had caught on to my blunder. I got all the way home and took them off, picked them up to put them in the front closet, and then… Hey, something’s not quite right here.

Yeah. I really did.

The one on the left is brown, though it’s such a dark brown it’s sometimes hard to tell it’s not black. Which is dangerous when someone is leaving the house in a hurry on a Monday morning and not paying real close attention to the subtle differences between brown boots and black boots. And yes, my pants are long and would have covered up the fact that the buckles are placed differently on the boots. But there’s a decorative seam on the front of the brown one that doesn’t exist on the black one. Good thing my feet sit under a desk for most of the day!

My youngest brother smoked a huge beef roast in his smoker. I made the potatoes and gravy and put together a veggie platter. My sister made glazed carrots and dinner rolls. It was all delicious!

My sister also proved to be an artist in the birthday cake department.

It's a bouquet of flowers! It's a cake! It's the best of both worlds!

And there was picture-taking for posterity’s sake.

Mom and her "baby" and some of the grandkids too

Mom and her favorite (and only) daughters

It was such a successful party, I’m tempted to do it again! But maybe I’ll wait another year!

I used Lucy as my excuse to get my lazy bones out of bed early. Actually, I haven’t been all that lazy the past few days. I made myself start getting up an hour earlier and go back to the gym this week. As he was refilling the hand sanitizer and paper towel dispenser, the friendly maintenance guy asked, “Where’ve you been?”

I said, “Sleeping.”

He smiled and asked, “Where’s your friend?” He was referring to my workout buddy who hasn’t been seen at the gym in a while either.

I said, “She’s pregnant.” He laughed.

Wanting to keep up the momentum, I thought I’d start my busy weekend with a walk with Lucy. We went out when the sky was still dark, but I knew it would start turning as we walked. It was nineteen degrees, not as cold as last weekend, but still… I put on my UnderArmour leggings and shirt under some yoga pants and a sweatshirt. I forgot that Lucy has two speeds – run and stop, (run, stop, sniff… run, stop, sniff.) I’d underestimated the effectiveness of UnderArmour and soon I was sweating.

Luckily, Lucy began to lose her momentum after a couple of miles and slowed down just enough to allow me to take in the morning and appreciate things a bit. I love those moments of the morning, when the darkness is fading but just before the sky really lights up. The sky is a beautiful color. I just read something describing it as the color of blueberries. I wish I could remember what I read and give the author credit, but they were right. Blueberries.

There’s a farm in our neighborhood. I suppose at one time our whole neighborhood was the farm, before all of our homes were constructed. Now the farm seems slightly misplaced in the middle of all this suburbia, in spite of the fact that it was here first. When I look at the old, white barn, its paint peeling in places, I can almost see the streets and homes disappearing and imagine what it looked like, undisturbed years ago. It’s still a functioning farm, in some capacity at least, and the smell of farm animals was potent in the crisp winter air. A few blocks away, where I live, I notice those smells occasionally. There’s a row of homes directly adjacent to the farm. I imagine it’s an ever-present aroma for those homeowners. I wonder if they’ve grown used to it, just like I’ve become accustomed to the sound of the trains.

Lucy is fun to walk with. She’s like a child who can’t discover enough about the world around her. She stops and marvels at every bird that flies overhead. Her ears perk at the hooting of an owl. Her body freezes, her tail pointing as she sniffs and tries to discern ducks, geese, cats and various other creatures that have ventured into the tall grasses near the ponds and wooded areas.

Even as her energy is waning, Lucy’s legs move at a trot, her body nearly bouncing because she can’t wait to see what we’ll encounter next. She finds sticks on the ground and grabs them up quickly in her mouth, as if she’s found some treasure. She trots off again, her head held high, turning her neck momentarily to make sure I’ve noticed the prize clenched in her teeth. She quickly gets bored with carrying it and drops it a few yards later. She’s so cute, I can’t help but laugh.

Back in our own driveway, as she always does, Lucy recognizes that the walk has come to an end. She begins to resist. No matter how far we’ve gone, no matter how tired she may be, she does not want to go back home. There’s adventure to be had and she wants more! I have to convince her we’re going in the house and in a moment, she relents. Once we’re back inside, she admits that maybe I’m right. It is time to be back home again where it’s warm and all of her toys live.

“Oh. There’s the love seat I’m allowed to be on. I think I need a nap.”

See? That didn’t take long!

“Hi honey! What are you up to?”

“Oh, nothing … ,” I replied. “Why?”

She answered my question with a question. “Who in your house hooks up DVD players and things like that?”

“Usually me, I guess.” I had a feeling I knew what was coming. “Why? What’s up?”

“Well, I was wondering if you could come over here and help us hook up our DVD player.”

My parents haven’t used their DVD player in years. I’m not kidding. It’s been years. The DVD player’s only purpose is to  serve as a base for the Direct TV receiver. There’s been a stack of DVD movies, still wrapped in cellophane, sitting on the shelf of the t.v. stand for about six years. Now my parents decide they want to watch one.

So after dinner, I went over to check things out. Now, I don’t have Direct TV. I have cable t.v. But I assumed things would operate pretty similarly as far as how all of the devices operate together. As it turns out, when I turned on the DVD player, there was a picture, so something was connected. There was just no sound. The DVD player was connected to the Direct TV receiver and apparently this was enough to get a picture but not sound.

So I got behind the big television and knelt down on the floor, in the dust that lives behind big televisions. I found the cord I was looking for, the one with the red and white plugs on each end. I connected one set to the audio out ports on the DVD player and the other to one of the six jillion sets of audio in ports on the television.

And? No sound.

I messed with those plugs and tried every single one of those six jillion audio in ports. And nothing. No sound. I rearranged those plugs in every possible combination. I read portions of the Direct TV manual. I searched through the t.v. menus. Nothing.

My dad offered to call Direct TV and ask the advice of a customer service rep. I said, “Not yet.”

And then when I said, “Okay, Dad. Let’s call Direct TV,” he said, “Wellll…”

So I crawled out from behind the t.v. and I crawled back behind the t.v. and I shined a flashlight on all of the possible connections and decided I was going to give up. Me and my dusty black pants came out from behind the big t.v., defeated. And dusty.

And as much as I hated to admit defeat, I did. I called Mark and said, “Help!”

Mark came over promptly and huffed his chest and said in his most manly-man-to-the-rescue voice, “Let me take a look.”

He “hmmmd” and “mmmd” and asked me a question or two and suddenly? There was sound.

“What did you do,” I demanded?

“I plugged the red and white plugs into this audio in port right here,” he said, pointing to one of the very ports I had most certainly tried a hundred thousand times. And he had a very pleased-with-himself grin on his face too.

Sighing, I looked at my mom and said, “Alright. Now that it’s working, which of these movies did you want to watch?”

“Oh, none of them. Not tonight. We just thought we should make sure the DVD player works so that when we do want to watch one, we can.”

“Oh,” I said, biting my tongue. “Alrighty then. I guess we’ll go home then.” And Mark and I walked out the door to my car as I was still biting my tongue. I looked at him as I opened my car door and he burst out laughing.

Yep. That’s my parents. And I love ‘em anyway!

Did he listen to me? No.

I’m not a fan of Valentine’s Day. It’s a fabricated holiday designed to get us to buy cards and spend money on unnecessary gifts to prove our love to another. You want to show me you love me? Make the bed. Clean the kitchen. Cook dinner sometime. And stay on your own side of the bed when I’m sleeping.

My husband is not a good gift hider either. He really should learn that if he wants to hide a gift from me, he should put it somewhere I’m not likely to go. Like the grocery store. The closet in our bedroom is not a very creative hiding place. I knew on Saturday what he was giving me when I … get this … went into my own closet! That’s okay. It gave me time to figure out how much money I did or didn’t have to spend on him.

He did tone it down a bit this year and just got me a big box of chocolates. Good ones. I’m not complaining. There’s never a bad time for chocolate. Last year he got me a Nook e-reader. I wasn’t complaining then either, but it seemed a bit extravagant for a holiday I don’t even believe in. I didn’t feel strongly enough to return the Nook though. That was a damn fine gift. Probably one of my favorite gifts he ever got me!

I hate looking for Valentine’s Day cards. I read all those mushy, sentimental cards and I have to fight to keep from sticking my finger down my throat and making a gagging sound. We like to get each other stupid humorous cards that convey the idea that, “Hey, we may get on each other’s nerves on a daily basis, and it may drive you nuts that I left the vacuum cleaner in the living room two days ago and still haven’t put it away. It might annoy me that you can’t watch one t.v. station for five minutes without flipping to another channel, but you do have some wonderful qualities which I don’t acknowledge nearly often enough and congratulations to us on managing to stay married anyway.”

This year, he got me a fine specimen of a card with a caveman on it, with caveman-ish sentiments inside.

Personally, I kind of like the part that calls me “hot like fire.” At my age, not many would be so inclined to describe me that way. It was perfect. Because I got him this one:

Because nothing says LOVE like making fun of each other’s imperfections. And an Adele CD, which is what I got him. And if he’s lucky, I’ll let him put his feet over on my side of the bed tonight.

Not much in the line of excitement happened this weekend. I bought a smaller wallet to fit in my smaller purse. The purse is relieved. It can be zipped now without straining. Also, Kacey came home from school again, this time to celebrate the birthdays of a couple of friends. She hitched a ride home with her new roommate.

YES, I said “new roommate!” I’ve mentioned before that Kacey was having some roommate troubles with the original roomie. I know I’m a little biased, but honestly, I think Kacey is totally easy to get along with. She’s easy-going and outgoing and most people seem to like her. And I don’t really think the original roomie didn’t like her. I think she just wasn’t used to sharing living space with another person. And she didn’t seem to catch on once she started college either, and this just made her seem rude and difficult to live with.

Meanwhile, while learning to navigate other aspects of college life, Kacey made friends. She became close with one girl in particular, Caitlin. I realized this when Kacey’s stories became filled with references to Caitlin. And it just so happens that Caitlin’s roommate just moved out. She wanted to get into the on-campus apartments. When a spot opened up, she left Caitlin alone in the room and Caitlin invited Kacey to move in with her. Voilà! Everybody’s happy!

See? They’re already doing goofy photos together:

Swapping smiles

So Kacey was home but she wasn’t really home, if you know what I mean. She’s a busy girl with a busy social life. And while she was busy celebrating friends’ birthdays, Mark and I went out for our usual every-other Saturday outing. We had dinner with our bowling pals at Acapulco. I had shrimp tacos. YUM! And then we bowled. I’m still trying to perfect my new skills. And they’re coming along. I’m a bit inconsistent but starting to figure things out. I got on a little roll in my first game and bowled a 188, so I was happy! And our team won all three games. We are way higher up in the ranks than we were at any given time last year. It’s progress!

This morning I woke up to sun and a temperature of nine degrees. Lucy wanted to go for a walk so I said, “What the heck!”

I bundled up with Under-Armour under my clothing and put Lucy’s suede coat on her. As usual, she was annoyed with the coat, but once we got outside and started walking, she forgot about it and just went about the business of exploring all of the new sights and smells. It was quiet out there. Not too many others were inclined to venture out this morning. We enjoyed having the neighborhood to ourselves for a change.

Later in the morning, Mark, Kacey, Connor and I ventured out to Ikea. Don’t you just love Ikea? Where else can you get so much for so little? We picked up a futon for Kacey and Caitlin’s room and a new comforter and duvet for Jake’s bed. I could have wandered around for hours looking at things and buying stuff, but the men-folk were too impatient, so we just got our necessities and got out of Dodge.

Before long, it was afternoon. Caitlin’s parents dropped her off at our house and we took the girls back to school. It was so much easier leaving my girl at school knowing she was going back with a new roommate and friend who she really likes. I think these last few months of school are going to be more like what she hoped her college experience would be.

"Welcome home. And say hi to Baby too!"

Lucy, as usual, was beside herself with joy to have us back home again. I indulged her with much petting and hugging and cooing over her cuteness. In return, she brought me her slobbery “Baby.” It’s good to be loved.

It was such a beautiful sight. As I backed out of my driveway, I caught the glow through my neighbor’s tall trees. The moon was huge! It seemed such a shame to have to drive away and go about my normal business. I really wanted to just stop and take it in for a while, but work was calling and I had to go.

I’ve tried photographing it many times before when there’s been a dramatic appearance, but shooting the moon is a difficult thing to do. The camera doesn’t do it justice.  And a camera phone through my windshield at a stoplight really doesn’t do it justice.

I had another nice surprise yesterday morning. I have the Words with Friends app on my phone and at any given time, I’ve got at least five or six games going on with various friends or relatives. Since the app is connected to my Facebook account, I can also play with any Facebook friend who adds the app. Once in a while I’ll get a new request to play a game with one of those friends.

Yesterday I got a request from Becky. Becky has been my Facebook friend for a year or so, though neither of us is very active there, so we’ve not communicated much. I met Becky when I was sixteen when I got my first job at the local bakery. She was a year older than me and was old-hat at the bakery job. She trained me in and helped me out until I was old-hat too. I liked Becky. She was fun and full of life. We had a great time as coworkers but we never took our friendship outside of the workplace. We worked together for a couple of years until she graduated high school a year ahead of me and I never heard from her again until we connected on Facebook.

The bakery job was one of those experiences that has remained a fond memory in my mind. It was my first real job and unlike many of my friends who just endured their fast-food or restaurant or convenience store employment, I truly enjoyed my time at work. (Maybe except for the 5 a.m. Saturday start times!) It was a mom and pop kind of business and those of us who worked there became a close-knit group. I’m not sure what exactly it was about that experience, but it has always felt like something special. The bakery is no longer in its little storefront in the old strip mall where I worked. The owners, my bosses, were the daughter and son-in-law of the original owners. They’ve since taken their business on to bigger and better things. Their new location is much bigger, with a cafe and seating area for customers. They’ve become local celebrities, well-known for their delicious cakes.

When I first connected with Becky on Facebook last year, she mentioned that she was thinking about organizing a bakery reunion for those of us who worked together in the early eighties. I confirmed my interest, but nothing more came of it and I haven’t heard from Becky since. Then came the invitation to play Words with Friends yesterday. The game offers the option to exchange messages with one another and soon Becky and I were chatting away like old, comfortable friends. The idea of the bakery reunion came up again. I got all kinds of excited. How fun would it be to reconnect with everyone from back then? We were all just taking our first steps into lives of our own then. The only one of those coworkers with whom I’ve remained in touch is my best friend from high school, Kendra. I’d love to reconnect with everyone else and see where their lives took them.

I’m not letting this be an idea that sounds great but slips away again. This time I told Becky I’d catch up with her on Facebook and help make sure it happens.

And it was big enough to hold my Nook. And my wallet. And my cheater glasses. And my sunglasses. And some hand sanitizer and lip balm and lipstick that I rarely use and some Ibuprofen and some Acetaminophen and some miscellaneous papers and about sixty pens  and a fingernail file and my cell phone and gum and the kitchen sink.

Google Images

Well,there really wasn’t a kitchen sink in my purse but I think I could have probably fit a small child in there if I tried hard enough. It looked quite similar to the one in the photo above. That sucker was heavy! Sometimes I’d have to switch shoulders because the weight of the bag was too much and became painful.

What is it with us women? Why do we have to carry so much stuff around with us? And I have learned that the bigger the purse, the more stuff you’ll put in there. When I was carrying my gargantuan purse, people came to know that if they were in need of something, they could ask me because it was a pretty good bet I had everything anyone could possibly need ever in my purse. Ever!

Last summer I was working on a project at work that required me to relocate to a conference room for a couple of months so I could work closely with the team. It got so that I hardly ever even went to my desk. I just went straight to the conference room each morning with my jacket, purse and all. Favorite IT Guy, Dale made an observation about the women in the group one day. He was absolutely fascinated with the amount of stuff we hauled to and from work each day in our purses. I remember entering the room just after the conversation had begun and he looked at me and pointed. With wide eyes and awe in his voice, he said, “You have two of them! Why do you have two purses?”

“I don’t have two purses,” I argued. “I have one purse and one tote bag.There is a difference.”

Dale was confused. “What do you need to carry in the tote bag that isn’t already in the purse?”

“My lunch,” I said. “And sometimes my breakfast, and magazines I might have a chance to read over lunch break, the charging cord for my Nook, ear buds, multi-vitamins…”

I could tell Dale had already checked out as I listed the contents of my bags. It was that day that I began to realize that Dale had a very good point. What is with all the stuff? I’m nearly breaking my back hauling around all of the stuff I just might need at some point, but 99% of the time I don’t. I mean really! What do I really use on a daily basis out of all that stuff in my purse? My keys, my check card, my cell phone and the lip balm. What’s the worst that can happen if I lighten the load? Is there going to be a hair emergency if I don’t keep that travel-size bottle of hair spray on me at all times? I doubt it.

So I bought a new purse. I made sure my Nook wouldn’t fit in it. The new purse would actually fit in the old purse! And I swore I was going to pare down the stuff to just the essentials. Oh yes, I was making great strides in gaining control of my purse again. I couldn’t wait to sit down last night and clean out the old one. I was ready to have a reasonable purse again with a reasonable amount of stuff inside. I carefully sorted through the contents of my purse. I threw a lot of stuff away and eliminated the non-essentials. There would be no non-essentials in the new purse.

Now that I’ve made the switch to the new purse, there’s only one problem… I can’t get the zipper closed.

Falling Waters. There was something about that name … something from long ago.

And then it was there. A bubble popped in my memory and there it was. Falling Waters. It’s relevance to me was suddenly clear. Falling Waters was music. Falling Waters was piano music.

I could see the sheet music that used to sit on the old upright piano in the living room of the home where I grew up.

Google Images

That piano had seen a lot of years pass by, even way back then when I was a child. I remembered it from my grandparents living room. Mom would always remind us that this was the piano she learned on, when she was a little girl. I can’t quite remember how my grandparents came upon the piano, but I’m almost sure it was used when it came to them because my grandparents had only ever had enough money to get by.

I was young, maybe six or seven years old, when the piano came to our house. Mom wanted us to have lessons, and I struggled through them for several years. I learned the notes and the keys. I learned how to keep my fingers curved and keep time to the metronome. But I didn’t love it the way my mom did. No matter how long I took lessons, I could never play the way Mom played. I never loved it the way she did. I never felt connected to the piano the way my mom seemed to be when she sat down to play. I quit my lessons after a few years and have rarely had the urge to sit and plunk out a tune again.

Mom was different with the piano. She took to it like a duck to water. When mom sat at the piano, you could almost see the music flowing through her. Her body swayed as she sat on the piano bench. Her fingers moved fluidly across the keys and she sat upright, her held tilted slightly back as she hummed or sang quietly along to the music. Mom could sing well enough, but it was the notes that came from the piano when she played that I really felt inside of me. When mom played piano, I stopped what I was doing and I felt the music flow over me. My mom and I didn’t always get along so well back then and I put a lot of energy into simply avoiding her so as not to find myself in another argument with her. But when she played the piano, she stopped being just Mom for a while and became her own person, the one who wasn’t constantly wrapped up in caring for four young children, keeping house, preparing meals and all of the domestic stuff that can become such a weight on a mom.

When I think of Mom playing the piano that now resides in my sister’s living room, I usually remember her playing The Blue Skirt Waltz. My dad loved that song and whenever she played, The Blue Skirt Waltz was his request. And as much as I wanted nothing to do with the music my parents enjoyed, wanting instead to be cool and listening to the new stuff on the local radio station, there was something about that old-time music that my mom played that resonated with me.

It wasn’t until I read Tara’s post that I could hear my mom playing piano again. Falling Waters was a gorgeous song when Mom played it. You could close your eyes and hear the notes becoming the sound of falling water.

As soon as I remembered the song, I went to YouTube and found this rendition of the song. And I cried.

I cried because my mom can’t play the piano anymore. She suffers from an extreme and painful case of Raynaud’s Disease. This disease affects the blood flow to the fingers and in my mom’s case, causes severe swelling and discoloration of her fingers. Her condition causes her a lot of pain. Her fingertips are often split open and the slightest touch can hurt her. Mom’s fingertips are often bandaged to protect the sores that plague her. The piano is a thing of her past.

My mom can’t play Falling Waters anymore. All that is left of that song for me is a sweet memory of Mom doing something that she loved.