Born Free

I spent yesterday morning doing various chores in the garage.  Since I can’t whistle, I do not whistle while I work.  Since I can’t carry a tune, I do not sing while I work.  But I do listen to music.  I haven’t yet developed the practice of using my iPhone with ear buds.  I should get into that habit I suppose.  I usually listen to “my music” on an iPad (sometimes using a little Bluetooth speaker to enhance the sound—unless the speaker needs to be re-charged—which happens quite often).

Did you know that music can help with your chronic back pain?  I read that somewhere.  Music also, according to research,  can help people with memory loss.  Music can help a person suffering from memory loss remember tunes or songs and get in touch with their history.  This, they say, is because the part of the brain which processes music is located next to memory. Music is therapeutic in many ways.  Longfellow called music “the universal language of mankind.”  Beethoven said music is “a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy.”   Sometimes I think Vonnegut had it right when he wrote, “If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:  ‘THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD WAS MUSIC.’”  

Unlike Albert Einstein, I do not think in music, live my daydreams in music, or see my life in terms of music, but I do find that music expresses my feelings, thoughts, and dreams that I  cannot always put into words.  Do you remember the song, “Born Free,” made popular by Andy Williams some years ago?   I heard it yesterday.   I stopped what I was doing, sat down, and listened to it several times over.  The tune fits the lyrics perfectly or do the lyrics fit the tune perfectly?  I’m not sure which, but tune and lyrics together make a powerful statement.  Or did it speak to me because I’m suffering from memory loss and the tune and lyrics helped me get in touch with a history I must never let die.

Born free, as free as the wind blows

As free as the grass grows

Born free to follow your heart

Live free, and beauty surrounds you

The world still astounds you

Each time you look at a star

Stay free, where no walls divide you

You’re free as the roaring tide

So there’s no need to hide

Born free, and life is worth living

But only worth living 

‘cause you’re born free

My Mother's Iris
First Bloom of the 2018 Season