Fall Out of Love?

-


The above is a close up of my cello, Frederick, that I took two years ago. Over the past alomost fifteen years of playing, I have had various dreams about my cello. One dream I remember that I was trying to play my cello and the strings were all made of different colors of thin ribbons. As you can imagine, this didn't help with the sound. I had that dream during a time when I wasn't playing my cello much and I missed it a lot and felt that I was losing touch with it. Last night, I had a disturbing dream that played upon some recent valid fears. First some background info:

On Wednesday, I brought my 150 year old cello to the shop because I have been having problems with the "A" string suddenly lowering so close to the fingerboard that it vibrates against it when I use the bow and makes a horrendous noise. I also suspected the sound post (located inside the cello undernerneath the bridge) had shifted. Lately, I have also noticed more cracks appearing and that the front of my cello seems rather flat instead of rounded as it should be. Noticing all of this, I kept getting a vague feeling of foreboding inside of me that Frederick's days were numbered.

As I said, I brought it to Zoran's violin shop on Wednesday. Besides the fact that Zoran is like, the ONLY luthier in town, he is also one of the best in the state or maybe even region? He has won gold medals for the cellos that he makes and he fixed my cello last year so well that I was even happier with it than I had been before I brought it to him. (Which is really saying a lot considering how much I love my cello!)

Anyway, Zoran had some bad news. He said in his slightly Croatian accented speech, "Laelia, I hate to say it, but I think it is time for you to...how do you say it? Fell...fill..out of love with your cello."

I looked at him..."You mean, it is time for me to FALL out of love with my cello? Are you serious? What do you mean exactly?"

He went on to point out all of the conflicting issues with my cello-things that combined to make small issues not so small anymore. Basically he told me that it is time to start preparing myself to part with Frederick. He doesn't know for sure how long I have before things get even worse, but Zoran knows his cellos. He put it to me this way, "Laelia, you can be in a relationship with someone with beautiful eyes, but if they have a lot of issues, you have to ask yourself if it is worth all the pain and constantly trying to fix the issues? Or you can be in a relationship with someone who has beautiful eyes AND has no issues. It is time for you to start thinking about getting a new cello."

NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!! :(

I had a dream last night that my cello was crushed on accident by someone I knew and they tried to tape it up with duct tape.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Bunch of Busybodies

-
Image
"What'chya doin'?" -a goat in New Jersey, 2011 (photo y Laelia Watt) Standing at a bus stop recently, I absentmindedly checked my Facebook page for the fifth time that day, when it hit me. It has been a while since I could remember what it is like to not be aware of what 30 friends were thinking at any given time. I like Facebook. It is a great tool which has helped me categorize all my photos, keep in touch with family members scattered all over the world, and has sparked many fun conversations with my friends over the years, but I suddenly missed having my brain filled with only my own thoughts during the day. As a person who has moved frequently throughout my life, the oddest thing about social media is that the thoughts, activities, photos, and political leanings of the friends I would normally leave behind and slowly drift from, are suddenly displayed daily for me to peruse. Don't get me wrong, I like keeping in touch with old friends, and as I said, I...
Read more

Losing the Weight of Shame

-
Image
(Me with yearling horse at the University of AZ Equine Center. Photo by my Aunt) In my journey, I've been focusing more on seeking joy in my body. These are some free-flowing thoughts to express a few thoughts I have had along the way: There is so much SHAME out there from every direction. All the "how tos" of "losing weight" and "never good enoughs" drown out the joy that is eating powerful, life-giving foods and doing exhilarating things that one loves! Walking, riding my bike, dancing, Pilates, canoeing etc are things I can't wait to do! I don't run for exercise, because I despise running unless absolutely necessary. I say, pursue activities that make you feel happy to be alive and thankful for your body! Do you ever marvel in awe at the way your body moves? Study human anatomy and physiology, and you will discover that the simplest move of a muscle requires an intricate chain reaction of minute proportions. One tiny malfunction,...
Read more

We Don't Know Everything

-
Image
(Example lesson in a photo: We only see part of it. Frederick the cello-LCW 2009) Science and Religion, (for the purposes of this essay, here referred to as their societal and historical entities), have much more in common than either camp has deigned to admit over the past few centuries. As any cursory glance of history will prove, both have been wrong at one time or another. This fact is not easily swallowed by the followers of those who believe Science holds all the answers to the exclusion of Religion, and it is equally unpalatable to the followers who believe Religion holds the only answers to the exclusion of Science. These are the commonalities between Science and Religion: 1. They have both been wrong, resulting in dire consequences for humanity and the environment, for the well-being of those who are more vulnerable among us, and for humanity's general understanding of the world and our place in it. 2. They have both been right too,resulting in astoundingly beau...
Read more