Notes of History

Yesterday, sometime after walking into the house from work, but before Shelly and I left for dinner, I looked at the piano in the living room, an instrument not used nearly as much as it should be, out of tune, and considered the history layered upon it. The hands of friends and family, which have drawn out the music there. If it was the anchor of the world, the memories which would be moored there.

I was brought back to the smell of coffee, before I liked coffee, sharp and hot. I can see the thin stoneware cups, with their muted colors. The air is green-blue and hazy. Lit through translucent curtains, draped before the dining room window.

It is too wet to play in the backyard, which tended to be swampy even on dry days. Justin and I had been chasing each other around, from the hallway to to the kitchen to the dining room back into the hallway. We had run in circles, trying to get enough distance we could veer off into one of the bedrooms or bathroom, so we could jump out and scare each other. To be fair, this was me scaring Justin, a tradition I share with my kids today. We ran until my parents patients had wore then and we had been threatened with bodily harm if we didn't select some other activity.

Back in the hazy light of the dining room, a Scrabble board sat in the center of the dark wood table. It was the center of my parent's and grandparent's attention, they placed small wooden pieces and scratched out points. My brother and I wore too young to play, but we knew, even then, it would be my Dad or Grandmother who would win. One of them always won.

In the living room sat the piano. It seems so consistent now, the static item around which time passes, the clear item in a blur. The focus.

On the keys of this piano, near what I now know is middle C, are dots of color. My grandmother carefully drew them on, making little circles with the crayons which always seemed to be in the living room. Six clear colors gave these keys an identity, a purpose. Above these keys, around eye level for my five year old self, sat a white piece of paper she had also marked. Little circles of the same colors, but in pattern. Yellow, orange, red, orange, red, red, red. When you pressed the colors in the order of the keys, simple magic happened. I knew how to play piano.

My grandmother not only didn't need colorful dots, but she didn't need music. She played by ear. As I think back, I wonder if was strange for her, to color code the magic she took for granted. I try to draw her from the blur to ask, but I can't. The keys of the piano are now black and white, and it has been a long time since I have used colored dots to capture my grandmother's magic.