My Year of Living Magically

Can you believe 2024 is nearly over? This month I’m looking back at the word-of-the-year I chose in January: “Magic”— where I found it, where it found me, what the upshot has been of keeping an eye (and an ear) out for it during a whole year—and writing it down monthly in my newsletter (sign up here!).

Without a doubt, the act of paying attention to something boosts its presence in your life. Being rather idealistic, I easily notice what is NOT ideal. But actively seeking out “magic” each month has given me a greater appreciation for just how many magical moments occur in every month…as well as every week, day, and even hour, if you are truly tuned in.

At this particular juncture in time, with the answer to the question I posed at the end of last month’s blog (read it here) resoundingly answered with “NO!”, I find that my WOTY experiment has gifts to get me through the next year…and maybe even the next four years…

I discovered that when you are alert for the presence of “magic”, it is never far away.

Sun streaming through a winter window, sculptural trees dancing past the car window, the “afterlife” of flute notes in a resonant hall, or via techie means on your computer or mobile phone. Beautiful sentences one after the other in books we love, humorous comments online to get us through a dark patch, the soft, warm fur and contented murmurings of a beloved pet. Soft sheets, filling porridge (yes!), and of course, colors! For me, blues of the sky, of the sea, or painted blue crumbling gracefully on a wall.

When you’re on the lookout: magic is everywhere! Faithful reader: I tell you it is freely disponível.

And of course—one might be tempted to forget in the current moment of angst—it is even found in other people!

The joy of a student’s moment of inspiration or achievement, sitting across the table breaking bread with an old—or new—friend. The cheerful exchange with another “foreigner” behind the cash register at the local grocery, neither of us speaking in our first language. Making chamber music through a telepathy that surpasses age, nation, gender, or taste in anything else. An unexpectedly deep conversation with a friend, baring souls, acknowledging our fragile humanity. Reconnecting with childhood friends decades on, finding them essentially unchanged. The astute listening skills and deep compassion of a therapist, coach, or mentor, helping us learn to help ourselves. Gently holding a child’s hand: you can do this, you will be fine.

In October I visited an exposition of paintings by Megan Rooney (born in South Africa, raised in Brasil and Canada, living in London). The bright colors drew me in. The explosion of gesture, texture and rhythm held me in awe; in an ideal world I would have remained the entire day in that room, soaking it all in. (Info on the exposition here)

Looking carefully at the paintings and reading about her methods, I found in them a metaphor for my year of living magically.

On a canvas equalling the “wingspan” of her reach—nearly 3 meters high by 2 meters wide (big!) — gestural strokes of oil or acrylic have been layered over and over, together with pastel and oil stick. (Needless to say, I am dying to try this messy mix at home…) Smaller brushes leave their marks on top and between these layers. Furthermore, there are scratchings, scrapings, and some layers have been sanded down…flattened, semi-obliterated, scarred.

Yet the whole is beautiful beyond measure. Color, gesture, space, movement, but also time act upon the canvas. Things that “don’t belong together”—oil and acrylic—are forced to come to terms, wayward things happen, control is gained and lost. A painting of rich variety and interest emerges.

Is this not life itself?

It is fundamentally a mess, out of control, scraped and scarred and even slashed to smithereens. And yet, it is beautiful, especially if has an eye out for the magic.

Right now, in order to connect with the beautiful magic, I am turning off (literally) as much of the ugliness as possible. Temporarily, I am not disponível for the deluge pouring forth onto our screens. I am on a path “inward”, disponível only to my private thoughts, music, art and books. Later I will find a path “out”; for the moment, I am reaching for the oxygen mask and putting it on myself first.

Be well, too. Happy Holidays (or not) and I’ll see you in 2025.

The Default in Our Stars

It is November 2024, and I am DISTRACTED by the US Election.

XX vs. XY weighs heavily on my mind.

In life, and art, and elections, there is a “default” setting. Sure, things are changing, things are NOT THE SAME, there is certainly an EFFORT being made to expand past the default.

Nonetheless, it is true that—by default—our bookshelves, our music libraries, our playlists, the art on our museum walls, the protagonists in our movies, our candidates, and our opinion-makers…favor men, white men, generally speaking.

Just imagine if XX hunched over the lectern, glowering as XY did. Imagine.

This is not news, so I’m not going to dwell on it. But as a little project of mine to actively seek out women’s art, music, and literature has collided head-on with the news cycle, I’m making this little report on my project, as a way of sending an SOS your way.

Mind you, I have nothing against men’s creativity—I have many favourites: in art: Matisse, Chagall, Rembrandt; in music Bach, Stravinsky, Brahms; in literature J. M. Coetzee, Julian Barnes, Robertson Davies.

But—not too surprisingly— whole other worlds open up when women are counted in. Perhaps in literature, being less abstract than art and music, the difference is most notable. Women’s experiences and ways of expressing those experiences are revealed when their own stories are told by them, and rich insight about human nature and relationships are perhaps a reader’s reward.

Just imagine if XX ever dared not to smile, as XY does. Imagine.

Many of my favourite authors explore a second sense of “outsider-ness” as well, such as being an immigrant, queer, or a minority—or several of these. As an American living abroad, this has resonance for me, even though our situations are not exactly parallel. To be a musician, and what’s more a classical musician, is also a form of being “outside” the norm, non-default.

Some of my favorite writers are Jhumpa Lahiri, Hilary Mantel, and Elena Ferrante. But at the moment I’ve been reading some newer-to-me writers, who I want to recommend:

I recently discovered Bernardine Evaristo, who won the Booker Prize in 2019. So far, I’ve read her autobiography “Manifesto on Never Giving Up” and “Mr. Loverman”, a novel. Evaristo is British of Nigerian heritage. The musical flow of her sentences and her characters' dialog is a delight—Mr. Loverman” is Caribbean, and I can hear his lilting voice so well. Evaristo’s life informs the novel, which runs the gamut from humorous, to heartbreaking, to wrenching, to redeeming. I’ll be reading all her other novels ASAP!

Just imagine if XX ever painted her face as crudely as XY does. Imagine.

Utterly different in tone are the semi-autobiographical novels of Annie Ernaux. Reading her frighteningly honest and microscopically observed “reportage” from the front lines of being a woman (or a girl), I realised the full extent to which “male” is the default. In a hundred ways per chapter, she lays bare her experiences, as if to the cold glare of an operating theatre: clinical, brutal, detached. So much for ladies “pink romance” novels… I have not read her masterpiece “Les Années” (“The Years”),  but I am working up to it—hey, I’m reading in French, which requires a pencil, a dictionary, a glass of wine, and a helluva lot of patience!

Just imagine if XX spoke one single time as XY speaks daily. Imagine.

I also have two non-fiction recommendations: firstly, a quirky book called “Traces” by Patricia Wiltshire. Morbid curiosity made me pick it up: it is about using biological traces—pollen, spores, fungi and such—to solve murders. More “pink romance”… NOT! What is amazing is how Wiltshire, now in her ’80’s, basically invented the methodology, using her botany background, allied to her instincts, endless curiosity, and intellectual discipline.

The juxtaposition of Wiltshire’s descriptions of the glorious English countryside, its oaks, elms, foxgloves, rushes, and a thousand other species, and the hideous crimes committed amidst that beauty leaves a lasting impression. She is clearly a remarkable person, an excellent writer, and someone able to stomach the truly un-stomach-able. I’d love to meet her, perhaps we could play sonatas together—she is an amateur pianist—in any case, better to converge around my profession than hers!

Just imagine if XX shattered every norm of decent behavior, as XY has. Imagine.

And finally, a music book and a listening recommendation: “Becoming a Composer” by Errollyn Waller, a Belize-born British composer who has certainly “never given up”. Along the way to being named “Master of the King's Music” earlier this year, she has sung jazz and pop, worked on TV, composed all sorts of chamber music and…twenty-one operas! Her excellent book reflects on her life, artistic collaborations, and her working methods, which include absconding to a windmill-house on the northern shore of Scotland in order to find the necessary peace and quiet for composing.

Just imagine if XX were a convicted felon, as XY is? Imagine.

Wallen as a young girl tells her Uncle Arthur (with whom she grew up) that she “heard sounds in my head” and he replied “perhaps you are a composer”. Wow. How many adults are so observant? She writes: “I am… a composer of classical music. I am not quite sure how that happened to a girl born in Belize and brought up in Tottenham.” Well, someone in her life suggesting she COULD become “non-default” and she followed through…that’s how that happened.

Any artist or performer will enjoy her book and also—of course—listening to her music, for example, the song “Daedalus” performed by Errollyn herself.

Just imagine if XX hunched over the lectern, glowering as XY did. Imagine.

Is the default really in our stars? Is change out of our reach? Can we imagine it?

We’re about to find out.