“I know dat’s right,” Michael commented. They shared a laugh.
“You know about music too, Uncle Clyde?” I asked. I didn’t know why I was asking about music when he was telling me such interesting things about myself.
“Oh yeah, son. I plays Music, and one day when you realize how ta stop jus’ playin’ yo’ bass, you’s gonna start playin’ Music too.”
Stop playing my bass? That was the second time that day someone had talked about that. What did it mean? I was just about to ask when Michael butted in.
“Uncle Clyde is the best harmonica player on the planet, in my opinion,” he said.
“Yes I is, but we ain’t here ta talk about me, is we?” Clyde answered. “But jus’ ta let yous in on a lil’ secret, I knows a lil’ bit about everathang. So do you. Dats wut you’s about to find out.”
“Dat’s wut I’m about to—I mean, that’s what I’m about to find out? What does that mean?” I asked.
“It don’t mean nuthin’ to you yet,” he answered. “In due time, son, in due time. You jus’ stick wit dis here Michael character. You be awright. But if’n he start to treat you bad, mess wit yo’ mind too much, you jus’ come see yo’ ole Uncle Clyde. I be right here underneath da bridge.” He glanced at Michael, and they both started laughing again.
Just then we heard a loud screech. We turned to look and saw a car desperately trying to skid out of the way of a pedestrian crossing the intersection. The car struck the man, knocking him into the air and across the street. It was painful to watch. He landed on the curb, apparently unconscious. It happened so quickly and slowly at the same time, it didn’t seem real.
Michael, Clyde, and I ran to the scene. It was later that I remembered seeing ‘Slow Moving’ Clyde running gracefully to the man’s aid. I’d thought Clyde was nearly crippled. Michael later told me that Clyde chooses to live and act the way he does because that way people generally leave him alone. He also told me that Clyde always says: “Even the government will let an old crippled homeless man be.” I’d never thought about a person choosing to live that way. I tried to understand Clyde’s position, but the comforts I was used to didn’t allow it.
By the time we got to the injured man, he was lying on the ground with his eyes closed. He appeared to be bleeding badly from the right side of his head. The driver of the car was unhurt. He ran over to assist but didn’t know what to do. Michael and Clyde stood there for a few seconds looking at the injured man. By that time, more and more people had gathered around, but no one knew what to do.
Michael knelt down and placed the injured man’s head in his lap. Clyde knelt down across from him. Don’t touch him, you guys, I thought. I couldn’t tell if the man was breathing or not, but Michael didn’t seem to care. He began to sing a soft melody as he gently stroked the man’s forehead. Uncle Clyde was sitting there slightly bobbing his head up and down; not nodding to the beat of Michael’s tune, just off in his own world. The onlookers, well, they just looked on. They didn’t seem bothered by the sight of two homeless men caressing and singing to an injured man. Or maybe they were like me, frozen with disbelief.
Every once in a while, Uncle Clyde would wave his hand over the man’s chest as if he was petting the air. It was a gentle motion that almost went unnoticed. Michael kept singing lightly, all the time with a gentle smile on his face.
After a few precious minutes, Michael and Clyde looked at each other. They looked as if they had a plan, but I couldn’t tell what their intentions were. The rest of the crowd and I remained silent.
Michael kept his right hand on the injured man’s forehead while Clyde placed his right hand on the man’s chest. They held hands with their left hands. Michael stopped singing for a moment, and then the man’s body twitched. His body jumped, to be more specific.
We heard a loud siren. Michael placed the man’s head on the ground. As everyone turned to look at the arriving ambulance, Michael and Clyde stood up and casually made their way through the crowd. Without looking at each other, they walked off in separate directions as if their exit was planned.
As Michael walked past, he motioned for me to follow. He didn’t look at me either. I glanced back at the injured man and noticed that he was now sitting up, wiping his eyes. I realized there was no blood coming from his head. I was shocked and confused. Questions immediately formed in my mind. When I turned to ask Michael about it, he was gone.
When I arrived at my car, I found Michael sitting inside. There he told me that the injured man would be all right. I asked him if we needed to pick up Uncle Clyde. He told me that Clyde would be all right too. We could hear the ambulance driving away as I started the car. I was curious about what had happened but waited until we were on the road and the situation was over before I asked any more questions.
“What happened, Michael? I know that you did something. What did you just do?”
“I helped his body reorganize,” he answered, leaning his head against the window and closing his eyes. It was the first time I’d ever seen him appear tired.
“What do you mean ‘reorganize’?” I asked.
“His body had gone through a tremendous trauma and became disorganized. You see, each part of a person’s body can act like an individual entity. Usually they work together, but when something like that happens, all the parts can take off running in different directions. Clyde and I helped bring them back together. That is the best way I can explain it.”
“And you did it by singing?”
“Partially.”
“What else did you do?” I asked.
Michael sat up and spoke. “Well, have you ever been to a science museum and seen the exhibit that uses sand placed on top of a thin flat metal plate? You take a violin bow and—”
I butted in: “And as you bow the side of the metal plate, the sand forms different geometric shapes depending on the pitch that’s being produced.”
“Yes,” Michael responded. "The sand responds to the different pitches as clay responds to a potter’s hands. But with the body, it is not just the pitch that is important; it is also the tone of the sound that helps produce the desired effect.”
“Can you explain what you mean by tone?”
“Tone can mean a lot of things. It can pertain to your voice or to color, or to the condition of your muscles. There is a tone control on your television set as well as one on your bass guitar. Photographers and painters as well as athletes talk about tone. But since we have agreed to talk about Music, I will explain it this way.”
He adjusted himself in his seat and continued. “Suppose we go dancing at a nightclub. We walk in and the D.J. is playing Music loudly. The sound system sounds great, the dance floor is packed, and the girls are pretty. What would you do?”
“I would find a pretty girl and ask her to dance.” I liked the thought of that.
“What would happen if, all of a sudden, the subwoofers blew out and there were no more lows coming out of the speakers? Imagine the sound. What do you think would happen next?”
"The dance floor would clear,” I answered, revising my earlier mental picture.
“Precisely! Why?” he asked.
"The subwoofers create the low bass frequency,” I responded. "They shake the whole room.”
“Yes, and they actually shake your whole body,” he added. “With a powerful system you can feel the bass vibrating right through you. When your body starts shaking, it’s like you’re already dancing just from the sound of the speakers.”
“I get it. And if the subs go out, I lose the feeling and don’t feel like dancing anymore,” I added.
“Even if the girls are pretty?” he asked, smiling at me.
“Right,” I chuckled.
“Very good,” he said, resting his head against the window again. “You see, tone is a powerful thing. Even though the same Music would be coming out of the speakers, the change in tone would cause everyone in the club to feel differently and therefore act differently. So with this in mind, you sho
uld understand that the notes you produce on your bass guitar will have different effects on your listeners depending on the tone that you use. Sometimes tone is the deciding factor that causes a person to listen to you, or not.”
“I never thought about tone in that way before,” I stated.
“If you want your audience to dance, you should use a certain tone. If you want them to quiet down and listen, another tone may be necessary. If you want them to be healed, an altogether different tone may do the trick. All I did with the man in the street was use tone and pitch to convince his energy to reorganize in a way that would cause his body to heal.”
I wanted to understand all of it. “What do you mean by the word ‘convince’?” I asked.
“When you are healing someone or something, the choice to become healed, or not, is not completely yours. Don’t ever think that it is. You are only in charge of what you are doing. The energy you are trying to heal must agree with what you desire. And on some level, the person or thing being healed must also agree. There are many agreements that must first be made. That is why all attempts to heal do not happen the way one wishes them to.”
That information was strange to me. I understood what he was saying, but I had no idea if it was true. All I had to go on was what I’d witnessed. Michael had a way of making anything understandable. Even if I didn’t completely understand it the first time around, I knew he would say it again in another way. I sat back and waited.
"The same is true when playing Music,” he continued. “Have you ever realized that on some days you seem to have it, and other days, under the same circumstances, playing the same songs, you can’t seem to find it? Do you think that it’s all up to you, or does Music have a say in the matter? Most of us think that it’s only up to us. That would be a mistake.”
The thought of “music having a say” was too much for me to grasp at that moment. He spoke about music as if it were real. That made me wonder. Not knowing what to think, I decided to ask another question.
“I noticed that his head had stopped bleeding when you left. Did you do that? And if so, how did you heal him so fast?”
He gave me a typical Michael answer. “Fast? What is ‘fast’ except a reflection of your personal perspective of time? And what is time except a misrepresentation of now? I tell you this: All healing is instant. You are either sick, or you are well. There is no in-between. So the only thing standing in the way of being instantly healed is time.”
“Wow! I guess you’re right,” I said, though I knew I would have to spend more time contemplating that statement. “I want to understand. I really do. Can you put it in terms that I might be able to understand right now?”
“Understand this,” Michael instructed. “Time and space are the only things that separate one thing from another. Take time and space out of the equation and what is left? Oneness! That’s it! But even though one could say that time and space are illusions, they are important. They serve a purpose. Without them we would be unable to observe and experience individuality. The game would be over.”
“Do you mean the game of life?” I asked.
“Yes, Life as we know it anyway. You see, when you dream, you are allowed to play by different rules. Dreams allow the sub-conscious to play itself out instantly. Wherever you want to be, there you are. Whatever you want, or don’t think you want, there it is all created by you.
“Now real life, as most people call it, can be looked at as ‘long-form imagination,’ a place where things take time. The addition of time and space slows down our reality and believe me that is a blessing. In other words time and space allow us to stop and smell the roses—or get pricked by its thorns. Learn to manipulate these elements and you play a different game altogether. The choice, even if made unconsciously, is always yours.”
“Unbelievable,” I replied. “And music? How does that fit into this scenario?”
"The same is true in Music,” he continued. "There is really only one note. Space and time allow you to experience the different characteristics of that note, making it appear as many different notes. Understanding that will help you make any note fit in at any time. How you see it is always up to you. Think about it; Music and Life would be much different without time and space.”
“Okay, I think I’m even more confused now,” I told him.
“Look at it this way,” he said. “If a person has a cold and breathes on you, are you in danger of catching his cold?”
“Of course,” I replied.
“Well then, doesn’t it make sense that it should also work the other way around? If I am more healthy than you are sick, shouldn’t my healthiness rub off on you? Shouldn’t I be able to help make you well?”
“Now that makes sense to me, I guess,” I answered, “although I’ve never heard anyone talk about it before. So that’s what you did to the man? You imposed your healthiness on him?”
“Yes, in a sense,” Michael answered. “And now you understand how staying healthy can benefit more than just you alone. Because I am healthy, I had a model which I could impose on him. That is one way to help others find health. Think about the word: healthy. It’s made up of two words: ‘heal-thy.’ So you can choose to heal-thy self or to heal-thy brother. The choice is yours.
“Like playing an instrument, there are many techniques that can be used. I used tones, healing tones. When we reached that man, Clyde and I listened to see how his body resonated. Only then could we choose which healing tones to produce. Then, like the violin bow at the science exhibit, I used the vibrations of my voice to alter the tones of his body. I needed to reorganize them into a more harmonious state. I didn’t need to sing loudly because the vibrations were traveling through my hand and into his head. That produced a direct connection. But the tones have to be accurate in order to produce the desired effect.”
“I’m trying to understand, Michael. I really am. What was Clyde doing?”
“Clyde was helping to push and sort of herd the body’s vibrations in the right direction. Remember when I said that all the parts of his body were running in different directions? Well, his energies were scattered. Clyde helped to realign them. Once they had decided to regroup, we held hands, said a quick ‘thank you,’ and were on our way.”
“I saw his body jump,” I stated.
"The soul will sometimes separate itself from the body in these types of situations to shield the person from extreme pain. Upon reentering, the body will often jump. That’s all.”
"That’s all?” As strange as that experience was, there was a quality to it that seemed to make sense. "This is crazy stuff, but for some reason it all sounds very natural. You guys are way beyond me. Now you’re gonna tell me I can do something like that with my bass, right?”
“I don’t think I have to tell you. You already know. Music, like everything else, is vibrations. Doctors use lasers to operate. What are lasers but vibrations? Music, in the right hands, can do the same thing. Remember this: The right notes cannot do it alone. The correct tone, as well as dynamics and emotion, must be used. Actually all the elements of Music must be present. These elements are the same as the elements of Life.”
The elements of music. The elements of life. I could say the same words but somehow I knew they didn’t have the same meaning. He said they were the same elements. Sometimes I felt as if I was able to keep up, but other times I felt utterly confused. This was one of the confusing times. My desire to understand all of it at once caused me to become frustrated. I wanted more answers even though I wasn’t sure what the questions were. Michael responded to my confusion with some soothing words.
“You say that you saw us heal an injured man on the street. If you take Clyde, the injured man, and me, and remove the elements of time and space, how many people would there be?”
The Music Lesson Page 16