by Jim Lombardo
Hannah felt the best way to save a person on a ledge, whether it was real or figurative, was the same. First, reach for their emotional hand, and then try to take hold of their actual hand. She spoke gently, but firmly. “Robin, what are you doing exactly?”
“Go away. Today’s the day,” he said, looking forward with his voice shaking and his arms held out to his sides as if he was about to take off. “I-I know I can fly, if I just believe it with all my soul. If I trust it. I’m meant to be with the birds.”
“Okay, I’ll give you that, Robin,” Hannah allowed. “But how ’bout we try this out over water first?”
Robin looked over at the pair. “You don’t understand. No one gets what’s going on in my head.” He then began desperately searching the skies and grounds. “Where are you?” he demanded.
“Are you looking for your bird friend, Robin?” Hannah inquired. “Because I could be a friend to you too.”
Robin glanced over at the child briefly, and then went back to looking for his bird in vain. The drone of an approaching commercial jetliner high above slowly overtook the sweet sounds of spring that surrounded them, which gave Hannah an idea.
“You know, you are right that you can fly, Robin,” she said. With that, his head jerked over towards her with interest.
“Yeah...Yeah?”
“Oh, definitely. I mean, God didn’t give man wings, but he did give us brains, and we used that to make wings for ourselves. Like that jet up there, and hang-gliders. Hey, you want to go para-sailing with me sometime? I know a great place.”
Hannah felt she might need more, and in a fraction of a second she nimbly reviewed everything the boy had ever said to her, to see if there was any usable information. She checked the view outside and continued.
“Robin, you said that on the days when there was rain and lightning your bird didn’t come out, because he wanted you to stay at home, where it was safe for you. Well, I don’t see him now, so don’t you think he wants you to stay in the nest where it’s safe, Robin? Come back in, and I promise we’ll go flying together, just like the birds.” She offered him a sincere smile and held out her hand in his direction.
Robin searched the sky fruitlessly again, but his heart wasn’t into leaping off anymore. He looked back over at Hannah.
What a puny arm that is, he thought, but it’s reaching out to me. Haltingly, he dropped his arms back down, and his shoulders drooped.
“You’ll be my friend, Hannah?”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Ode to Joy (4.35 years old)
“I don’t believe it. The sun!”
After six consecutive days of low-hanging gray clouds and drizzle, the July sun had finally broken through, illuminating Brian’s face as he peered out the living room window.
Hannah, now four years old, climbed down from her raised, adjustable chair in the dining room where she had been playing an electronic keyboard set. She ran over to the window and happily beheld the view.
“How ’bout we go to the beach, Daddy-o?”
“You read my mind. Monica, you up for it?”
“Yeah, super, let’s pack some sandwiches and go.”
“Can I just get through the rest of Beethoven’s Ninth first?” asked Hannah.
Brian rolled his eyes. This was Ludwig Van Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Opus 125, “The Choral Symphony,” one of the composer’s final creations. Although a piano was not included in the instrumentation, Hannah had arranged an original piano accompaniment and could play it flawlessly.
“Please?” she begged. “I’m on the last movement, and it’s too perfect to stop. The Ninth took Ludwig 31 years to write, and through the last three years of composition he was completely deaf. Imagine that, Daddy.” Hannah paused and bowed her head in silent tribute before continuing. “When he finished conducting the premier, he couldn’t hear the roaring applause behind him. One of the opera singers went over to him and turned him around so he could see the crowd clapping wildly. They loved it. He never got to hear the magnificence he created, Daddy…but we can.”
Brian shook his head. “Why is everything so incredibly dramatic to you?” he teased. “And are you sure this dude was totally deaf? How do you write a song if you can’t hear anything?”
“Daddy, daddy, daddy. First of all, Beethoven was not a dude, okay? He was a defining figure in…look, do me a favor, close your eyes completely and picture a black horse.”
Brian obliged. “Where you going with this?”
“Just tell me, do you see the horse, Daddy?”
“Yeah. Black beauty. So what?”
“So, how’d you do that without your eyes?”
Brian’s eyelids opened, and he appeared perplexed.
“Let her play more, Bri’,” Monica called in from the kitchen. “It’ll take some time to get ready anyways. Hannah, finish up while Daddy and I make the goodies.”
“Okay, smartypants,” Brian conceded, “entertain us.”
Hannah hugged Brian around his legs and then dashed back to her seat. Like a seasoned pianist, she paused, sitting for a few moments to collect herself, with her hands on her lap and eyes closed. She then opened them, theatrically raised her fingers high above the keys, paused, then lowered her hands emphatically, and proceeded to unleash the brilliance.
Waves of music filled the apartment. Although Hannah was merely playing an ordinary keyboard set at a dining room table, in her mind she was onstage with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, being conducted by legendary conductor Leonard Bernstein. She had borrowed this setting from a video she had watched and was now sensing it as virtual reality. Hannah basked in the splendor of the piece, as any lover of classical music would. What was unique about her experience was that to her, this was the ideal musical complement to the unobstructed view she had of her parents preparing lunch in the adjoining kitchen for their trip to the beach. The scenes that played out before her seemed equivalent in grandeur to the sounds entering her ears.
With the full orchestra reverberating in her brain, she was captivated by the sight of Monica and Brian standing there conversing, while elegant cellos and basses engaged in an animated back and forth exchange. She was moved to join in with the chorus singing in German from the poem, “Ode to Joy,” which the composer had interspersed into his masterpiece.
Freude! Freude!
Wem der grosse Wurf gelungen Eines Freundes Freund zu sein,
Wer ein holdes Weib errungen, Mische seinen Jubel ein!
[Joy! Joy!
May he who has had the fortune to gain a true friend,
And he who has won a noble wife, join in our jubilation!]
As Hannah watched her mother reaching up to retrieve a can of tuna from a kitchen cabinet, a constellation of violins soared to a higher pitch, as if professionally choreographed. Monica opened it with an electric can opener and then dutifully began scraping the albacore into a mixing bowl with a glob of mayonnaise in it.
While still playing, Hannah contemplated how man was desensitized to so much of the wonder of life. Years and years of repetition and familiarity dulled the senses. The miracles of the seemingly trivial, everyday things in life were viewed too often as mundane. Objects and experiences that should leave a person awestruck inspired only yawns.
Hannah reflected on the golden phonograph records that scientists had sent along with Voyager 1 and 2. These were spacecraft, designed to explore the outer planets of the solar system during the 1970s and 1980s. With their missions complete, they were now hurtling off into interstellar space at a speed of over 35,000 miles per hour. The golden records, titled “The Sounds of Earth,” included many sounds and images encoded onto them in analogue form, of humans, animals, and nature, including birds, whales, thunder, and ocean surf. The hope was that someday in hundreds of thousands, or even billions of years, another civilization will intercept the crafts,
peer into the time capsule within, and be granted a glimpse into the amazing wonders of our planet so many call home. Beethoven’s earlier Fifth Symphony is included, in all its majesty, along with a picture capturing the momentous instant of a child’s birth into the world. But there is also an image of a person simply sticking their tongue out to take a lick of a chocolate ice cream cone. Hannah agreed wholeheartedly with the scientists who decided to include that picture too.
As Monica sliced into the sandwiches to divide them in half for easier sharing, the movements were dramatically underscored and accentuated by the broad strokes of the cello’s bow.
Freude trinken alle Wesen An den Brusten der Natur
[All the world’s creatures draw joy from nature’s breast]
Timpani and bass drums boomed and rolled like thunder in her mind, as she watched Brian heave a bulky Igloo cooler onto the kitchen table. Hannah continued singing the choral.
Froh, wie seine Sonnen fliegen Durch des Himmels pracht’gen Plan,
Laufet, Brueder, eure Bahn, Freudig wie ein Held zum Siegen.
[Gladly as His suns do fly through the heavens’ splendid plan,
Run now, brothers, your own course, joyful like a conquering hero]
As her self-created musical neared its end and the orchestra mounted to a crescendo, Brian snuck up behind Monica who was working at the counter. He put his hefty arms around her and kissed the top of her head. To Hannah, the melody seemed to meld seamlessly with the physical and spiritual world.
Seid umschlungen, Millionen!
Diesen Kuss der ganzen Welt!
[Embrace each other now, you millions!
This kiss is for the whole world!]
When Hannah was done, she turned herself around in her chair to face the window where the sun was beaming in gloriously. She thought, Look, Maestro. He loved it too.
Chapter Thirty
Salt Island
The Blake family began their trek from their car that was parked in the beach lot. As usual, Brian insisted on carrying as many things as was humanly possible, to the point that it became comical. He held the cooler filled with sandwiches, chips, fruit, drinks, and ice packs by its two handles, while one forearm bore the strap of a sizable towel bag. One individual finger on each of his hands were hooked around the metal tubing of their beach chairs. Around his neck was draped a colorful beach blanket. Lumbering along mightily, he resembled a robotic superhero. Monica carried a beach umbrella, a compact boom box, and a beach bag with suntan lotion and a novel, among other necessities.
Hannah led the way, clutching a beach ball and a Frisbee along with her own mini Dora the Explorer beach chair. She wore red, heart-shaped sunglasses and a delicate lilac hoodie covering her golden curls to avoid the inevitable mob of fans if she was noticed. Hannah loved meeting people when venturing out of the house. Each one was fascinating to her in their own way. But she also appreciated that, as a matter of safety and peace for her parents, it was better to keep her identity concealed, unless they were accompanied by a police detail. She somewhat enjoyed the gamesmanship of figuring out ways to avoid being discovered. As they passed a family walking in the opposite direction on the winding promenade of wooden boards leading through the dunes to the water, she pretended to be a French-Canadian youngster having a meltdown.
“Ma mere, je veux de la crème glacée.” [Mother, I want some ice-cream.]
Monica, also undercover with a sunhat and sunglasses, played along gamely. “Non!”
“Donne-moi de la glace maintenant, ou je fuis. Et je prends le Cheez-Its!” [Give me some ice-cream right now, or I’m running away, and I’m taking the Cheez-Its!]
Hannah’s enthusiasm for the beach escalated as the pummeling sounds of the surf steadily intensified. After navigating through an undulating series of dunes, the ocean panorama swept into view. It was stunning. A celebration of the senses. Since so much of her time was spent reading and studying on the computer and watching TV in close proximity, it was so pleasing to relax her eyes, and behold the grandiose expanse of land and sea. Especially the horizon, which always stirred wonder in her.
Good Harbor Beach was popular for its pristine white sands and robust surf, which was a consequence of directly facing the Atlantic Ocean. The shoreline was just under half a mile in length. On the southern end, a peninsula of mountainous rocks jutted out, and a huge elegant mansion was perched atop the pile. Known as the Birdseye Mansion, this was once the summer home of Clarence Birdseye who had pioneered new technologies for fast-freezing foods during the 1920s.
At the base of the peninsula a narrow stream served as a conduit for the rising and falling tides, as they filled and then drained from expansive salty marshes behind the beach. This stream was an ideal place to wade in knee-deep water and spot tiny fish, snails, and hermit crabs scurrying about. On the northern end of the beach, about 300 feet offshore at high tide, sat Salt Island, a bean-shaped rocky hill about 600 feet in length. Although the island was accessible on foot by way of a sandbar at low tide, warnings were posted to avoid venturing onto it. This was, for one, because the land mass was completely overrun with poison ivy. But, secondly, the rising ocean tide could rapidly swamp the sandy pathway with deep water and strong currents that were difficult to swim against, leaving a person stranded. Hannah always loved the spectacle of Salt Island, the waves crashing against its rocky base, and the colorful wildflowers that flourished on it. But she also appreciated it for the life lesson it imparted, namely, that oftentimes it was wiser to enjoy something only from afar. Just to the left of the island, off the coast of neighboring Rockport, MA. about two miles in the distance, was Thatcher Island, which featured two magnificently tall lighthouses bookending its eastern and western shores.
As he often did, Brian let up momentarily at his first sight of the ocean and thought fondly of his father. He then led his family past the walk-up snack bar known as The Beach Pit that was pouring forth the hearty aroma of fried fish and burgers. Monica and Hannah followed him through the throngs of people relaxing on beach towels and chairs, down the sloping beach at a wide angle to the water, in the direction of Salt Island. The family continued on until they were far enough away from the crowds that they could enjoy some privacy.
“How ’bout here?” Brian suggested.
“It’s perfect!” Hannah shouted gleefully.
Brian let the chairs fall from his iron grip, set the cooler and towel bag down, and unraveled the beach blanket from his neck. He kicked off his sandals and let himself fall back onto the sand like a ragdoll. Moments later he popped up into a sitting position. “Time to eat,” he said.
“But, Daddy, we just got here,” protested Hannah. “Let’s build a sandcastle, or maybe play Frisbee, or maybe swim....I can’t make up my mind. I want to do all three at the same time!”
“Well, you’re certainly a genius if you can figure that one out, sweetheart,” said Monica, straightening out the blanket.
“You know, it is a strain being just one person sometimes,” Hannah lamented. “Okay, Frisbee then.”
“First you’ve got to get your lotion on,” said Monica.
Hannah obligingly knelt down. As her mother smeared the Coppertone over her shoulders and back, the child clawed her right hand deeply into the dry sand, gathered a handful, and held it up at shoulder height. With her palm facing down, she slowly loosened her grip, transfixed at the sight of the particles trickling out like an hourglass. The sands of time, she mused.
Brian and Hannah were soon on their way. They walked about halfway to the shoreline where the sand was moist and flat. Hannah kept looking back, as she was fascinated by the footprints they left behind. Her father’s impressions in the sand were deeper than hers. She knew this was because the curious effect called gravity was pulling harder on him, but the reason for this force’s existence remained enigmatic. She had been tinkering with the conventional theory that gra
vity involved the interaction of mass and a higher, imperceptible dimension of space. Hannah found it interesting that the mysterious dimension of space that could not be perceived, and which resulted in gravity, was designing areas of space in a dimension that she could perceive, namely the hollowed-out foot shapes in the sand. So was there space you could see, and space you couldn’t see? Not really, she reasoned, because she wasn’t actually looking at space in the sand in any dimension, but rather was observing sand molded into the opposite shape of a foot. All of space was actually an invisible, immaterial thing. She considered how in this world, there were powerful veiled forces that were constantly in play, and which most people took for granted.
The tide was on its way out, so there was plenty of room to play. Given Hannah’s completely normal physical development, sports activities were an area where she became just another child, and that was fine. It gave Brian and Monica a chance to teach and encourage her, and to be the experts for a change.
“That’s good, Hannah. Just follow through and keep it flat. You’re doing great.”
Not that the game of catch sounded typical between the two.
“Aww, Daddy, I can generate the proper gyroscopic action, but the wind is disturbing the vertical angular momentum vector. Also, the aerodynamic torque is causing it to precess around the spin axis, so the trajectory’s tough to regulate.”
“Huh, and for all these years, I thought I was just throwing it bad,” Brian replied.
After they had played for a while, they returned to the beach blanket. Monica was relaxing in a beach chair, while the CD player was busy billowing out Weezer’s buoyant “Island in the Sun”.