Eat Mangos

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Clutching my guitar and a box of carnations, I stepped off the bus and into the dappled December sunlight. Ahead of me lay the cobblestone driveway of the Lytton Gardens Senior Center, the second stop on my choir’s holiday tour. Here, our directors had informed us, we would perform a few pieces from our repertoire for a small audience on the nursing and special care floor. 

I don’t know why I felt so much apprehension about singing on that floor. I had heard that nursing is reserved for persons who are very sick or very old; in the elevator, our guide told us that nursing is usually the final step before an occupant passes away. My hands grew clammy on the handle of my guitar case, and I felt as if I were venturing into a place very quiet and sacred, a place most people avoid because they are afraid of the finality of life.

The elevator opened and we could see two men and a woman in wheelchairs. One of the men observed us with sad eyes, and the women didn’t seem to be able to hear or see anything. Looking around, I spotted a few more audience members in faded polka-dot pajamas. As Ms. S., our music director, gathered the rest of Downbeat for warm-ups, I wondered if these people were going to be able to enjoy our singing. I wondered if they would even hear us.

Ms. S. blew the pitch pipe and raised her arms, and suddenly, the basses burst into their syncopated rhythm. The sad man raised his gray eyes and began to beam sheepishly, and the woman next to him began clapping along. Slowly, I felt a change come over our audience; it felt as if, suddenly, the room was filled with children.

We held out last note to an enchanted silence. It was as if the audience was absorbing the last echoes of our carols. Then, suddenly, something came along to complete the magic of the afternoon. Downbeat was handing out flowers and conversing with the seniors when one of the nurses approached us, saying that a patient who was not well enough to come out wanted to hear Silent Night. Ms. L-R, our other director, asked if my friend Vyvy and I could perform it with guitar.
We followed the nurse down a labyrinth of hallways and to a closed door. “He’s just getting out of his bath, but he really wants to hear you,” she told us and went in. Vyvy and I waited for five minutes before the door finally opened, revealing what at first seemed like a mass of white sheets. In the bed was a small man with all but his head under the covers, and it was him that we serenaded. He smiled a toothless grin and turned to me as I was putting away my guitar.

“Are you German?” he asked all of a sudden.

I smiled back at him and replied, “No, Ukrainian, actually.”

“Do you speak Ukrainian?”

“No, I grew up speaking Russian,” I replied. I could not understand why he was so interested in learning about me. Then, he made the strangest request.

“Sing me a song in Russian.”

I searched my memory for something I could sing, and the only piece that came to mind was the Lullaby by Tchaikovsky that I had been working on in my voice lessons. So there, in that darkened room, I began to sing, without accompaniment or a stage, to an audience of three people and the flashing monitors by the bedside. And with each note I felt as if I were losing something, as if I were giving a part of myself away; but there was nothing sad about that loss, because in a way, we lose something with each moment of our lives that passes, and at least my lost moments would never tarnish in this one man’s memory. 

He fell fast asleep, and on my way out the door, I placed a pink carnation on his bedside.

I don’t think I was ever aware, before that afternoon, of what a crucial responsibility musicians have. I’ve realized that there is a moment in peoples’ lives, perhaps before they are born, when they hear music for the first time, and it becomes their guide up until their final breath. People seek companionship in the songs they hear, and it is up to us, to me, as a singer, to let them know that they are never alone in their journeys. There is no such thing as simply singing; the goal is to make every phrase into a message, and to part with each listener on a note of mutual understanding. Because, who knows, my song might be the first, or the last thing a person hears.