So this past weekend we visited nan. It was hard. Even overwhelming.
On Thursday night I dreamed about my childhood, specifically the classroom I was during year 5. Except in the dream I was the age I am now. In that classroom my old high school music teacher was there. He was a tyrant to me. Hated me for some reason. Put pressure on me.
Anyway to make that long story shorter, he ended up cheating on his wife. Got himself sacked from the school as a result of it.
For quite some time that dream kept happening for me and I can’t quite figure out why that is. It was a repressed memory maybe? A painful one? If you have seen the film Whiplash (highly recommend it) well he wasn’t quite as bad as that, but he commanded a certain fear and I distinctly remember many of the kids in the band, particularly the jazz band, were always impressing him. All of them except me. He kept telling me to pull my finger out.
“You better pull your finger out mate” I remember him saying. And when I got a B+ in my AMEB music exam for Grade 4 he said “that was good” with a tone of surprise. Part of me wishes I could rewind the clock and say back to him “you sound shocked”. He was a smartass. Smug. Showpony.
Well in the end I still thanked him for giving me a “love of music”. I guess also too part of that comes with the memory that I did win a music tuition scholarship to get half price lessons with the music tutor we had. I don’t think he liked the music tutor but he was employed there anyway. Almost as if the music teacher wanted to have someone to hate on. The type of egoism you’d expect from someone who has sacrificed so much for their job and aspiration.
The band at my school was superb. Tight sound and a good range of songs. I think the music teacher was able to pull the wool over the principal’s eyes. And did so quite successfully.
The distance between where I am now in life and where I was back then is actually insurmountable - indeed how can I go back to that? You can never repeat history.
But at the same time, the memories are almost tangible. Almost physical. A raw feeling in the gut even.
The sheer nerve of this man to treat teenagers the way he did.
Looking back I’m glad I was late to rehearsals during lunch because at least it meant that I was doing something else - food technology for my HSC. It ran the same line as Music did and I nearly did do music. I imagine that had I picked music instead and worked my proverbial A$$ off then I could’ve done well like anyone else. But I was outclassed by a good friend who had been taught piano since about the age of 4.
Funny really. Looking back now I remember a lot of that from those days.
Funnier still is that I dreamed this on the night we found out about Pop passing. I think maybe this was a way for Pop to see how much music was actually a struggle and I distinctly recall him saying to me “When will they give you an award?” and I was never able to answer that because I knew how painful or weird or confusing the whole experience was with the music teacher. Surely enough though, on our last night performance when we were in year 12 my friend and I got an award for “service to the school’s music program” and pop was in the audience along with my nan. “About time they gave you an award” Pop said.
Maybe I will share part of this anecdote next week at the funeral. It’s one of many. Also this week (I won’t be on shift until Thursday, that’s if i don’t use my leave which I likely will) I will do some things in Sydney that remind me of him - including going to the driving range. And I will also visit the street he was born in.
Last night we went for dinner at the RSL but it was too hard. Last time we went was 2 weeks ago when he was in the nursing home. Prior to that I think was actually with pop. In three separate instances there were different scenarios with him there, with us but not there and then finally with him gone on into the next life.
I’m glad thats over I said to mum as we left, not because I didn’t like their company, but because it felt wrong or weird now that Pop was gone. And I think that’s normal. Very normal. Good even?
My cousins will farewell their grandmother on Wednesday. On the other side of their family. Mum suggested we go and support them. It was big for her to say this. I think it would be a good idea. You can tell by the mood last night that it was hard for us all.
Such hatchets need to be buried at some point. If we can call them that of course?
In the coming days I will recall lots to memory. Dream even. And eventually come to accept the reality of the situation.
I will write the best eulogy I can from my heart and memory for next monday. So that way, I will say in Welsh, “Cofiwn, ni anghofiwn” - “we will remember, we will not forget”
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