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I’m afraid of opening the case.
I’m afraid of what comes next.
Which is totally bonkers, because I get to choose what comes next. I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do. Except for going to work in thirty minutes, because I definitely want to stand here afraid of an inanimate object for a while longer.
Okay, not at all.
I take a look around the room, as if maybe something has changed in the long moments I’ve been standing here terrified.
Nothing is different.
I can do this.
I take a step toward the bed.
Nope. I move back until I hit the wall. Not ready.
This is the part where I should call someone. Phone a friend. Emergency bravery by association. My mom. An old friend from high school. Tessie. Desi. Wanda Chamberlain. The problem is, I don’t want anyone else here for this, not even over the phone. If I pick that thing up, I want to do it myself. All by myself, all for myself.
Have you ever watched those energy workers online? The ones who wear gold-flecked lip gloss and many, many earrings and tell you that when you learn to listen to your body’s responses, you’ll discover what you really want? I kind of want to try that. If I close my eyes and Zen out and just let my arms reach for what they want, will I pick up the violin?
I close my eyes, breathe in deeply, try to empty my thinking mind, and whisper to myself, “Reach for your desire.”
This experiment lasts exactly thirteen seconds and then I laugh out loud. I mean, really? This energy work is not a road I should travel alone. I clearly need deep guidance for a journey into the depths of this mind.
Do you know who else would find this hilarious? Dr. Grayson Mercer, that’s who.
But again, I don’t want to call him. This is just for me. I need to figure this out on my own.
And what is there really to figure out? I know what I want, right? Or I wouldn’t have just spent my get-ready-for-work time standing in my room with my back against the wall, staring at a closed case.
“Right.”
I know I’m only agreeing with myself, but it helps to say the word aloud.
I take the three steps to the bed and before I can think about it anymore, I lift the lid of the case and lay it open.
Is it the light touching the wood I notice first? Or the smell of rosin? The long lines of the bow and horsehair?
For a few seconds, I stand and take it in. Am I happy? Am I scared? There’s something shifting, but I think maybe it’s as simple as relief that I opened the case. The violin is here. I can see it. It’s stillreal.
I run a finger over the deep red velvet, first with the grain and then against, seeing the mark my finger leaves and feeling the soft fabric that cradles my instrument, that’s kept it safe and protected for more than a year.
I tap the wood with a fingernail, hearing the resonance of the sound roll around inside the frame. I run a finger down the A string, and that familiarskreesound doesn’t immediately make me slam the lid closed again. I think that’s a win.
I pluck the E, and my ear knows it’s very out of tune. Of course it is. But there’s something about the fact that my ear still knows, after all this time. Comfort? Familiarity? Recognition? I don’t know, exactly, but as I stand here in my room with the blinds closed and nobody around, I take a minute to touch the scroll, to press my fingers to the fine tuners. To breathe, which maybe wouldn’t happen if I don’t consciously think about it.
I don’t plan what I do next; I just let my fingers take over. They slide around the neck of the instrument and wrap tight.
I lift it out of the case, and it slips as smoothly from the fabric as it always has. I hear the swish of wood against velvet, the whisper of my thumb against the fingerboard.
Placing the violin under my chin without a shoulder rest would horrify any and all of my teachers, but they’re not here. I’m alone in my room with nothing but this inanimate object that has become such a terrifying presence.
I just tuck it there and tilt my head until my chin settles where it always did, on the ebony rest that fits me perfectly. As if it was once a part of me, as if it was made for me. Because it was. I turn to my mirror and remember the hours and days and years I stood in front of mirrors holding so many violins. I remember my very first, when I was three. Maybe it’s because there are pictures (formal portraits my parents hired professional photographers to take of my tiny toddler self with my spiraling red curls and that miniature violin). Maybe it’s because there are stories of my immediate aptitude, my extraordinary talent.
Or maybe I just remember. How my first month of lessons, I didn’t even touch my bow. I learned how to stand. Where to place my feet. I stood on a mat with shoe-shapes printed on it, and if I moved or shifted, my teacher would nudge my feet back into the correct angles until those angles became natural. Until I stood that way all the time, weight on my left leg, feet like a ballerina in open-fourth position. My nose following the line of my left foot.
I still stand like that, which I only notice when someone comments on it. It’s how standing works, at least in my body.
