Sad of eye

Tonight, I went to a concert in the Old Capitol. Mark, our orchestra conductor, had invited some world class musicians to come perform. They played works by Hummel, Mendelssohn, and Dvorak, and with this vitality that filled the building to the dome.

One of the most notable things about this ensemble was how different the violinists were from each other. One seemed to push sound through his violin, as if he could channel his soul directly through the instrument, with passion and drive, letting us see his innermost emotions. The other seemed to pull the sound; I could almost imagine that he was somehow, through some mysterious workings of his hands, imbuing the violin with a soul of its own, and then coaxing from that soul a line of beauty and nuance. That these two sounds mingled with each other, and with the other instruments, was surprising. The interplay was especially interesting when the "pulling" violinist played first, and the "pusher" second.

Their last piece: Dvorak's second piano quintet (This is the second movement.)

The opening totally gets "Nature Boy" stuck in my head.

It's been a year and a half since I went downtown with Alan the last time. Sitting there tonight, I couldn't help but remember being at the Union with him the night before he died. I teared up a few times during this movement. Eighteen months, and I still haven't gone a day without shedding a tear for him.

A year ago, I posted on Facebook how part of me had been left behind the night we lost you, how the changing seasons took me by surprise. I charged myself with figuring out how to move on and reconnect the two parts of myself. Truth be told, I haven't found the magic salve for that wound, but I'm stitched together and moving forward. Maybe that's good enough.

Rock Bottom

Looking back at the last couple years for Alan, I see a whole bunch of accomplishments and disappointments. From my vantage, I saw good grades, good friends, keeping appointments, and a strong effort to do the good thing. I also saw difficulty keeping on top of responsibilities, trouble sticking with a job, and too many times saying "f--- it," which inevitably led to trouble -- my bike getting stolen, an OWI mostly from being a smartass to a park ranger, blacking out in a stairwell. His life was a lot of ups and downs, but there were so many ups, and I was so proud of him.

He didn't see things like that. Those accomplishments didn't matter. His experience was that of a burden constantly being on him. The oppressive feeling of responsibility when you don't think you are going to live up to expectation and the fog of melancholy were always there. When he did well, or when he was having a good time, he truly did seem to feel good. It just didn't last; it always faded back into the fog.

He must have felt like he was constantly hitting rock bottom, and when he hit its surface, it would shatter, revealing an even deeper chasm in which to fall. This summer, I thought he had reached the bottom. After his OWI, Mom and Dad briefly moved him into an apartment closer to downtown so he didn't have to find a way to get downtown without a car. I checked on him regularly, but his sleeping schedule was way off, and it was hard. He had quit his job and was looking for work. He was focusing on substance counseling, and we were working on getting him to get mood treatment as well.

One evening, I took him out to dinner, and we listened to his music in the car. I had introduced him to Schubert's Death and the Maiden quartet, and he had put it on his phone. He thanked me for showing him the piece.

He had also discovered Mingus and Moanin'.

I think he said that Jordan had played it for him in New York. I can't imagine he had never heard it before given how many times Uncle Steve and I played and talked jazz with him, but this was an epiphany for him. It spoke to him.

I remember thinking that these two pieces were the sounds of his rock bottom. I thought he had nowhere to go but up, and he seemed to be looking that way. I had no idea how much further he would fall.

Knee-deep in Science

In the spring of 2011, Alan and I took a trip to Korea together. Our cousin Sunghoon and his wife were our gracious hosts. On the flight there, we were across the aisle from each other. Alan was next to a couple who had never had Korean food before, and he helped them figure out how to eat everything. I got stuck next to an elderly Chinese man who elbowed me for most of the flight, spoke no English or Korean, and yelled incessantly at the flight attendants whenever he wanted something.

We arrived at their tiny apartment late in the evening, and went out for samgyupsal, grilled pork belly, which was one of Alan's favorite foods. The next couple weeks were a whirlwind of activity, with us touring the east coast, the south coast, and the southeast, as well as Seoul and visiting our aunt in Daejeon. Despite this jam packed schedule, there was plenty of time, especially in the evening and morning when the two of us would talk in our room.

Alan told me about the delay -- his friends would count to ten before expecting a response and getting mad at him or repeating themselves. He had to stop smoking weed while we were there, but he was dismayed to note that he was "only 10% less spacy" clean.

He told me about how hard it was for him to start the day without a cigarette. Despite my wanting him to quit, I would pack the pack a few times, pull out a cigarette, set out an ashtray and lighter by the open window, and then wake him up. This was the only way we could get started each morning.

While we were there, Sunghoon, asked us why you couldn't say, "Oh my f---" in English, which he felt should be the obvious phrase to say for something more intense than "Oh my God." He charged us with trying to get it to take off in the US.

We compared music notes, and found a weird little overlap in Electro swing -- club and dance worthy electronic music with heavy Big Band and swing influence. When Sunghoon played it, we had never heard of it before, but it first grabbed Alan's attention, then mine.

I still can't figure out the words to this track -- Don't have a tiger, we're knee-deep in science?

When I returned (earlier than Alan, who stayed behind), there was a strange emptiness in my life. I remember thinking the world felt hollow back in Chicago. The same sights that brought me joy just didn't do it for me. For ten days, I just lacked my normal contentedness with life. Maybe it was Alan withdrawal. Maybe it was just jet lag. Maybe it was the let-down of ending that trip, full of amazing "Oh my f---" moments shared with my brother, and returning to the real world.

Theory

When Alan was an adolescent, he started to struggle to connect with Mom and Dad. Who doesn't? When things got really tense when I was visiting from college or from med school, I would drive him out to Barnes and Noble to let him calm down. I told him that I, too, had struggled at that age with them. It's hard to be mature enough to form all these thoughts, but not be mature enough to know when they don't matter. For me, it was Lynne Slattery Schroeder who first set me straight on that. For Alan, I felt it was my job. I told him that parents were like that -- that you couldn't change them, and that it was easier to change 5 hard things about yourself than one easy thing about someone else.

On the drive, we would listen to my Dave Brubeck CDs, and I started ear training with him. We talked about basic music theory. We used pieces with weird meters to practice hearing the beat.

Blue Rondo a la Turk, 9/8 broken up as 2-2-2-3/3-3-3:

Take Five, 5/4:

I think he played a version of this at his senior recital with Ed Hou and Ryley Crowe. I am waiting to get footage of this from our parents. I also played it with our jazz band, Gyrase, in med school. Too bad we never played it together.

Unsquare Dance, 7/8:

Later, Uncle Steve and his friend Jordan would introduce him to more jazz, but this was his start. Our sharing of music went both ways. He was always introducing me to new things, but this was something I introduced to him.

In retrospect, this was the beginning of our tradition of car conversations. It often felt like we were each other's co-pilots, driving through life together. I'm sure now, I'm not the only one feeling a bit lost without Alan in the passenger seat.