I cried early this afternoon; did so four or five days ago and for the same reason. A powerful reason but I don't intend to explain.
The crying had a strange leathery quality and was unnatural in that it didn't flow; there were times when I seemed to be forcing myself to cry. But the need was there, no doubt about that. And tears.
The sound seemed alien, quite unlike the crying I did as a child and in early adolescence. Might the noise I made today be affected by eight years of singing lessons? I simply don't know. But the mind-state was the same despite the passage of time; crying being the only way of expressing a very real sadness.
My next birthday will be my ninetieth; are nonagenarians prone to crying? I have to confess to a certain degree of self-awareness as I cried but in the end it may have worked A psychosomatic diminuendo, perhaps.
Can one cry to order? An interesting question.
Composed a lengthy comment. Lost it. More later.
ReplyDeleteIt seems like I’ve commented on crying here before - but maybe it was in an email to you. Describing that in recent years it’s almost always music that precipitates teariness. I haven’t had a real “blat” in quite a long time, but teariness with wet cheeks and an occasional chin drip is a weekly occurrence. I try to keep it subdued, as my wife is often present - though I’m certain she’s aware of my crying and thinks better of me for my sensitivities.
ReplyDeleteWhat cracks the valve to set tears brimming? It can be sadness or it can be joy - I suspect it’s mostly a combination of the two. Memories of events that once brought great joy may manifest later as nostalgic melancholy. When I listen to music I’m overwhelmed at the genius of its creation and performance. Making me vulnerable. And open to the cacophony from my subconscious - this may be why, when I’m merely wet eyed and sniffling, I feel I could probably let a few more voices in to “break down and cry”. But I haven’t truly experimented with doing it purposefully. Why not, when all experience indicates a sizeable relief may be found in a good howl? Why is it painful crossing that line?
Can one cry to order? I think it’s a highly valued skill in the acting trade - cuts down on scene disrupting edits caused by assistants rushing in with eye- droppers. I’ve never tried crying to order but I suppose there might be therapeutic value. Why does the manipulative value of crocodile tears come to mind first?
Maybe we fight back tears at times because we are afraid of what’s inside us, fully conscious that it’s a lot - maybe too much to allow the valve to be fully opened.
Of course there is grief that rips control away from us. Likely a natural therapeutic response. Googleable stuff I reckon -
MikeM: This demands thought and I'm preparing my mind.
ReplyDeleteMikeM: Yes, you had mentioned crying before and I was well aware that you are sensitive to music. Not so surprisingly I too respond physically to music but it tends to take the form of a restriction in my throat. One odd side-effect is that I respond emotionally to lyric sentiments expressed in German. This started a long time ago when I was familiarising myself with Beethoven's late string quartets - arguably his most profound works. Deafness and a tendency towards rage ensured that Beethoven's final years were miserable although he attempted to be philosophic where possible. One piece appears to ask the huge question "Muss es so?" (Must it be like this?); in a musical sigh he provides the answer "Es muss so." (It must be). There's a wealth of feeling in that tight brevity; I don't actually cry but - just seeing the words - makes me catch my breath.
ReplyDeleteSomething similar occurs in Schubert's song Gute Nacht which kicks off the Winterreise song cycle:
Die Liebe liebt das wandern
Gott hat sie so gemacht...
Love loves wandering
God made it so..."
Another reference to the Deity who's no friend of mine. And yet when I see that second line ahead of me on the score I have to work hard to avoid my singing voice becoming a croak.
Learning to sing, as opposed to merely listening to someone else singing, constantly brings about what James Joyce calls "epiphanies" (a sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something) especially when the answer to a musical problem transforms another part of the piece, often several bars away. For me the feeling of being blessed is inescapable; that music is "something other" and quite undefinable.
My two crying events, posted above, contained elements of horror and, virtually simultaneously, of sorrow and don't bear public analysis. Certainly a long way from crying to order. For the record my chest cavity felt hollow and this too may have changed my voice, if, in fact, crying is created by the voice. Now I recall the feeling it seemed possible that crying might rid me of these two enemies; a purging perhaps.
I rarely cry, but when I do it is akin to the deluge. I once went nearly a decade without crying, only to break down when I got a telephone call telling me one of my brothers died. It was immediate and without thought. When my mother died I didn't shed a tear, but for the next year I thought I would lose my mind with grief. I wonder if crying would have helped? I didn't like my father much, but at his funeral, in the church, I broke down when the angelic voice in the choir sang The Battle Hymn of the Republic. Why? Her voice was deep and the song was so familiar. Specifically, I cried because of the line "a wretch like me." It resonated. I also cried when the choir sang Schubert's Ave Maria at my daughter's first wedding. I wasn't sad. It was the song. Latin is a powerful trigger. Combine it with beautiful music and there I go.
ReplyDeleteTo cry is go that deep, to respond to emotion. I pretty much hate it, but when it overtakes me I know it is an appropriate response. I'm sure it can be forced to the surface if one needs to go there.
Colette: We share a twin reaction: closeness to our mothers, lack of enthusiasm for our fathers. My mother died in the UK, Christmas 1971,while I was living in the US. I'd been telephoned in warning about this by my brother, but the confirmation was delayed as were many transatlantic calls at Christmas in those days. When the news came I cried.
DeleteBack then I didn't even read poetry let alone try to write it. A decade passed and I'd changed. I posted this sonnet in my blog (then called Works Well) on September 10, 2009 and it remains the piece of verse that gets closest to my feelings at any time
A debt remembered
Pittsburgh, Christmas 1971
I waited, knowing the festivities
Would choke the flow of transatlantic calls,
Delays which brought their own blank auguries,
A prelude to the saddest of farewells.
“Ah… yes…”, my brother said, quite languidly,
Languor that looked for comfort in delay.
But what he added lacked necessity,
The link was cut and youth had gone astray.
She died within a distant older place
I’d left behind with callow eagerness,
Yet unrestrained by any false embrace,
Encouraged, taught, with chances of success.
She wrote, I write, but here’s the difference
No letters, now, to foil my ignorance.
Years passed, I'd returned to the UK and I regularly visited my father who was close to death in a nursing home. "Don't come if it's a burden," he said. I reckoned I'd have said the same if our situations had been reversed. "It's OK, it's not a burden," I said. Admittedly I didn't even come close to crying, but the sentiment was true enough.
We change, don't we? And often for the better. We should relish this.
Glad Schubert moved you. I've been heavily involved with him for several years. Oh wow, the discoveries!
Yes, we change. Thankfully, but usually without relish.
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