O Sister, Where Art Thou?

I have been fortunate indeed in my siblings.  I have two older brothers that I worshipped and adored (when I wasn't fighting them...) but just one sister.  I would sign her birthday cards, "Love, your favorite sister," to which she always replied, "I'm your only sister."  My sister and I are three and a half years apart, which was just enough for me to feel superior during those difficult teenage years.  But I always knew who was really the kinder, gentler, nicer human being.  When my parents would buy us both a candy bar, I would hide mine in my top drawer to sneak bites in private while she would break hers in half and give part to me.  If I was sick or just to tired to get off the couch she would bring me drinks, crackers, whatever I needed.  And in return for all this kindness, I suspect I was probably a supercilious jerk.

Not so, Nadia Boulanger, the most famous composition teacher of the 20th century.  She had a younger sister, Lili, for whom she solemnly promised at the age of 6 to care and protect.  Nadia aspired to be a composer, but it soon became evident that Lili had the greater talent.  Nadia nurtured and encouraged that talent.  A very young Lili accompanied Nadia to her music lessons and Nadia was her first composition teacher.  These efforts were not wasted as Lili became an outstanding composer of beautiful, delicate music with sweeping lines and passionate melodies.  Listen to this lovely Nocturne.  It is an excellent example of Lili's skill in controlling lush, post-romantic harmonies.  After Lili's early death at the age of 24, Nadia continued to program, perform, and promote her sister's music for the rest of her life.  Upon Nadia's death in 1979 at the age of 92 she was laid to rest in the same tomb as Lili, united once more.

Music proved to be the touchstone for my sister and me as well.  After I went off to college to study music and gain some maturity (thank heaven!) my sister and I became much closer.  We played Billy Joel together, her on the guitar and me banging away on the piano.  We played trumpet duets together, at which I was so terrible that she could hardly form an embouchure for laughing.  Most fun of all, I think, we sang harmony together, our particular favorite being an old Harry Belafonte song we heard on the Muppet Show in our childhood.  These opportunities to make music forged a lasting bond.

To create any work of art with another human being is to open your soul and share a piece of it.  This is a beautiful thing.  I now have many sisters from all walks of life who sculpt, paint, write, sing, direct plays, act in plays, play the piano, the list is endless.  As I have collaborated with each one I have changed and grown in ways that I didn't know I could.  This is the joy of the artistic sisterhood.  It doesn't matter if you consider yourself artistic or not, you can still experience this joy in the creation of a  meal or planting a garden.  There are many forms of expression, and they are all enhanced when they are shared with others.

So find a sister.  Take her under your wing.  Share your life and bless hers.  Nadia would be proud.

Lili Boulanger

Nadia Boulanger

If I Had a Hammer

"Don't blame Christ for the Christians."  So says one of the characters in The Parchman Hour, a riveting play by Mike Wiley about the 1961 Freedom Riders who rode interstate buses into the Deep South in an effort to end the illegal segregation of public transportation.  Many of them found themselves arrested and locked up in the Mississippi State Penitentiary, alias the Parchman Farm.  They were beaten, abused, and suffered an endless list of grievances.  At one point in the play when life has become unbearable for the inmates, one of the Freedom Riders wonders about the morality of Christ and the people who profess to worship Him.

I have absolutely no family connection to the Civil War, the Civil Rights movement, segregation, or Jim Crow laws.  Racial discrimination is not a part of my past.  While many of my neighbors' great-great-great-grand daddies were fighting for the North or the South, mine were settling the Rocky Mountain west.  They walked across the plains to Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming to be spared another notorious form of discrimination, religious.  My ancestors were apparently not Christian enough.  Evil twins, racial and religious discrimination both spawned lynchings, murder, mob violence, destruction of property, and innocent people forced from their homes.  As noted in The Parchman Hour, so much of it was perpetuated by those who claimed to be Christian.

My husband and I had a wonderful discussion after the play (art should always foster great discussions!).  We talked about how we don't understand that kind of hatred.  It is simply unfathomable to us that human beings would attack their fellow human beings over bus seats.  What are we, kindergartners? "Johnny's in my seat!" "No, I'm not!" "Yes, you are!" "No, I'm not!"  Childish, isn't it?  I have friends of many faiths including Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Wiccan, Judaism, and every flavor of Christianity, and not one of them is so despicable as to deny someone a bus seat, or a bench in a bus stop, a chair, a couch, a bed, a coat, or a pat on the back due to race or religion.

So who do we blame for the "Christians?"  Who do we blame for the Muslims who set off bombs?  For the Buddhists who marched prisoners to Bataan? Who do we blame for anyone who spreads the kind of intolerance we saw depicted in the theater?  It can only come from those whose narrow minds are afraid of change, afraid of learning something new, or afraid of someone who is different.  These are they who coach the rising generation in the ways of hatred.  To quote Oscar Hammerstein in the wonderful musical about prejudice, South Pacific, "You have to be carefully taught."

The Parchman Hour intersperses songs from the 1960's throughout the production.  One of my favorites has always been "If I Had a Hammer."  It's such a simple concept.  Get a hammer, and do something with it!  I found myself thinking after the performance, if I had a hammer I'd knock down some walls.  You know those walls that separate us from each other, things like bias, ignorance, grudges.  I'd take a whack at those first.  Then I'd start hammering on a few heads, just the especially hard ones, the ones full of war-mongering, rumor-making, strife-creating nonsense.  Finally, I'd use my hammer to build.  To build communities where we can all live, learn, and worship in peace and safety.

If The Parchman Hour comes to a town near you, go and see it.  It is an evening well spent.  You will sing, laugh, and be changed for the better.  Then go to Lowe's a buy a hammer.  All people regardless of race and all religions regardless of beliefs can contribute to make this world a better place.  As Stephen Schwartz tells us in his musical Godspell, "We can build a beautiful city, yes we can."

The Parchman Farm Women's Barracks

A hammer from Lowe's