As the Percocet depression gradually dissipated (with a short foray into antibiotic depression, when my cheek puffed up from a possible infection and my doctor’s partner, who I’d never met before, put me on a really strong antibiotic that was maybe overkill), I slowly started to get back to a regular routine: organizing the pile of clothes draped over my semi-recumbent bike, looking through all of the notebooks on my bedside table, and starting prep work for my next novel. I thought I would be doing at least one macaroni song per week by now too (writing new lyrics to an existing song, as a way to get used to song structure and try out an activity for my students), but I keep losing my nerve and going back to the research stage hoping to re-find my nerve.
Getting back to voice practice was also a process. I started with humming at first, afraid to open my mouth and risk re-opening the barely healed stitches, but now I’m back to doing the full session of vocal exercises and song experiments, lip trills and all. I can’t imagine what people passing my window must be thinking, with all of that “Ha ma ma” and “Kee kay kah koh koo” and “Videe videe vee” and “Doo vah doo.” I try not to think about it too much. I was even able to go to the first choir practice of the year (also the only one of the summer). I can’t tell if my tone has improved, but I didn’t run out of air or struggle to reach a note for the full hour and a half, so something might be working.
Unfortunately, I’m also back to watching the news. I really should know better, but I keep worrying that the world is going to collapse overnight and I’ll be the last one to know, and the last one to get to the supermarket for my share of the toilet paper and canned beans. The rising antisemitism has been snowballing lately, with Trump throwing Israel under the bus in his Iran deal, and the new mayor of New York city calling AIPAC (the American political action committee that advocates for Israel) “monsters.” If he were calling all political action committees that spend money on American elections, “monsters,” I might have been able to discount it, but that’s not what he said. AIPAC has become one of the best-known PACs, not because it spends the most money, or because it’s the most powerful or the most successful, but because it supports Israel, and Israel seems to have become a dirty word. Mamdani, who makes a point of saying that he has lots of Jewish friends and supports the many Jews who live in New York city, campaigned on his anti-Israel views; not just anti-the-current-government-of-Israel, or their decisions around the war, but anti the existence of a Jewish state at all. I’m not sure where he thinks the line is between the Jews he likes and the Jews he can’t stand, but I’m pretty sure I know which side of the line I’m on. And now he’s successfully supporting candidates who are even more virulently antisemitic than he is (or at least than he openly acknowledges), and the Democratic party seems to be going along with him.
For my sanity, I’ve been watching recordings of the Harry Styles concerts on YouTube, first in Amsterdam and now in London, if only to see what he wore at the latest show (I’m not a fan of the short shorts, but the shirts and ties are very cool). It’s hard to hear his voice in the clips from Wembley Stadium, but he did a one-night concert with an orchestra, as part of his Meltdown festival in London, and sang a cover of Simon and Garfunkel’s Bridge Over Troubled Waters that was truly beautiful. I’m not the right audience for the synthesizer distortions on his new songs, or the way he runs laps around the stage (because I can’t relate to having that much energy), but when he sits down at the piano to sing, I’m there.
One day I’d love to write a song that captures something I can’t express in any way other than music, but for now it feels like there’s a lion standing guard by the gate, warning me away. In the meantime, I’m finding comfort in other people’s music, and in checking in on Harry Styles’ latest fashion choices, and even in singing along.
Harry Styles & Jules Buckley Orchestra – Bridge Over Troubled Water – https://youtu.be/dO7zAwhaQbM?si=39jREgLWB2-eQolV
If you haven’t had a chance yet, please check out my novel, Yeshiva Girl, on Amazon. And if you feel called to write a review of the book, on Amazon, or anywhere else, I’d be honored.
Yeshiva Girl is about a Jewish teenager on Long Island, named Isabel, though her father calls her Jezebel. Her father has been accused of inappropriate sexual behavior with one of his students, which he denies, but Izzy implicitly believes it’s true. As a result of his problems, her father sends her to a co-ed Orthodox yeshiva for tenth grade, out of the blue, and Izzy and her mother can’t figure out how to prevent it. At Yeshiva, though, Izzy finds that religious people are much more complicated than she had expected. Some, like her father, may use religion as a place to hide, but others search for and find comfort, and community, and even enlightenment. The question is, what will Izzy find?
rachelmankowitz 