Greenwich Village, November 1985—Photo by C. Statella
No social media and the Dream of the ‘80s
NYC, an arts therapies coalition conference. I managed to make it to one session given by an ultra-Freudian art therapist. Pedantic, pastel challenges from the floor: “how is this practical?”
I saw the exit, and bolted. Although I had liked her black dress.
Wind blasting. The city was gritty, the air was so cold. Walking walking, snapping Life on the sidewalks. Then at night, the Palladium called. Hypnotized, scandalized. I’m afraid I wasn’t very edified by this trip… in the way you’d think.
Except~~
Something crossed my field of vision regarding Therese Schroeder-Sheker. This wasn’t music therapy. Something wholly different, holding the Unseen.
A voice crossed my mind: “Not yet.”
Decades. Growing up, down, sideways. Eventually, her book Transitus nestled on my bedside table. For comfort, I read a little bit each night during my parents’ four-year-long passage.
Contemplative Musicianship Program under her supervision? Yes (after an extensive application period)!
Contemplative. But also a descent. Emerging three years later, “Carol, what have you been up to?” (And what do you have to show for it?)
“I’m sorry, I can’t sum it up easily.”
Pandemic.
A few years later, we’d stayed in touch, warmly. I re-designed her site. Sometimes, I feel I’ve barely begun to metabolize what rose within me in ‘85, that “urge for going.”
Last week, a new launch—Therese’s colleague and friend, music-thanatologist and poet Sharon McBride Murfin. Just in time for the turning in, for the silence.
One thing about the ‘80s: Such a flawed time, but dreamy in countless ways.
One thing that’s so different: Screens didn’t trivialize and distort our human-to-human-ness—shattering us from within. BASTA.
As long as I live and move in the online space, I hope it’s in service to being in the real. Otherwise—why?
Now, to~~
