The power of music

In the inauguration proceedings today there was a musical interlude between the V.P.'s swearing in and that of our new President.  It was a simple instrumental involving a piano, clarinet, cello, and violin, by well-known musicians.  Except for the first of this list, I never had any interest or education in these instruments.

Maybe it was the moment, but as they played this simple piece I realized just how beautiful these notes sounded and just how moving this moment in time was.  There are times when sentiment overcomes me, like the time that my sister's future father in law, at their rehearsal dinner,  showed slides of my sister and her future husband as they grew up.  I don't remember the music, but it was exactly appropriate.  On an anniversary of John Lennon's death, I happened to hear Garrison Keilor sing a rendition of "Imagine".  There is something about the intersection of time and music that can strike a chord within me that opens the floodgates.  This doesn't happen often--when it does, though, it's burned in my memory forever.

 As today's performance ended I realized that my face was awash in happy tears.