falling apart, and back together

My body has been slowly deteriorating. It started with a mild cold last week (a runny nose and stuffy head don't faze me too much). Wednesday night escalated to a "whopping" ear infection (in the words of the doctor I visited yesterday). To top it off, I got a small chunk of glass stuck in my index finger this morning while I was cleaning. Despite the bodily setbacks, my optimism has not been subdued. Perhaps the best remedy for physical maladies is indeed chamber music, of which I had two doses this week: one quartet gathering, and one marvelous viola quintet session.



(Fortunately my quartet--and the additional violist that joined us--does not share the same fashion sense of the above ensemble)

The happiest moment of my week would be a tie between the road trip to Boston on Monday (and specifically our historical sight-seeing excursion) and drinking wine with other musicians while watching Heifetz perform ever-so-effortlessly. Absolute bliss...

My eyes already touch the sunny hill.
going far ahead of the road I have begun.
So we are grasped by what we cannot grasp;
it has inner light, even from a distance--

and changes us, even if we do not reach it,
into something else, which, hardly sensing it,
we already are; a gesture waves us on
answering our own wave...
but what we feel is the wind in our faces.

-Rilke

Why does everyone run when it rains? Water is harmless, and the gentleness of it falling in one rushing hush makes me want to take my time and absorb it all.