|
I was asked to play my Sonatas and Interludes in the
home of an elderly lady in Burnsville, North
Carolina, the only person thereabouts who owned a
grand piano. I explained that the piano preparation
would take at least three hours and that I would need
a few additional hours for practicing before the
performance. It was arranged for me to start work
directly after lunch. After about an hour, I decided
to take a breather. I lit a cigarette and went out on
the veranda, where I found my hostess sitting in a
rocking chair. We began chatting. She asked me where
I came from. I told her that I’d been born in Los
Angeles but that as a child I was raised both there and
in Michigan; that after two years of college in
Claremont, California, I had spent eighteen months in
Europe and North Africa; that, after returning to
California, I had moved first from Santa Monica to
Carmel, then to New York, then back to Los Angeles,
then to Seattle, San Francisco, and Chicago,
successively; that, at the moment, I was living in New
York in an apartment on the East River. Then I said,
“And where do you come from?” She said, pointing to a
gas station across the street, “From over there.” She
went on to say that one of her sons had tried to
persuade her to make a second move, for now she lived
alone except for the servants, and to come and live
with him and his family. She said she refused because
she wouldn’t feel at home in a strange place. When I
asked where he lived, she said, “A few blocks down the
street.” |