playing piano after 14 years

in this time of quarantine, I have found myself in an old Japanese library-house with a piano. I rarely leave to go outside (except to wander through rice paddies and see the sakura trees). my entire life happens blissfully inside four walls. so, I have started to play the piano again — after fourteen years of not playing it.

certainly, I have passed by pianos in other places, other houses. but there was always resistance in my mind that kept me from touching the instrument. it is a big instrument. I played piano from age 7, then moved away from my piano teacher at age 14, when I began to play the flute — which I did intensively until age 18.

in high school, I had many friends who were far more accomplished pianists; they played the Rachmaninoff concertos I had dreamed about, brushed off their skill like it was nothing — and their Chinese mothers were very, very proud. I decided to let them do their thing, and I would do my thing. I decided that I was not a pianist.

the last time I touched the piano was freshmen year of college. there was a grand piano in our student dorm hall. I met a guy there who was in the double program of Columbia-Julliard, and for many evenings, I listened to him play virtuosic, mesmerized.

I had brought one piece of sheet music with me from North Carolina — Chopin’s Nocturne No 20 in C# minor. I think I played it for him, but I was really embarrassed. playing an instrument I hadn’t touched in 4 years (and having no major accomplishments or awards for it) in front of a Julliard student… to say that I didn’t feel enough would be an understatement.

but now.

I spend my days alone in this Japanese house with a piano. I felt distinctly aware of how different things are now. how differently I feel. there was no one watching me, no one judging me. no recitals to prepare for, no competitions to enter, no friends to compare myself with, no parents and no teachers to please.

it was just me. the music. and the black and white keys.

and you know what, it was so freeing — so freeing, on so many levels. to remember the sensation in my fingers, to practice scales from the beginning, to find the Chopin and Rachmaninoff pieces that I’ve heard thousands of times — and download the sheet music to my iPad.

there was no teacher telling me what I could and couldn’t play — what was too difficult for me — and there were no peers to compare myself against. there was no where to go with my piano, nothing to do. I was simply being. relishing this time when I have the luxury of a house with a piano. feeling into how this instrument — unlike the flute — was big and expansive enough to be a channel for the wide range of my emotions.

now, I am playing piano again after fourteen years — after leaving home and moving to New York, after quitting two jobs and falling in love and heartbreak, after playing the flute, quitting the flute, then playing it again — after building a writing practice, an art practice, throwing pottery, dancing tango, starting a business — after packing my bags and leaving New York City and coming here, to this old Japanese library house with a piano.

it’s just me and the piano, alone in a room. the keys are sticky and slightly out of tune. my hands have to remember the feeling. it’s hard to play. but I feel such deep joy. such pure bliss. a sense of infinite possibility and endless potential. each time I play, it’s like I’m saying: I’m here. and I’m ready to surrender myself to you again.