At the Harris

TRIO, my book about the Schumanns and Brahms, took 20 years from gleam in my eye to bird in hand. Sears (where I worked when I started writing the book) was then in the process of moving from the Tower to a distant suburb which would have entailed a daily commute of 4 hours to-and-fro. I chose to quit, complete the book, and look for another job after I finished—but Brahms took 500 pages just to be born. I tightened my money-belt, lived off savings in a studio with a view of a brick wall, and cut corners on everything. My time was spent primarily between my writers cell, the library, and Borders (for research). During the 3 years it took to write the first 1,800-page draft, I lost 20 pounds (saving on groceries) and gained a ponytail (saving on haircuts) and a long rolling beard. People stared on the street, friends called me Tagore, Tolstoy, Maharishi, Rasputin, and Rip van Boman. I was beginning to look like Brahms (except he never met a sausage roll or stein he could resist).

I was happy with the draft and swore never to work a fulltime job again as long as I had books to write, enrolling instead in half a dozen temp agencies for my bread and butter, none of which would find me employment unless I trimmed my beard and wore suits to work. The sad scared shellshocked corporate lackey you see below is from my ID at the Harris Bank where I worked for a while (after trimming and neatening the beard) in various capacities, once as a receptionist on the corporate floor on a day they were celebrating the birthday of a vice-president of the bank (balloons, cake, coffee, et cetera).

After the celebration was over and the lobby had cleared, the vice-president approached the reception desk, smiling, bemused, eyes downcast, a handsome man, perfectly coiffed/garbed/shod. “You know, I’m 47 years old, I have a lovely wife and family, a large home, a well-paid job, everything I might need, but I can’t help wondering what’s next.”

Not his exact words, but you get the drift. I don’t know why he chose to bare himself to me with my thinning hair, my greying beard, my ten-dollar suit, to ask what might be next for him, perhaps he felt like slumming, more likely he was just thinking out loud. I looked up as I replied—and these were my exact words: “I’m 48.”

His smile disappeared, he looked at me as if I’d suddenly come into focus, turned away without another word and vanished into the corporate offices behind me. I wouldn’t recognize him if I saw him again, but I had sometimes wondered if there would be life after TRIO. Thankfully, there was. I published it myself because agents/editors refused even to read it unless I cut it to the conventional 300-400 pages, but I had no wish to publish a conventional book and could not be gladder I stuck to my guns. Among other acclamations, Kirkus Reviews called it “A magisterial work … Astonishingly thorough research … A riveting dramatization of musical history,” giving it a starred review (awarded to just 5% of their reviews) and listing it among their Best Books of 2016. Almost as exciting, the Fresco Opera Theater Company of Madison, Wisconsin adapted it for a chamber opera.