Kalyn woke the next morning feeling much different. Her body moved with a smoothness that surprised her. She no more than sat up and it seemed the mere thought of getting out of bed sprang her body to the bedside. No leftover drowsiness, no waiting for her body to ease into the day. She stood there a moment thinking and wondering, when she heard her grandmother call her name. "I'll be right there" She washed her face in the basin and dried herself on the big fluffy cotton towel hanging on the chair near her bed. While dressing herself in a plain but well made smock and the tightly woven sandals she liked, Kalyn noticed a fluidity to her movements and a flexibility she hadn't felt since childhood . On her way out to the kitchen, the lightness of her steps brought the same wonder again, it seemed as if she weighed nothing and her legs and feet were moving magically without effort.
"You were restless in your sleep last night" Kalyn's grandmother was an erect, slim, and pretty woman having what might be described as a regal bearing. Many a shopkeeper had been bettered in a deal by her intense look and had their hearts softened by her kindness and beauty after-wards. "You were talking and making sounds, tell me what your dreams were" Grandmother sat down at the table with her tea, waiting.
It was then Kalyn remembered. The sound of the old warrior's training outside her window, her laying awake thinking about his movements, about what his life had been like before, and then the dreams. Kalyn began, " I dreamed I was traveling by boat over the sea to somewhere, the man...the captain steering the boat seemed familiar but I could not place him. There was a storm and we were in danger of sinking , I remember shivering, chilled by the rain and wind. Great mountainous waves lifted us up and we slid down the other side. Lightning and thunder jangled my fear. Among it all I remember the captain standing at the tiller, screaming laughter into all that chaos until the tears ran down his face." Kalyn also remembered--- after the storm, strong arms and hands carrying her to the dry cabin space under the foredeck, being dried off by those hands and laying under a wool blanket shivering with her clothes hanging over a lantern to get dry, a flush went to her cheeks, and she held that part back.
"Well, you must have survived, because here you are" Kalyn's grandmother was pointedly looking into the bottom of her teacup, she had the tiniest of smiles on her face.
Kalyn, more wary now lest Grandma divine unspoken truths, ah but it was only a dream, so she continued. "Yes, the boat did not sink. and then all of a sudden it seemed it was a hot day and we were upon a shore, the captain had steered up a small river and grounded the craft. This was a strange place even for a dream. Closing her eyes to better remember she went on "There were large white mountains crowded on either side of the river valley we had entered but even for all their wondrous beauty they carried the hint of a threat, some unsettling evil" Kalyn's voice choked when she said those last words and she struggled to remember but there was no more.
Kalyn's grandmother jerked her head up, alert, a single tear slid down her cheek. Her eyes were filled with love for Kalyn and something else too, it looked very much like fear.
Jazz
My experience with music has been one of a long journey to a level of understanding that there is always something more to be discovered. That nearly vacuuous statement is as close as I can get to the truth of it . Music is one of those things that keeps me reasonably sane. Trying to write stories, lyrics, and poems has given me a stronger appreciation for the difficulty of finishing these things when they erupt onto the page . It is quite hard to shape what is an emotional or fanciful product into something that makes some sense to another human being. The rules of musical expression are probably innate. There was an article in New Scientist , i believe, where the researchers traced part of the mind's musical experience to the area of the brain that controls our locomotion. The similarities in word usages , for movement and music are many, at least in English. Deep dreamy passages let you drift as of in a primordial sea, strident beats bring you back onto land ready for a long march to the next hunting ground. Jazz , for me , is often the bending of those rules of motion in earth-gravity and breaking into an alternate dimension where other rules apply......does that make any sense ? <