inspiration | Laura Bruno Lilly

Once again I find myself in Colorado visiting Dad while in the midst of record breaking weather. The Deep Freeze temps that usually occur during the National Western Stock Show in January have arrived earlier this year. Family and friends are beginning to joke about my visits bringing crazy weather; first the 1000 year flood and now this. If this keeps up, those same friends and family might not be so happy to hear of any further visits I’ll be making!

The unseasonably bitter cold has brought out concerns for the neighborhood stray cat where my brother and sister-in-law live. It seems there is this kitty who was once a beloved house cat, living an indoor life in a home just kitty corner (!) from my brother and sister-in-law. This lovely feline had an adoring owner who passed on about three years ago. Kitty’s inherited owner took no interest in claiming her, causing Kitty to become an unwilling outdoor cat.

As with most strays, she makes her daily rounds; surviving better than most because of her winning personality and because her territory is within a nice neighborhood. According to my brother, she is the perfect stray to take in and call your own. Kitty has tried to adopt various humans, but with little success. Mostly because she is technically someone else’s pet. In the case of my brother and sister-in-law, they accepted Kitty’s offer at one time, trying to incorporate her into the family. Unfortunately, the household’s menagerie of permanent and semi-permanent pets didn’t accept Kitty into their gang.

So adopting Kitty was not an option. Continue reading

Right now, this very moment, something normal, something comfortable, something so very ‘Family’ is happening: Dad is blowing his horn. After weeks of fooling around with re-organizing his music, the bane of us musicians which can become more procrastination than need, Dad’s got his groove on. He is blowing long tones on the mouth piece, testing out his own custom hand-shaved reeds, adjusting tension on the ligature; just about all the stuff a sax-man needs to get ready to start in on a serious practice session. Ahh, the riffs, the scales, the bits of favorite tunes, with squeaks here and there as attempts are made to blow those flashy odd harmonics, reachable only by a select and sacred few like my dad.

Dad in his new digs

Even with those super sax-man lungs he’s developed over the years, at age 90 Dad’s biggest hurdle at the moment is more with the stamina required to play a full set. And yet, I’d give it a couple weeks at the most for him to break through that temporary barrier.

Dad is my inspiration as a musician. Dealing with skin cancer on the top of his bald head, he loves to recount the story of how he got it in the first place…all my friends had to work days, but I got to lay out on the beach along Lake Michigan and sunbathe since I worked the clubs and joints at night. It’s almost a badge of professionalism for him, though he advises this generation to stay out of the sun.

A private moment

For the six years since Ma passed away, he put his sax down. While he kept up a semi-regular practice routine, his (he)art just wasn’t in it. In this difficult stage of his life, he laced up his dance shoes and began stepping to the music of others. An odd juxtaposition as the pull to play the music was ever nipping at his cha-cha heels.

Just two days moved into this Independent Living apartment and I get to listen to the sounds of my childhood, the background noises of everyday living in our home, the ever present music. Not from some recording or old radio show, but coming from the (he)art of our Family’s home: Dad’s horn.

Tag: inspiration (Page 8 of 8)

Story of a Kitty & Remembering Tripod

Dad's Got His Groove On

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