Reality Check

Slipping in and out of reality like bouncing around in a roller coaster, the crippled, elderly man with a long, silvery beard sat quietly on the edge of a park bench and smoked his long pipe.

“It is truly a magnificent world, my old friend,” he said with a smile, as he reached his gnarled, arthritic hands to caress the black violin case leaning against his right knee. “Just making sure you are still here.”

The soft spoken, gentle man, attired in a spotless white shirt, a striped grey tie and out-dated business suit gazed at his shiny, black shoes. Now and then, he pulled his pocket watch out of his vest pocket, as if there were urgent matters that needed his attention at a specific time.

After a while, he put out his pipe, cleaned it and placed it in his jacket pocket.   

“Who is that old man?” a young girl asked her mother, when he waved at them as they walked past.

“Never mind,” replied her young mother, pulling her daughter’s arm.    

“I like him!” the girl replied. Her mother said nothing and walked faster. “Mommy, I can not keep up with you!”

“Marley,” said the old man. “You and I have had a lot of good years together. I miss your canary voice, but I know that you are singing with the angels. May I listen in? You know I can hear you.”

He picked up his violin case, placed it carefully on the park bench beside him and opened it up. There was an old violin and a bow inside.

“Marley, your singing is so beautiful to my ears. Give me a moment while I tune up my violin and I will play something especially for you.” 

He took a box of rosin out of his pocket and rubbed it on the strings of the bow.

“There, that is so much better”.

He rubbed the rosin up and down his violin strings, as well. “Don’t tell anyone that I do that. It might give them a heart attack. Now I have to tune up my old friend.”

To a young man who walked by, it looked like he was chatting with someone sitting right beside him while he tuned his violin.

“I won’t disturb him,” the young man decided, as the old man seemed to be reasonably content. “I wish my world was that peaceful,” he said to himself as walked on.    

“Marley, do you remember me telling you that rosin comes from the sap of pine trees? In case I forgot to tell you, now you know. We had such beautiful pine trees and we used to sit under them together. Can you recall that? We were so much in love at that time and I have never stopped loving you. I never will either.”

Moments later, the old man began to play his violin with a sound so sweet and pure that it could melt anyone’s heart, but there was no one there to listen to it.

“Sing this song with me, Marley, the old man insisted. “You know how much I love to hear you sing.” He started to sing with a beautiful tenor voice, as he played his violin. In his mind’s eye, she was singing along with him too. “That sounds so beautiful, Marley. Never stop singing to me.”

A tiny bird on a nearby tree branch chirped happily, as the old man played his violin and sang one song after another.

“Marley, Sebastian is back sitting here in his tree again, singing along with us. He has been with us for so many years. I know you can hear him. If I remember correctly, he was the one who taught us to sing, right? Oh, those were the good old days.”

The old man began to play again, this time even more beautifully as he went through one old classic after another.

“Marley, one day they told me that I must have been born a gypsy, because only gypsies can play like that. We were pretty good dancers then too, remember? I can still picture you in your beautiful blue dress. Did I ever tell you that someone said you were a gypsy too? No one except me knew that you always preferred to dance in your bare feet. I have never taken my shoes off to dance. In fact, I almost never take them off except at bedtime. It is not that I did not want to go barefoot then. Oh, I guess I took my shoes off when we went swimming in the pond together. Sebastian, did you know that?”

The old man’s world was entirely his own, other than for Marley, the old violin he considered to a friend and Sebastian. To him, it was a real and a happy world where he was free, unlike the worlds of others who also lived where he resided.

“Our world is real, right Sebastian?” His eyes lit up. “Watch, Marley is dancing in her blue dress! Her feet are bare too. I know that you can see her.”

Sebastian chirped in response to his words. The old man knew every song by heart and just kept right on playing while Sebastian sang right along with him, for several hours.

“Marley, you still sing as sweet as a canary. You can sing for me forever. Sebastian, you are a good little singer too, but of course, you always have been.”

Finally, the old man put his violin away and closed his eyes for a moment.

“Mommy, that old man is still here. Can we talk to him now?”

“No, dear,” insisted her mother and walked by him, as quickly as possible.

The young man did not stop to talk to him either.

A short while later, a middle age woman wearing a nurse’s uniform came and sat down next to him. The bird fluttered away immediately.

“Have you been visiting with Marley and Sebastian again today, Pierre?” she asked the old man. “Let’s go. It is time for dinner and we cannot be late. Marley would not like that.”

The old man, smiled at her, as she helped him to his feet.

“May I carry your violin for you?” she asked him kindly.

The old man was not about to surrender his treasure to anyone and pulled away from her as she tried to take it. Pierre always insisted on carrying it himself. Together, they strolled back to the retirement home.

“Pierre is off in his own world again,” she told another nurse seated at the nurse’s station.

“Do you have his medication ready?”

 “I will bring it in shortly. Help him to wash his hands and face that then take him into the dining room,” she responded. “It is fine as long as he does not harm himself, or anyone else. It never hurts to do a reality check once in a while though.”