The lullaby game

When I was three years old my parents moved from the little A-frame house my father built in Columbia, Missouri to a remodeled garage on my grandparents' Pleasant Hill farm.

That move was hard on our family, though I remember little about it. Aside from two or three vague memories, all I know about the transition comes from the stories my mother told me later.

Living in that tiny remodeled garage with an infant, a toddler, and a pre-schooler was hard on my mother, as well. I don't remember that, either.

But I remember a corner of the bedroom my brothers and I shared. I remember a crib piled with quilts and too many stuffed animals. I remember a worn beige carpet, stained and overdue to be vacuumed, Alexander's dark blue eyes wide and serious above his snub baby nose and pacifier. I remember a nightlight casting a soft little glow in our room each night, and I remember what it was like to curl in my father's arms while he sang to us.

Not even my parents could tell you exactly when the singing began. I suppose it didn't begin at all. My father is a man who sings. From the moment they knew I existed, as a tiny, squirming creature cradled in my mother's womb, it was only natural that some of his songs should have been for me.

Some of them were songs that are sung to children. 'Over in the Meadow', 'The Gunnywolf song'. But mostly, my father left the children's songs to my mother. The things my father sang were strange, and haunting, and mysterious. Songs that no one would ever dream of as lullabies. Before I knew what they meant, I was in love with these songs.

I remember my father as he was those nights- boyishly dark haired and handsome, laughing and warm as the three of us crowded against his knees like eager puppies. We would sit on the floor, on the awful beige carpet, in the soft golden shadows of the nightlight, and each of us would choose a song. There were stories as well, on especially good evenings.

But those songs, those songs, where did they come from? I never began to ask myself until recently.

Because he loved the old musicals, he would sing to us from those. I remember his fine, rich tenor voice crooning 'Wouldn't it be Loverly?', and 'Sunrise, Sunset' .

'Sunrise, sunset

Sunrise, sunset

Quickly fly the years;

One season following another,

Laden with happiness and tears.'

"Someday, Shalucie bug, I'll sing it at your wedding. My little girl is growing so fast."

Folk music, rebellious music came to us as well, laden with hidden messages. 'Waltzin' Matilda', 'Charlie on the MTA', 'You Can Close Your Eyes'.

'Listen children to a story, that was written long ago

'Bout a people on a mountain, and the valley folk below

On the mountain was a treasure, buried deep beneath a stone

And the valley people swore they'd have it for their very own...'

'When I was a young man I carried my pack

And lived the free life of a rover

From the Murray's green basin to the dusty outback

I waltzed my matildas all over.

But in 1914 my country said 'Son,

Tis time to stop ramblin' there's work to be done'

They gave me a tin hat and gave me a gun

And sent me away to the war...'

I always felt like crying when we came to the end of the song, and the legless old man watched his elderly comrades hobbling along in the parade:

'And the young people asked 'What are they marchin' for?

And I asked meself the same question.'

It was not for so many years that I came to understand the significance of the singer's question. But the question, and the answer, and the bloody beaches of Suvla bay were a part of who I was long before that.

One that I remember most clearly (yet there were so many that are woven into me as tightly as threads in a well-made Persian carpet) is an old, wistful anti-war tune.

'Where have all the flowers gone?

Long time passing

Where have all the flowers gone?

Long time ago

Where have all the flowers gone?

Picked by young girls, every one

When will they ever learn?

When will they ever learn?...'

I begged for this song again and again. As a three year old, and four year old, and even twelve year old, I couldn't put into words what spoke to me in the lyrics. I hadn't the faintest idea what it was that the girls, and the boys, and the soldiers were never learning. I couldn't explain the comfort I pulled from the song's full circle- from flowers, to soldiers, to graveyard, and flowers again. I only knew that it was true, even before I knew what it was I was knowing.

Looking back, I realize that everything I became as an individual, everything I value and respect, all the strange and unorthodox opinions I formed :-P began with the songs my father sang to me. I find the core of our relationship in those memories as well. My love and admiration for him, longing to please him, were born in the warm circle of his arm around me, the flickering halo of the night light, the incomprehensible magic of his voice:

'And if you smile and you say 'Well things were different back then'

Well you have to remember, they were only just men.

There's a lesson for the learning for the likes of you and me.

Just have a little faith and you'll see.'

'Well the sun is slowly sinkin' down

And the moon is rising

And this old world will still keep turnin' round

And I still love you, I still love you.'

When my mother wonders how her daughter became a firebrand, a rebel, a pacifist, a dreamer, and a fierce independent, she can remember the crooning melodies that floated from our room each night, and my humming as I played with my toys- remember how I memorized every word of each song as the years passed, until, when my father faltered or stumbled over the lyrics, I was able to carry us along.

In our own ways, though perhaps to different degrees, my two brothers and I are both shaped deeply by my father's singing. His strange, surprising lullabies made windows for us into worlds and ideas our childhood friends never encountered. Being on the other side of an ocean makes these memories come back vividly, as I miss him more than I ever have in my life.

I've been thinking about this all day, because I just learned a song which reminds me of my father. A song which one day, should I have children of my own, I will sing to them in the cozy shadow of a crib. Because even if it takes them half their lives to learn what it means, I want words like this to be burning like golden seeds in their hearts from the beginning, waiting to blossom in that far away time known as 'when I grow up'.

If you'd rather hear it for yourself, here's the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbwQXVcbkU0

(I have a feeling that my father used to listen to Pete Seeger. Something about their singing feels alike, though I can't pinpoint the similarity.)

Die gedanken sind frei
My thoughts freely flower
Die gedanken sind frei
My thoughts give me power
No scholar can map them
No hunter can trap them
No man can deny:
Die gedanken sind frei

I think as I please
And this gives me pleasure
My conscience decrees
This right I must treasure
My thoughts will not cater
To duke or dictator
No man can deny:
Die gedanken sind frei

Tyrants can take me
And throw me in prison
My thoughts will burst forth
Like blossoms in season
Foundations may crumble
And structures may tumble
But free men shall cry:
'Die gedanken sind frei!'