Why I Owe My Present Life To A Cello

I had an idea once. It was just a silly idea, I thought. I didn’t know where it came from. It just popped into my head one day as I lay on the top bunk in a small camp-style wooden bunker in the outback of Australia.

My idea was to play the cello. I had never touched a cello or played one. I had never even thought about playing the cello before. Guitar, yes. Cello, no.

Who knows why it popped into my head, for I had just come in from the camp bathrooms. There, little green frogs with suction cups for fingers were jumping up at me from out of the toilet and huge, hairy spiders peered at me from their massive webs.

I marveled at the amount of creatures in Australia while walking back to my room.

Suddenly, a toad nearly the size of my head jumped towards me. I muted a scream as it launched its huge body in my direction again and again. Its thick, warty skin seemed impenetrable.

This toad somehow got situated right in my path. I had to leap over the toad’s damp, lumpy body. Fearing it would somehow follow me inside my cabin, I quickly scrambled inside and to safety on top of my bunk.

This is why I say, I don’t know why,”I want to play the cello” suddenly popped into my head as I lay there on my bunk.

“The sound” I told myself. “The sound is so mellow, so soothing, so deep and healing. I am going to play the cello.” I said in my head. Somehow I knew I would.

My trip to Australia continued for weeks and I couldn’t get the thought of a cello out of my head. It was just a thought, easily dismissed, but it wouldn’t leave and for some reason, I didn’t want it to.

This thought, this idea seemed important. So, I let it linger, thinking that when I got back home it would disappear.

Sometimes when you travel, odd things come to mind. Things like eating big bowls full of my mom’s coleslaw, for example. I used to dream about it and think about how delicious it was, and how I would eat big bowls full of it upon returning home. In reality, her coleslaw is amazing, but who eats bowls full of coleslaw?

I thought that the cello was just another coleslaw-type thought.

Upon returning to the states, however, my cello obsession continued. I pursued going to school to play cello, and checked into taking lessons.

I began hearing all the cello pieces in the music I had listened to a thousand times before and began talking about it constantly. I was on a mission. A cello mission!

One day, my sister called and said I should come to visit her at college. Knowing of my love of the cello she said, “There is this boy, I think you would like him,” she said, “He plays the cello.”

That was all I needed. I was off like a shot.

That boy did play the cello and I fell in love with that boy.

He let me borrow his cello and I played for hours listening to the soothing hum of the strings. I let the notes gently finger my soul, bringing much needed healing. There are some words that are said with music that the human language can’t ever touch.

I married that boy, that boy and his cello. The funny thing is that neither I or he, have played the cello since.

It was sold, that cello, to buy my ring. And my obsession with the cello ended. Just like that. I still loved the sound, but the importance, the lull, the woo of the cello, for me, had left.

It was like it had fulfilled it’s purpose in my life and had therefore left.

The cello obsession led me down the path to meet my Michael and the rest is history.

Sometimes I think back to that original thought I had of the cello, the idea, the picture in my mind. I wonder what would have happened had I dismissed the idea as stupid or put off pursuing the cello because of fear or lack of money or a million other excuses?

The cello dream played a very important role in my life. It opened my eyes to my present love and, had I not been so obsessed with the instrument he played, would he have caught my eye as he did? Maybe, maybe not.

What I learned from my story is that ideas and dreams are put in our heart for a reason. Not pursuing them is equivalent to a long slow death.

They tickle at our ears, they keep coming up over and over, and the more we push them down, the more they seem to bubble up. They squeeze out through cracks, they ooze from us whether we want them to or not.

They don’t go away.

What happens to unfulfilled dreams and ideas anyway? Do they just shrivel up and die or do they appear again and again as depression, anxiety, high blood pressure, or cancer?

They start to fester when they are not pursued.

Dreams and ideas are placed in our hearts for a reason. A very important reason, which can never be seen from the outset. It can’t be seen because our lives are a story, you know? And any good story has suspense and drama.

So, who knows who you will meet or where your dreams and ideas could take you if they are just given the wings of action to fly.

Think about it.

Question: What are your thoughts on this most interesting topic, I would love to hear! Leave your comments in the comment section.