SING, PLAY, DANCE

Dear Spike:

Your Uncle Mikey arrived this week, carrying an enormous keyboard under one arm and two guitar cases in the other.

That's good news for you, because while your mother and father have a diverse array of talents, music isn't our strong suit. So when Mike takes care of you during the days when I'm called away to work, I've asked him to play music for you — and with you.

We're not the only species on this planet that makes music, but there's no other animal that has figured out how to do it with such diversity. We make music with our mouths and with our hands, with simple percussion tools and elaborate wind instruments, with wood and brass and plastic, with electricity and with digital ones and zeroes.

I once visited an Alzheimer's home where music was being used as a conduit to people whose minds had otherwise been lost to the present world. Music is good for your brain.

I once heard a muezzin call the faithful to prayer in Iraq's volatile west desert. In the city of Ramadi, where everything stopped at sunset for fear of death, his song continued on. Music is good for your soul.

And today, every time I hear you sing — your sweet little voice rising and falling, mostly in tune — I fall in love with you all over again. Music is good for your heart.

Sing, play, dance and humm. Whistle, tap, snap and clap.

Moan and chant. Scream if you must.

Make music. And don't ever stop.

Love,
dad