Singing with Roy

My husband loves nothing so much as music. I believe he could be locked in a padded room with great music playing and be happy to the end of his days.

We’ve recently “learned” that our neighbors apparently like music too. I always play a CD while Bob eats breakfast; early this week he was in the kitchen groovin’ with The Greatest Hits of Roy Orbison. He came upstairs and told me, in a quiet voice (so they wouldn’t hear him), that the woman who lives behind us had brought “a whole bunch of children” and they were in our yard smiling at him as he stood at the sliding glass door singing. Unfortunately, I was too slow on the up-take and expressed my doubt. The day deteriorated because of my disbelief.

The next day he came and got me so I too could see the “maybe as many as 30” people who were out there still smiling with the music. We have a wooded back yard. I looked out. Trees. Greenery. Vaguely, as always, I could see the neighbor’s house. This time I was prepared: “It’s so good they’re smiling,” I said jovially. Bob was happy and nodded in time to Roy.

This morning as we sat on our front porch drinking coffee and enjoying the day, Bob looked down at our river rock and chuckled. “This dementia is so weird. It looks to me like the rocks are smiling.” We laughed, commenting on their good nature. As we got up to go inside, Bob jokingly leaned down to the rocks and said, “It’s ok, guys. At least I know you’re alive.”

Later in the kitchen, I asked, “You know how you were joking about the rocks off the front porch? Do you think that could be what’s happening here in the back yard with the people and the music?”


He glared at me from the doorway, said nothing, and left.