A Novella in installments, tracing the intermingling autobiographies of a boy and a violin, spanning over a century. The previous episode is right here. To find any episode, look here.

(The protagonist posing with some old friends.)

(3) – Buried Alive and Resurrected in Albany, 1897

It felt like I was entombed forever, many days I would guess. I had to guess because it was so uniformly dark all the time. Not only was I sealed tight in my coffin, but this in turn was placed inside another enclosure and it was sealed. Then I was carried, coffin, enclosure and all to some big thing, which hissed occasionally, by a whistling man — the only sound I could make out — and placed against some sort of wall inside something else. Other things were piled against my sides. And I waited. Then a very loud metal bang happened and a great whooshing sound gathered in volume, and I started moving. The entire place I was in began moving. I did not know if I was being transported to a mass grave or not. Then something almost pleasant happened. The whooshing sound built into a soothing steady rhythm. Whatever moving thing I was in was accompanied by a SH-SH-SHUKKA sound, like when heavy rains would hit the roofs of my dark wall room at night time. It was peaceful and made me stop worrying. Maybe some kind humans created this sound to calm us down enroute to our mass ritual burials, and that was comforting to know about.

The soothing sound kept going for a long time. Mostly we moved in straight lines but sometimes we bent our path. And twice we even stopped, and I could hear distant noise and activity, but after a short while the whole thing would resume, and the anxiety departed. Until at last we had a very definite slowdown and stop. There were loud hissing whistles and clanging, and even the sliding metal door banged open. I could hear outside, and a man was singing in a loud slow voice: ALL-BUH-NEEEE. ALL-BUH-NEE. I began to entertain the hope that I was not condemned to die.

After many short and medium-length trips, and stranger’s voices, and being carried hither and thither by rough and gentle hands, I was delivered at last to a much more peaceful place. At one point even voices could be heard singing, and it became cooler in my many containers and by the sounds of things I surmised I was outside. Then I was shifted at an angle and I heard firm knocks upon a wooden door. ‘Who is it?’ a pleasant lady asked and the person who was nearest to me, carrying me, answered ‘Sears & Roebuck, special delivery, ma’am. In time for Christmas.’ The door opened and I was handed over to the lady and carried within.

The man left and the door closed. I was immediately surrounded by the most delightful cooking smells, warm and deep and inviting. The humans at my first living place were always eating sandwiches, they called them, and they carried no appeal for my senses whatsoever. But this food — it was definitely either food or I wanted ot to be — was positively downright heartwarming. I was later to learn it was Beef Wellington and beetroots and something called plum pudding. Music filled the air, sweet, depth-filled music of many tambres and dynamics, now swelling and now fading to lovely hushed tones. I was in some kind of paradise, albeit locked up in enclosures. I was placed, more lovingly this time, behind something, but still within earshot and fragrance-shot of the goodness nearby. And more hours passed and I think two full days. Sometimes voices came past, nearby, running higher-pitched voices. And a deeper but friendly voice also on occasion. All told I counted four different humans, cooperating and inhabiting this place, this edifice. I do not know their purpose or occupation, but it seemed clear that the lady was the one who was performing the most actions and making the music resume whenever it paused, and also producing those delicious food smells.

Then finally, at darkness time when things became more quiet and the higher voiced ones dissappeared, my container was lifted, and I heard a sawing cutting sound. My outermost box was being opened. I heard a sigh of pleasure. My coffin was then lifted up into the air and very quickly the lock latches on my coffin were clicked and my lid lifted and light flooded into my face for the first time in forever. It was a warm glowing light. I saw candles and oil lamps glowing across the room, There was a pine tree smell filling the air. The man, kindly and about forty with thick unruly black hair and glasses, lifted me by my sides and neck gently out of my coffin. “Well-constructed case”, he mentioned. The lady, beside him in the most beautiful dark green sweater, exclaimed ‘oooh, how pretty it is’. I blushed cause I realized she meant me instead of the coffin-case thing. I was turned over and examined, eliciting more ooohs, and then turned back afront and the man plucked all four of my cords in sequence. And I had the heaven feeling inside again, like in my first place with the whitecoat man. ‘They will love this, I hope’, said the lady. And the man said ‘This will be in our family for many many years.’ Then I was turned about whereupon I saw an enormous tree, green and decorated with all manner of confusing trinkets. The source of the wonderful fragrance flooding the air. But the tree was not in earth, but in the room, its base held firm in a pot of water. I was placed upon a stand under the boughs of the tree. And the concave arrow thing with horsehairs was placed right beside me upon a hook. Strangely, the coffin was placed next to me at my feet. To my right lay a number of mystery boxes covered with shiny paper in all sorts of colors. ‘A grand Christmas tree, with bonnie gifts’, the man said appreciatively to the lady.

I am a gift! I was to be a gift. A gift destiny.

_______RS

NOTE: The next episode, if it exists yet, is right here. To find any episode, look here.

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