Inspiring Women SUMMER 2020

“But look, Robin, she does have your feet.”
At the funeral service I played a decent improvisation of the Canon in D on a freshly tuned
Steinway with a squeaky pedal and exited stage left. I picked up my suitcase and drove in a
procession with our niece and nephew to Cave Hill Cemetery.
Our nephew helped carry the casket to the grave and I wept, not as the Designated Mourner,
but as myself. I wept for the trajectory of age and the oblivious way we march into the chasm
of finality. One day you’re making French toast for your family, your kid is calling everyone a
sasshole, and the future—with its endless opportunities to make good trouble—stretches out
before you like an interminable game of hide and seek. Then the next day, it’s a spray of pink
roses, a couple of hymns that no woman with a normal voice can sing, and a hundred
resonating farewells.
The air felt cold enough to break me in two, but the defiant sun shone fiercely on the end
of an era.
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People hover in the airport lounge. Boarding begins for the privileged few. The rest of us stand
patiently and listen to the over-worked gate attendant recite his endless list of elite preboarders—first
class, business class, active military (thank you for your service), families with small
children, disabled, economy premium, non-active military (thank you for your service,) platinum
card, gold card, silver card, bronze card, and more military (thank you for your service).
No one, and I mean no one, boards the plane in any of these categories.
“All other passengers may now board the plane.”
Finally. Like a pack of defeated, economy-class sassholes, we, the other passengers—also
the only passengers—drag our weary selves onto the plane. No one thanks us for our service.
It’s February. In a few weeks all flights will be cancelled due to COVID-19. We settle in, naively
assuming that the perks and privileges of our peripatetic lives will go on forever, uninterrupted
by disease, death, and the destruction of our planet.
The canned music on the plane drones on for a few moments before I realize I’m hearing the
Canon in D. Not my recording, but a soulless midi-synth-string interpretation intended to soothe
our nerves as we prepare for flight. I hear the sound of a fake cello and drift off to sleep, right
before the plane lifts into the air.
Robin Meloy Goldsby's solo piano career has taken her
from Pittsburgh to posh New York City venues and
exclusive resorts, and on to the European castles and
concert stages where she now performs. Robin, a
Steinway Artist, has seven recordings to her name and
has appeared in the USA on National Public Radio’s All
Things Considered and Piano Jazz with Marian
McPartland. She is the author of Piano Girl; Rhythm; Waltz
of the Asparagus People; and Manhattan Road Trip.
Currently, Robin is the featured pianist at the Excelsior
Hotel Ernst in Cologne, Germany. Her newest recording is
called Piano del Sol and you can listen to it here : Piano
Del Sol
You can also visit Robin’s web page at www.goldsby.de.
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