Someone asked me today whether I take piano requests.
I don't. I cannot. I lack the skill to read music or play things I don't know.
Their request was "I Vow To Thee My Country."
Even if I took requests I'd refuse to play that.
All earthly things above
Entire and whole and perfect
The service of my love
The love that asks no questions
The love that stands the test
That lays upon the altar
The dearest and the best
The love that never falters
The love that pays the price
The love that makes undaunted
The final sacrifice."
For my country? No.
For any country? No.
That's a kind of dangerous nationalism that we could do without if we want to see global compassion, an end to war, an inclusivity in love and a liveable future for the generations we hope will follow us.
A country is an artificial. It's exclusionary. Our country has a very dodgy history with regards to lots of other countries and geographical areas that were there before we decided to cut them up. A country implies the separation of humanity, especially when language like this is applied to it. A country is the way of them and us. How can we vow all earthly things to something as objectively meaningless, small, and temporary as a country?
For humanity? For the planet? For seeking to grow into compassion? For the safeguarding of an ecologically viable future? Possibly. Possibly not because I'm not good at all at living out any kind of socially saintly life even close to the small ways in which I'm potentially capable.
But even if offering myself for the planet or for compassion then there would be questions. To give up questions is to lose freedom, to lose individuality, to lose part of our own beauty. To give up questions is the way of the cult.
There wouldn't be jumping into death undaunted either. There wouldn't be sacrificing the dearest. There would be faltering. There wouldn't be perfection because nobody can promise that. And there wouldn't be a vow. There would only be giving what can be given, with limitations of health, mind and physical resources.
There would be encouragement and despair and anger at the behaviour of the leaders of the country who so often stand in the way of the future. And while there would be "the service of my love" mostly there would be tiredness and a head and body that aren't particularly reliable.
It's an impossible vow for anyone to make.
It's an immoral vow for anyone to make.
I didn't say any of that of course. Partly because it wouldn't have helped in any way, merely brought division and turned to people across a table into two countries across a border. Partly because I'd have inevitably parted company with tact. And partly because I felt physically rotten and a bit dissociative at the time and speaking at all was very hard work, as it often is. Writing has sometimes gone very wrong but is easier than the immediacy of spoken conversation.
So I merely explained that I don't have the musical skills to take piano requests.
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