This week I stumbled across an Atlas Obscura article about a clock museum in Vienna. I love clocks, watches, timepieces in general, so it caught my interest. It reminded me about a prediction my dad had for me. He said I would visit Vienna “under strange circumstances.”
He mentioned this many times over the years, sometimes repeating the “under strange circumstances” phrase. Other times he stated it as a fact as in “when you go to Vienna . . .” as if I was actively planning a trip.
My dad had a deep knowledge and love of classical music, so I assume this is why Vienna held a special attraction. In Vienna, “Mozart entered on what was to be the most fruitful and successful period of his life. He had once written to his father that Vienna was ‘the land of the piano,’ and his greatest triumphs there were as a pianist-composer” (“The Central Viennese Period”). There are museums and tours devoted to the composer in Vienna. Beethoven lived in Vienna for 35 years (Billock). I’m sure he would have loved to have visited a city with such a strong connection to the music he loved.
I never asked what he meant by “under strange circumstances,” but I have often pondered that phrase. What exactly constitutes “strange circumstances?” Does that mean that I would be in a transitional time in my life personally? Does it mean that there may be something odd about the economic or political situation in Vienna . . . or at home in the U.S.? Aren’t all times somehow “strange” depending on who you ask?
Another prediction my dad had for me was that I would learn to fly a plane. Again, over the years he would state this as a fact: “When you learn to fly a plane . . .” or “when you take flying lessons . . . .” So, when I learned that my first college roommate’s father was a flight instructor, it tickled the memory of that prediction. Two years later, I moved out of the dorms and into a room in a shared house. One of my roommates was a young college student, too. The other was . . . also a flight instructor. Though he took me for a flight in his Cessna one time, I never took flight lessons from him or anyone else. And, I really have no interest in learning to fly. But, the fact that I had two opportunities to interact with flight instructors seems like an odd coincidence.
One of my favorite pieces of my dad’s art is a drawing/watercolor of a person in profile. I assume the subject is female, though really it is fairly androgynous. She is in profile and is gesticulating. Her mouth is open and her eyes are closed, as if she is singing. She wears a hat . . . and, she has green hair. My dad said I am the subject of the picture, but that’s not really possible.
The upper left corner reads “1967 é vero.” In Italian é vero translates to it’s true.
I was born in 1969.
Do I think my dad could predict the future–predict my existence? No more than anyone else can do such a thing. He liked to be mysterious and mystical. It is unlikely that I will ever learn to fly a plane and who knows if I’ll ever make it to Vienna. I’m not so sure now that his predictions were predictions at all. I’m thinking they were hopes–hopes for what he wanted for his daughter. Maybe these were things he wanted for me, or maybe they were things he wanted for himself. The common thread connecting the green hair, learning to fly, and traveling to Vienna “under strange circumstances” seems to be living a fearless, adventurous life. My hope is that I can do just that.
Billock, Jennifer. “Following Beethoven’s Footsteps Through Vienna.” Smithsonian.com, Smithsonian Institution, 27 Jan. 2020, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/following-beethovens-footsteps-through-vienna-180973951/.
Sadie, Stanley. “Vienna: the Early Years.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., http://www.britannica.com/biography/Wolfgang-Amadeus-Mozart/Vienna-the-early-years.
Take Lots of Pictures 