Читать книгу A Gift of Love - Tony Cointreau - Страница 10

Ever since I can remember, music has played a large role in my life. When I was a child the radio was always on, and later, when I discovered records, they became my passion. I told my family that someday I would either become a singer or be a missionary. I wasn’t religious but I kind of liked the idea of helping other people. At the time I didn’t realize that music and helping others were not mutually exclusive.

It was no surprise that after graduating from high school, I went into show business. Musical comedy, concerts, and cabaret became my life. And in 1984 the couturier Pierre Cardin, who was a driving force in show business in Europe, brought me to Paris to introduce me at a gala in my honor at Maxim’s. I then stayed and worked in Europe for ten years doing recordings and concerts.

During those years I occasionally came back to the United States for a job that interested me; but more importantly, Mother Teresa showed me that any musical ability I had could also be used within the confines of her homes for the dying—and give me more satisfaction than I could have ever imagined.

During my first week at Gift of Love, I met a patient by the name of James who was not only unable to coordinate his legs and arms but also could no longer articulate his words. He could make sounds but could not make himself understood. He had also lost his sight. This inability to communicate made it impossible for him to share his pain and fear with the other patients, the Sisters, or the volunteers.

My heart broke every time I saw him lying on the couch in the lounge, locked within his own body. So every time I passed Mother Teresa’s picture on the wall next to the chapel door, I prayed for some kind of guidance—some small way to unlock the door of his isolation.

Suddenly I felt inspired to run up the stairs, pull up a stool, and say, “James, why don’t we sing?”

Seeing a flicker of interest on his face, I took his hand and started to sing an old spiritual called “His Eye Is on the Sparrow.” Before I had finished the first line, the most extraordinary smile lit up his face. He then grabbed my hand with all his strength and started to sing along. Of course, he was only making sounds, but I could tell that he knew it perfectly and was singing every word along with me. We sang it twice and I’m sure he could have happily gone on for hours. I walked away in awe that something I had taken for granted my whole life could make such a difference in someone else’s life. I also learned that the simple gift of music can bring joy, no matter what the human condition.

Another thing I learned that day was that the Sisters noticed everything that went on in the house.

Shortly after breakfast I was mopping the kitchen floor (I have friends who would kill for a picture of that), when a Sister came up to me with a sweet smile on her face and said, “Tony, you never mopped or swept a floor before you came here, did you?”

“Does it really show, Sister?”

She then laughed and apologized, thinking maybe she’d been rude.

I said, “No, Sister, I pay people to do this for me.”

After I assured her that she had not hurt my feelings, she asked, “What do you do?”

“I’m a singer.”

Never one to miss an opportunity, she said, “Oh, well, then you must sing for the men at lunch.”

When lunchtime came around I thought she might have forgotten about it, but as soon as the patients were served, she announced, “Now, Tony, you can sing!” I figured the hit song of the day had been “His Eye Is on the Sparrow,” so I did it again for everyone else. Not only was James smiling and rocking back and forth, but the other guys were enjoying the entertainment too. I thought, “Wow, I don’t need an orchestra, a piano, or a theater to give people pleasure. I can do it anywhere!”

The most satisfying of all, though, was when I discovered the physical and emotional peace my singing could bring to someone in the last days of their life. The effect of a soft, continuous rendition, rather like a mantra, of a song such as “Take My Hand, Precious Lord” never ceased to amaze me. Bodies rigid with pain relaxed. They no longer gasped for air, and the look of fear was erased from their faces. The beauty of it is that you don’t need to be a professional or have a great voice. My mother, who had no singing voice at all, could make me feel loved and protected at bedtime with any silly song that popped into her head. It’s something anybody can do. And there are no rules.

There were also times when I least expected it that music created its own miracle—times when it was the only option left to me in a situation where I felt woefully inadequate and lost.

It seemed that every day that I walked into Gift of Love I was forced to face a new problem that made me want to put my coat back on and walk out. But I never did. I don’t know why I stayed, except that the rewards I derived from facing the constant challenges of life and death were stronger than my insecurities and fears.

One of my greatest challenges was a black man called Sada who had been raised in a French-African nation. Sada was suffering from a whole gamut of AIDS-related problems. He knew he was going to die soon and he wanted to get it over with.

The first morning I met Sada, I saw that the Sisters were bathing him—a task they usually left to a volunteer. I then went down to the kitchen, where the night volunteer told me that Sada only allowed the Sisters to care for him. If a volunteer tried to help, he would throw anything within his reach, such as a bedpan, a urinal, or a bowl of porridge. He would also try to bite any of us who came too close to him.

I wasn’t really concerned about Sada until twelve o’clock noon rolled around, the time when the Sisters went down to the convent for a couple of hours every day.

Before leaving me alone to care for the patients, one of the Sisters said, “Tony, Sada didn’t eat his breakfast this morning. Would you please make him a full bowl of Cream of Wheat with a little butter and salt? That’s the way he likes it. And also a bowl of grapes which he will peel himself with his teeth. Make sure there are enough pillows under his head so that you can first place one bowl and then the other in the crook of his arm. After that he can feed himself. Oh, and be sure to give him a little plastic bag for him to spit out the parts of the grapes that he doesn’t want to eat.”

I’m sure I stared at the outside of the convent door for a good five minutes after she left, hoping that she would soon reappear and tell me it was just a joke. But it wasn’t. Once again the Sisters had left me to fend for myself as best I could.