The Class

He looked at me as if I were a man from Mars. And then patiently explained that American education wasn’t relevant to anything. In his view, the whole Western world was decadent. And the only solution was to cultivate our spirits.

I told him I’d back him up in whatever he’d decided.

To which he replied that he strongly doubted it, since his decision was to drop out of the whole family.

I then said something like, “I don’t get it, Andy.”

He then revealed that his name was no longer Andrew, but Gyanananda (I had to ask him to spell it), which is Hindi for “seeker of happiness and knowledge.” I tried to take this all with good humor and offered that he would be the first Eliot of that name.

He explained that he was no longer an Eliot. That he was opting out of everything my rotten generation stood for. And was going to spend his life in meditation. For this he did not want, nor did he need, any of the so- called Eliot money.

When I asked him how he planned to live, he replied simply that I wouldn’t understand. I then explained that my question was not philosophical, but practical. For example, where would he be living?

In the footsteps of his guru, he replied. At the moment this prophet was presiding over an ashram in San Francisco, but was getting intimations from his karma to return to India. I then asked him what he was going to use for money. He replied that he had no use for it. I asked, still more specifically, how he planned to eat. He said that he would beg like the rest of the swami’s followers.

I proposed that, since I was a generous soul, he start his begging with me. He refused. Because he sensed I would use it as a string to tie him and he wanted to “fly untrammeled.”

He then got up, wished me peace, and started to go. I pleaded with him to give me some sort of address, somewhere to get in touch with him. He said that I could never be capable of being in touch with him unless I divested myself of all material things and learned to meditate. All of which he knew I would never consider.

Before he left, he offered me some parting words of wisdom — a kind of benediction.

He said that he forgave me for everything. For being an unenlightened, bourgeois, and insensitive father. He bore me no malice since he understood that I was a victim of my own upbringing.

He then walked away, stopped, lifted his hand in valediction, and repeated, “Peace.”

I know that he’s a minor and I possibly could call the cops and have him grabbed for psychiatric observation. But I know he’d wriggle out and only hate me more (if that’s possible).

And so I sat there looking at my plate of foliage and thought, How did I screw up like this?

***

“I’m afraid I have some bad news for you, Mr. Rossi.” Danny was sitting in the Park Avenue office of Dr. Brice Weisman, a world-renowned neurologist. Having taken enormous pains to ensure confidentiality, he had arranged a thorough examination. Though the doctor was about to put a name — and perhaps a fate — to it, Danny had known there was something physically wrong with him from that horrible moment in the studio when his left hand suddenly rebelled, refusing to obey the brain that bad been its absolute master for forty years.

The following day he bad returned to the television studio with the rehearsal tapes he had made at home. Then he, Maria, and a single engineer superimposed them at the crucial moment in the previous night’s taping when his hand had failed him.

Though Maria was his accomplice in this bit of deception so uncharacteristic of Danny, he had not confided in her completely. He had simply pleaded a busy schedule, impatience, and even television economy for this bit of electronic trickery.

“After all,” he had joked, “I’m dubbing myself. It’s not as if I had to sneak in Vladimir Horowitz.”

The only thing that made Maria suspect something more serious was Danny’s persistent questioning about whether the engineer was “a trustworthy guy.” Did he realize how many times he asked her? What was bothering him?

Indeed, that was what had brought Danny to Dr. Weisman’s office.

At first the neurologist merely listened impassively as Danny offered his own explanation as to why his left hand occasionally trembled. And that night, as well as in practice sessions thereafter, had seemed to be disobeying his mind.

“I mean, clearly it’s fatigue, Doctor. I suppose it could be nerves, too. I drive myself very hard. But obviously, as you can see from all those little movements you asked me to do — touching my fingers and all that — there’s nothing wrong with me physically.”

“I’m afraid there is, Mr. Rossi.”

“Oh.”

“I can detect a peripheral tremor in your left hand. There’s also some discernible bradykinesia — meaning it moves slightly slower than your right. All of this indicates basal ganglia dysfunction. In other words, some kind of damage to the motor area of your brain.”

“You mean a tumor?” Danny asked, his fear exacerbating the tremor in his hand.

“No,” the doctor said calmly, “your CT scan shows no evidence of one.”

“God, that’s a relief,” Danny sighed. “Then how can we fix this damn thing so I can get back to work?”

Weisman paused and then answered softly, “Mr. Rossi, I would be less than honest if I told you we could ‘fix’ your condition. In fact, we can only hope that it progresses very gently.”

“You mean it might spread to my other hand as well?”

“Theoretically, that’s possible. But when someone as young as you presents this sort of unilateral tremor, it usually remains on that one side. And, you may be relieved to know, the loss of function is very, very gradual.”

“But you’re a doctor, dammit. Why the hell can’t you cure this sort of thing?”

“Mr. Rossi, much of the working of the brain is still a mystery to us. At this stage of our knowledge, the best we can offer are medications that mask the symptoms. But I assure you, we can hide a tremor as small as yours for many years.”

“Will these drugs let me play the piano?” he asked.

Dr. Weisman took off his glasses and began wiping them with his tie. Not that they really needed cleaning. But this way Daniel Rossi’s face would be out of focus when he told him the worst.

And he began with a kind of verbal anesthetic.

“Mr. Rossi, may I tell you, I’ve always admired you as an artist. And what I find most remarkable about your talent — and what will help you in what I know is going to be a difficult situation — is your versatility.”

He paused and then consigned Danny Rossi to a living death.

“I’m afraid you won’t be able to play concerts anymore, Mr. Rossi.”

“Not at all?”

“No. But your right hand is fine and very likely to remain so. You’ll be able to continue conducting with no problem.”

Danny did not reply.

“And the best consolation I can offer is something I learned from one of your own TV programs. Giants like Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven all started as performers, but are remembered today only because of what they wrote. You can throw the energy you once spent at the keyboard into composition.”

Danny hid his face with his hands and began to sob more intensely than he had at any time in his life.

Dr. Weisman could not offer any further comfort. For he had no inkling of what his words would elicit from his patient’s psyche.

Danny suddenly leapt to his feet and began to pace the room. Then he shouted from the depths of his grief, addressing the neurologist almost as if his diagnosis had been an act of hostility. “You don’t understand, Doctor. I’m a great pianist. I’m a truly great pianist.…”

“I’m aware of that,” Weisman replied softly.

“But you don’t get my point,” Danny retorted. “I’m not that brilliant a conductor. And at best my composing is second-rate, derivative. I know myself. I can’t do any better.”

“Mr. Rossi, I think you’re being much too harsh on yourself.”

“No, goddammit, I’m being honest. The only thing I’m any good at is playing the piano. You’re taking away