March 1:  the birthday of Frederic Chopin.  One of the most dazzling musicians of the Romantic Era, Chopin in his too short life (he died at the age of 39) composed a host of memorable pieces for the piano.  His works are full of life yet resonate with the sound of memory and contemplation.  We listen to them today and think about how his Polish origins blended with his relatively cosmopolitan lifestyle (he was well acquainted with Hungarian composer Franz Liszt and the novelist George Sand) to produce melodies that dig into our soul.

     And in this time of Lent, a time in which we take time to meditate on our fragility and mortality, a time in which we find space to ponder the meaning of our curious conglomeration of physicality and spirit, we remember Chopin.  We remember his creativity, we remember his vision.  We remember his angst.  And we realize, again, that we live in a beautiful yet tragic world, that we dance on a very narrow line between being here and not, and that we, human beings, we magnificent creators, find our humanness most profoundly when we submit to the mystery of doubt, pain, and the realization that we may not know whom we really are.