Epilogue
The end... Last night I finished the third volume of Butterfly Dance. And I feel neither joy, nor happiness. I don't know how it is with other authors. Whether they feel joy, happiness or perhaps contentment at this point. I am filled with emptiness. The story is over. It is time for me to let go of my heroes. But is it possible to just release them like that now, after all the work with the three volumes, having spent a year and a half in their company? They were my family, friends and colleagues. I hurried home to meet them and while the pandemic was raging all over the place, people stayed behind closed doors, learned to be afraid and keep a distance, wear masks, I sat down every evening, closed my eyes, listened to music and kept dreaming their story on and on.
When the theme of the first volume "arrived", I was so overjoyed, it never occurred to me that I might be afraid, concerned about how I would create a connection through mutual assistance, a bond between humans and bugs, in exchange for the love of a little girl. And I made it. Then thoughts continued "dancing" and coalesced into a second volume. But that one was without bugs or other animals, those useful helpers with my writing. The second volume is a story of humans only, with their lives, successes and failures. The end of the second volume is - but actually isn't - a happy one. I could have concluded the story, but I could not, really. Because the problems lingered on despite the apparent happy end. They required more thinking and a final solution. And it was made all the more topical by the pandemic. So the third volume was born. I send it on its way now in the hope that the Reader will find in it something that may make his or her own journey easier.
There were a few well-known pieces of music in the previous two volumes, and I also mentioned a few musicians as well. Music plays a major part in this volume as well. But this time a lot more composers and musicians came to my help than before. I attribute this to the pandemic. As a doctor participating in the vaccination effort I often started writing in an exhausted condition both physically and spiritually. And in some cases it actually took hours before some tune, the orchestration or the genius of a musician came to touch me. They functioned like a remote-control device. Overarching centuries or just decades, they opened a door in my soul and there I was in the story, living the life of my characters. Thoughts started coming and all I had to do is jot them down. And they were many. Authors and performers. They talk about non-exhaustive lists. Yes, let this be a non-exhaustive list of some of my favourites: Bach, Mozart, Vivaldi, Nat King Cole, Smetana, Wagner, Aretha Franklin, Telemann, Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Scott Joplin, Barbra Weldens, Villa Lobos, Michel Legrand, Karl Jenkins, Debussy, Gershwin, Mendelssohn, Edouard Lalo, Elgar and of course my greatest favourite, the piece I always admire in all circumstances, Veracini's Largo performed by Ruggiero Ricci.
The third volume of the dream is turning into something palpable, a book. Let the Butterfly Dance begin. The fates coming to life in it make story look very much like butterflies dancing all over a flowery meadow ... or simply like life itself...?
