Here in the midst of the summer travel season, I hope it helps other travelers too. I’d like to share a few observations regarding airport security in the United States. I have passed through many American airports in which security is efficient, courteous, swift and thorough. At others, I have also overheard many interesting conversations: ranging from the results of “Dancing with the Stars” to relationship problems, lunch menus, political opinions, weekend plans and sports scores. The problem is, these conversations occurred among uniformed security officials! These are the same people who should be paying attention to the job at hand, making security as efficient, courteous, swift and thorough as it is in the attentive airports. In these airports, there is no question at any time that security is the only issue. It is clear that we need to improve our security systems at some of the airports in the United States. The Transportation Security Administration is a Federal Agency but it is not consistent in its efforts across the country.

I applaud another recent technological advancement: body-scanning x-rays. While there are still a few glitches to work out, these systems could potentially save time and save lives. I would rather be subjected to a full-body x-ray than have to stop, remove my shoes or other articles of clothing as part of a standard search. Keep this in mind: walking through a full-body x-ray machine is not the same as security officials seeing you unclothed (the above article explains why).

Most importantly, our behavior as individuals can immediately improve airport security. Airport security systems will not change and improve overnight. But each of us individually can make the experience better by exercising common sense, restraint and patience the next time we find ourselves at an airport.

Common sense: Give yourself enough time before to your flight. Ninety minutes has been the recommended amount of time for domestic flights for a number of years now. Two-and-one-half hours is still the recommended amount of time prior to international flights. Both are still necessary.

Restraint: Passing through security can be nerve racking no matter how attentive and efficient the security officials are. It will only make the experience more nerve racking if you make it unpleasant for them. At the airport, my intention is to pass through the line, arrive at the gate and fly to my destination. The best way to do that is to be courteous and simply wait your turn. Sure, I would like the line to move faster. But raising the issue at the time will not change the speed of the line.

Patience: Bring your sense of joy and harmony with you (this is best achieved if you follow the above steps). After all, the reason we have heightened airport security is because there are threats of terrorism. These threats stem from a lack of joy and harmony in the world today. The best way to combat this is not with anger, but through compassion in our everyday lives. Sometimes that includes passing through slow-moving lines. If we have the patience that allows us to practice compassion in those slow-moving lines, it will allow the world to be just a little more joyful and harmonious, and airport security will be that much easier too.

At others, I have also overheard many interesting conversations: ranging from the results of “Dancing with the Stars” to relationship problems, lunch menus, political opinions, weekend plans and sports scores.

You can read more about the venue here.
You can find out more about the July 16th performance here.

Friends, family and fans have been asking about the trip and the performance. I thought I’d address some of those questions here on my blog.

What songs you are planning on performing? I have prepared six or seven original pieces for solo piano. Besides a recent private performance, this is the first time most of them will be performed before an audience. One of them debuted last month at Ravinia, “Softly, She Sings.” It comes from my wife, Jan. It’s a melody that she first imagined as a child. One day she sang it to me in a soft voice, hence the title. I look forward to performing it in London.

Some other songs I’m planning on performing: John Coltrane’s “Dear Lord,” a medley of standards including “Here There and Everywhere,” “In the Still of the Night” and “Body and Soul.” There’s a medley of “The ‘In’ Crowd” and “Wade in the Water,” and another consisting of some other Gospel pieces.

How many times have you performed a solo recital or concert? This is probably only the fourth or fifth time I’ve performed solo in over 50 years as professional musician. I usually play with my trio along with Larry Gray and Leon Joyce. During those concerts, there is usually a solo section but the London performance will be an entire concert of solo piano playing.

What brought about this and other recent requests to perform solo? On my latest album, Songs from the Heart: Ramsey Plays Ramsey, I recorded four solo pieces and this could have inspired requests for me to perform as a soloist.

How do you feel about performing as a soloist? I love playing solo piano because that is how I was brought up – playing in church and studying European classical music such as Bach and Beethoven. From the ages of 4-15 I performed almost exclusively alone on stage. It wasn’t until I joined the jazz group The Cleffs as a teenager that I began performing regularly with other musicians. But most of all, I feel that while I am performing as a soloist I am not alone. I am on stage with the piano which is my dear, dear friend and has been my friend nearly all my life.

What do you love best about London? London has all the diversity and energy that one would expect and enjoy in a large, international and cosmopolitan city but it still retains its own unique flavor. In the United States, we favor new skyscrapers and structures. In cities like London and Tokyo, while there is that same contemporary growth, they are able to retain their old charm. I also love the cultural traditions – mainly stopping in the afternoon for tea.

Besides the performance, what are you looking forward to the most? The break from my schedule here at home. I love my daily routine of waking up and spending much of the day writing music and practicing piano. But even with a routine that I cherish, one must come up for air. Jan has been very busy with her jewelry and accessory design work and writing her book. We are both looking forward to some rest and relaxation in London. We love to just get out and walk. London is a wonderful city for walking.

Philosophers, religious leaders and other well-known wise people throughout history have espoused the importance of being in the moment.  In its truest sense, it is impossible to not be in the moment.  You cannot live in the past.  You cannot dwell in the future.  What is here and now is all there is.  Yes, you can live in the past and dwell upon events in your mind.  You can project into the future and predict events you think might come to pass.  However, in both cases, the mind is reliving the past or projecting into the future.  Our true selves are always here in the moment.  It is our minds that take us away.

As I mentioned in the last blog entry, time is a concept we as human beings invented in order to organize our lives.  It served us well.  We marked the passing of the seasons to know when to plant, when to harvest, and when to store up food for the winter.  The concept of time continues to serve us in our society today.  Without it, we would not know what time to show up at the doctor’s office, what time the workday ends and what time a movie begins at the theater.  It can serve us well, if we allow it.  But, we must be careful not to allow it to govern us too strictly.

When we value things for how little time they take, when we try to get as much completed in the least amount of time, we are allowing time to rule us, not serve us.  I have heard many times throughout my 75 years that the journey is more important than the destination.  It took me almost that long to really understand the meaning of that statement.  Once we focus too much on completing a task in order to start another, we are projecting into the future and missing the richness of being in the moment.

The same applies to living in the past.  We are shaped and informed by our memories of events and interactions.  These too can serve us.  We learn and grow from them.  Still, we must not allow our past experiences to govern our experience of the moment.  Memories, painful or joyous, can dictate how we react in the moment.  While our past experiences can inform us, what we are dealing with in the moment is never the same situation as a past experience.  Have you ever felt yourself react quickly to a situation and realize that you were terribly off base?  Why does this happen?  It happens when we allow the past to rule the present.  Pause, breathe, get back in the moment.  It is not always easy, especially when we are caught up in emotions.  More often than not, allowing just a few seconds to return to the present moment makes all the difference.

You may be wondering how this relates to my 75th birthday.  As I mentioned, living in the past or the future causes us to miss the richness and beauty of the moment.  A landmark birthday is a wonderful thing.  It allows friends, family and other loved ones to express their appreciation.  For this, I am grateful.  But for me, 75 years is no greater an achievement than waking up every morning and savoring every moment as I go through my day.  I may reach 80, 85, 90 and beyond, if I am lucky.  And, if I am lucky, I may receive another batch of wonderful greetings and expressions of appreciation as I reach those landmarks.  As I reach them, I may take a moment to look back.  I will feel satisfied knowing I have lived a life full of opportunities to be in the present moment, and I have taken advantage of that amazing gift, which presents itself always, everywhere, at any time.  But if I do take a moment to look back, I will be sure to keep it brief.  Otherwise I will miss being in the present moment, which is a much greater reason to be joyful than any number.

We live in a world of nations, states, counties, cities and towns that establish some kind of social order. But our Mother Earth knows no such boundaries. Sometimes, our decisions and behaviors that are based on protecting ourselves within our boundaries, work to benefit humanity. Other times we make decisions based on what is best for those living within those borders, but are not best for those living outside of them. Far too often, the decisions made in the name of country, state, city or town do not consider how they affect our Mother Earth.

We live in a nation divided by political party. Mother Earth knows no such divisions. We came up with those in order to organize like-minded individuals into groups and to achieve certain goals within our own nation. Sometimes political parties help us reach those goals that can be positive, constructive and beneficial. Other times, the goal of a party is simply to prevent the other political party from achieving their goals. They are more focused on the success of the party (or the lack of success of another party) than any other aim. In far too many cases, how our Mother Earth is affected is overshadowed by the potential gain of one political party at the expense of another.

We live in a manner that is divided into seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years. While each day is marked by a single rotation of our planet on its axis and each year consists of a full revolution of our planet around the sun, our Mother Earth does not consider time the way we do. We came up with the concept to keep track of our lives and to function as individuals and societies to accomplish what we wish to accomplish. Every culture views and handles time differently. Yet the culture that appears to be growing most rapidly is that which aims to accomplish “more” in “less” time and to use the most resources in order to accomplish it. Sometimes this is useful and achieves positive results for us as individuals and as a society. All too often, we become so wrapped up in the concept of time that we do not consider our Mother Earth. We want to carry more “stuff” from one end of the Earth to another and use more and more of her precious and finite resources in order to do so. As we watch the seconds and minutes tick by, Mother Earth simply continues to carry us with her. Never does she try to get where she is going faster or slower, in more or less time, doing anything other than what she has always done. She simply is Mother Earth, carrying us through space on her journey around the Sun.

I am not advocating abandoning all of our political, governmental and economic institutions. We all know the result would be chaos. But can we all slow down and consider how we as individuals use our planet’s resources on a daily basis? Can we consider how our political parties, nations and groups of nations use and abuse our planet’s resources in order to accomplish their goals? The way we organize ourselves can make life better. Yet if we become so wrapped up in using more and more resources to get from place to place, we may not have a planet that is able to sustain us on our journey together. Our Mother Earth has provided a home all these thousands of years, long before there were countries and nations and political parties and seconds and minutes and hours. She was around long before humanity came into being. The question remains: can she continue to provide a home for us in the future as disagreeing nations and political parties with the massive need to consume our planet’s precious resources? The answer is not clear. But can we all take the time to consider the impact on our Mother Earth these groups make, and the impact we make as individuals in our lives today? This answer is clear . . . Yes, we can.

I see protests on TV. I understand and support peaceful protest. Peaceful protest brought about some of the changes that helped make this country better, namely Civl RIghts in the 1960s. We still have a ways to go with racial tolerance in this country, but it is better than it was, largely because of changes brought on through peaceful protests. While there are few, if any, acts of physical violence or destruction during some of today’s anti-Obama protests and rallies, I challenge the notion that they are actually peaceful. I see signs with swastikas. I see images of our president as Adolph Hitler. I hear comparisons to fascist regimes. “Peaceful protest” means more than a lack of physical violence. It means an expression of ideas in a way that is thoughtful, informed and aims to bring about positive change.

Many of the protestors I see on TV fear that our government is violating the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights. I believe we are lead by a government that is of the people, by the people and for the people. There is no “them” and “us.” “They” are “us” and “we” are “them.” Our government in Washington is not some sort of monarchy that has been in place for eons that we must purge ourselves of by any means necessary. If any individual or group is unsatisfied with government on a local, state or federal level, it is clearly their right to voice their opinions and concerns. My concern is the lack of responsibility shown with these horrifying images and words that are disproportionate to the situation at hand.

No government is above questioning and challenging. Protests are not out of the question. But the kind of protests I keep seeing serve more to divide rather than unite, to produce further beliefs in “us” and “them” within our own nation. What do I propose? Nothing new. Understanding that if you are dissatisfied with your government the answer is not found with incendiary images and words. It is instead with reasoned debate and discussion among a well-informed populace and participation in the voting process (which is still woefully ignored).

Again, as in many issues, the cause is often ignorance. The remedy is always education. Clearly, if people associate images of Hitler and Nazi symbols along with of our President, there is a lack of understanding and knowledge. There is a lack of knowledge of what swastikas and other Nazi imagery means. There is a lack of understanding of what our President has said and stands for. A person calling the president a “Fascist” shows not that he is one, but rather the person making the accusation does not know what a Fascist is. Knowledge, information and education wielded in a compassionate matter is the remedy to cure such ignorance.

I started this article stating that we need to take notice and take action. I hope by now you have taken notice. What about action? I always like to end on a positive note. Fortunately, all of the remedies to our nation’s internal problems are positive and healthy things unto themselves: being well informed, engaging in thoughtful debate, educating oneself, bettering our education system for our young people, voting, working to end intolerance brought upon by ignorance, being more compassionate. All of these things serve to help us grow as individuals and as a nation. The key is now to go beyond reading about them or thinking about them or talking about them. The key is to do them.