Neurodivergent special interests can be more or less “obscure.” The author used to be fascinated by mathematics and was a math student through graduate school. Even at that time, I began spending an unsustainable amount of time in music libraries and record stores. Decades later, after writing several articles on various pieces of little-known music, among other things, it’s safe to say where my sympathies now lie. The two, math and music, are linked in some ways. After many years of making connections through mutual love of music, I draw some through-lines.
Back in my grad school years and for the decade after, I made several connections with people because of common interests in music, more than I did because of mathematics. Early in college I already had some trouble deciding whether I wanted to major in music, math or philosophy. I had entered college with a strong focus on mathematics. However, an excellent philosophy class during my first year reminded me of my early interest in that subject, and I was always interested in music, first as a would-be performer and as a listener, then as an intrigued theory student and, increasingly, amateur researcher, to the point where I began to be distracted from mathematics. This sequence of events and indecisions led to stretched attention, falling grades and, eventually, being asked to leave grad school after only three years, with a Master’s, but not the PhD I had been aiming for. I was not yet properly diagnosed, and so was not able to take advantage of coping and organizational strategies that would have helped both generally and specifically with my responsibilities as a graduate assistant grader.
Positive examples of forming connections between and through music have been easy to find in my life history. One who has since died was a music appreciation teacher in London who emailed me when I got his friend’s vita wrong in a webpage I had created. His friend had been an interesting English composer, born in 1901. The webpage was basically an incomplete musical worklist, but it went down when GeoCities did. We eventually corresponded at length, mostly about music, starting sometime in the early 1990s, and ending a little before his death in 2009. He and his wife joined me for dinner when I took my second trip to London in July 1999, after which he and I went to one of the Promenade Concerts at the Royal Albert Hall for a program of Debussy, Sibelius and, one at the beginning and one in between them, two terrific psalm settings by Lili Boulanger (1893-1918).
During the same week in London, I met up with someone I’d known online for at least two years, whom I ran into on a newsgroup while discussing the music of another 20th century British composer of interest to me [Benjamin Frankel, 1906-73]. I did not at first recognize the name of my new correspondent, only later realizing he was the author of the program notes on the CDs I had of that composer’s music. We also kept up a good correspondence, and I had dinner and listened to broadcast tapes at his place.
One of my most substantial acquaintances I owe to music is with a composer, music professor, musicologist, researcher and professor emeritus, whose articles and music reviews I enjoyed reading in a monthly magazine I subscribed to. Through his reviews and other writings, I came across a lot of music I might not have otherwise and was glad he encouraged me to give it a listen. A friend of mine at the time encouraged me to express my gratitude via e-mail, which, hesitantly, I did. This was around 30 years ago.
I started corresponding with this musician sometime in the early 1990s, exchanged emails for years, met him for a whole very pleasant weekend at his place in 1999 (always remember your passport when traveling to another country. I didn’t), and we are still in touch. During that one weekend we had much to talk about and listen to regarding music, and the spectrum, too.
I have often been reluctant to impose myself on a stranger’s time, even though, in my experience, professors have uniformly responded very well to a reasonable correspondent who sends a letter expressing interest in their work. I did this a few times back in my “math days,” too, in one case to correct a to-me-obvious error in a book on Differential Geometry, receiving a very positive response from the – now late – author. This was, in retrospect, maybe also at the thought that a high school student was trying to read a book of theirs very much directed at graduate students and even partially succeeding, but this didn’t occur to me at the time. I digress.
Looking over some of my early conversations over archaic newsgroups (UseNet) like “rec.music.classical” can’t fail to remind me that my writing style, my way of interacting with people, has changed in the 15-year period in which I was using them. Incidentally, I notice that one of my earliest posts that can still be found online was a tentative-looking request for information, from August 1989, on Bach’s lovely “Prelude, Fugue, and Allegro,” and I seem to have used even just that one newsgroup thousands of times, meeting some people there – a few of whom I later met in person – between there and 2005. Unsurprisingly, 30 years ago, my enthusiasm was more open, but my willingness to get into an argument, online anyway, over many things, was greater.
To the extent I have negative social media stories, many of them also originate with UseNet, as when I arrived back at my parents’ from a visit to New York Public Library Lincoln Center, to find a “saw you there” email from someone with whom I’d been having some sort of argument on the newsgroup; he recognized me because in those days merely three-odd decades ago we thought nothing of putting photos of ourselves on our personal websites.
Now there were others who, unlike that character, I’d gotten off on the right foot with, but where my acquaintance is best remembered only sketchily as a cautionary tale, and a big reason why I am glad I have waited a few years from meeting someone online to doing anything with them in person. There are skills I have begun to learn since then, like active listening, understanding my goals in communication, and how I sound (do I sound like I’m only trying to teach where I could be learning, using a conversation as a one-sided opportunity to promote, and if so why…) that I don’t doubt can help with my relationships going forward.
I have now lived in the same city for over 30 years, and continue to make and develop acquaintances, relationships and friendships. My skills, like most people’s, improve, backtrack, but generally improve, with time, understanding, and work. The reward has been deeper and more meaningful connections.
Eric Schissel is employed part-time by Mental Health News Education and can be reached at [email protected].