The moment hit me again, this afternoon, when I was in Metropolitan Museum of Art, sitting in front of Vermeer’s “Woman with a Lute“. Woman with a FluteI was sitting down in front of the painting listening to the audio guide playing a piece of Lute music popular at that time. The melody was so simple and slow, compared with the contemporary top 40. Of course our popular music is a lot faster, louder, and more complex for obvious reasons. Simple lute or any acoustic instrument will no longer satisfy modern population’s appetite for music entertainment.

To appreciate this music, I tried to put myself in the ancient time. I gazed into the painting and imagine myself to be in it, sitting by the window, looking out, waiting for my lover’s return. Momentarily I was in a life that I was not constantly surrounded by sound and visual stimulation provided by mass media, the biggest noises would be a busy market, or galloping horses. I guess I could how it’d be one of the most beautiful harmony I’ve heard, at least comparing with the tunes sung by drunken men on the street.

This is when the moment hit me. I was concentrating so hard that for a nanosecond, I felt like I was “really” in the 17th century, hearing nothing but quietness, feeling the slowness of pace compared with NYC pace. Ever since I saw “Somewhere in Time” when I was a little girl, I’ve always had this fantasy of being able to time travel if I could just concentrate as hard as Christopher Reeve.

For a moment, I felt like I was there.