His mother had passed away

The funeral was comforting

A gathering of family and friends

It was over too quickly

Now he was all alone

Clearing out her house

Going through her possessions

Opening boxes of papers

She amassed a lot of stuff over the years

His school reports brought back bad memories

Must try harder

He has difficulty concentrating

Could do better

He recalled those painful years

Being judged by his teachers

Being pressured by his peers

Being bullied because he did not fit in with the crowd

He was not happy back in those days

The boxes of family photographs seemed endless

Faded black and white images of a baby

He knew it must be him

As he was an only child

But it seemed like another lifetime

He picked up the dusty guitar case

His old guitar was still inside

He spent hours as a boy playing that guitar

It was his way of dealing with all the bullying taunts

The therapy that kept him going through those difficult times

He had stopped playing it when he left school

Forty years later it was still waiting for him

He took the guitar home

Cleaned it and fitted new strings

He struggled to remember the chords

His fingers moved too slowly at first

Then the music just flowed

Bringing back incredible feelings

Of being totally engrossed in the music

Losing himself in the rhythm

Closing his eyes to escape deeper into the notes

He was reluctant to open his eyes 

Not wanting to be jettisoned back again in his troubled youth times

He kept playing late into the night

He slept soundly with his guitar next to the bed

They would never be separated again