Influence, according to the fourth definition in the Miriam-Webster Online Dictionary, is  “the power or capacity of causing an effect in indirect or intangible ways.” Thus, an influential person is defined as “exerting or possessing influence.” I looked in the dictionary and was disappointed that what I think to be the best synonym of “influence” was missing. This synonym is “my mother.”

            Against the wall of the formal room in my house rests a horrifically out of tune piano, complete with chipped ivory keys and a light coating of dust. While the piano has lay dormant for a couple of years, the music and memories continue to float out of it and through my senses, provoking forgotten images. My mother was not a great pianist by any means. As a child she learned to play the organ, but didn’t really continue it. However, once in a while, she would sit down on the creaky piano stool and carefully place her long fingers on the cracked keys. I would watch her, absorbed in the grace and wonder that radiated from her as she began to play Simon and Garfunkle’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water”. It is at those moments that she changed me in ways that I cannot begin to describe accurately. It was something about the way she played each note in a careful yet passionate manner, or the way she would start the entire piece over when she played a sour note. It is from her that I learned to embrace and savor a moment in time. To this date, whenever I hear “Bridge Over Troubled Water” I cannot help but remember those special days that I was able to indulge in a form of beauty that cannot be mimicked. Through playing that one song over and over again, I learned from my mother that it is ok to make mistakes, because mistakes can be corrected. I also learned about passion, and that life wouldn’t be as good without the sweet sounds of music. A couple months before my mother was diagnosed with cancer, she started to teach me how to play “Bridge Over Troubled Water.” I only learned the first couple of measures before she died. Even though she is gone, I still hear the incredible harmonic notes and feel them creep down my spine. Last week I sat down at the piano, and felt the cold keys that my mother used to touch. I started to play the only couple of chords that I knew. It is that moment that I realized that she was the most influential person in my life. Even though she is not physically with me, she still holds “the power or capacity of causing an effect in indirect or intangible ways.” Each day I think about her and all that I have learned from her, and she is the true meaning of influential, a definition that cannot be found in any dictionary.