If it seems like we've been silent the last couple of months, that's because Akiko's life has been pretty different since early March! One moment she was working out at the gym like she did five times a week, and the next she was flat on her back with paramedics on the way.
Suffice it to say that she hasn't been playing with the LA Phil since then, but we can see the way back at least! Midway through her recovery, we talk about her time in the hospital and back at home.
We also take the opportunity to answer some fantastic questions that you emailed during our time away, including what audition recordings are all about, whether we'd fake Prokofiev's Cinderella suite, and how we deal with audience distractions!
Transcript
Nathan Cole: Hi, and welcome back to Stand Partners for Life.
Nathan Cole: And this time, after a bit of a long break… we took a long break last summer. This one was a little different. Akiko, do you want to tell us why?
Akiko Tarumoto: I have been recuperating from an unfortunate incident at the gym. I took a bad step, fell on my bottom, and spent the next eight weeks recovering.
Nathan Cole: Eight weeks and counting.
Akiko Tarumoto: Seven weeks and counting.
Nathan Cole: Oh, okay. And not working, not playing in the Philharmonic.
Akiko Tarumoto: Not playing. I'm playing but not playing at work.
Nathan Cole: Take us back to the incident a little bit.
Akiko Tarumoto: People keep kind of guessing what it was, and they'll be like, "Oh, were you…?" I don't know why it bothered me at the hospital. The doctors kept talking about how I was doing step aerobics, and I was like-
Nathan Cole: That makes you sound like a-
Akiko Tarumoto: I didn't take a time machine back to the '80s and don skintight, shiny spandex…
Nathan Cole: "And one, and two…"
Akiko Tarumoto: Yeah, no. So I was not doing step aerobics. It did involve a box, one of those foam boxes. They come in various heights, and this one was the lowest one. It was a 12-inch box, and I was just trying to do something to keep my heart rate up between weight lifting rounds. And yeah, just, it was one of those weird things that just, I guess I was kind of tired, and my foot didn't come cleanly down from the box. My other foot was already on the way up. So the box slid toward me, and I landed. I had nowhere to go but on my bottom.
Nathan Cole: And I've had other people ask me, people who don't know you very well -- But just to make it clear, I mean, you were probably at the gym or were, at that time, five times a week, doing these kinds of classes.
Akiko Tarumoto: Yeah, yeah. In fact, I was joking that I should probably spend as much time playing the violin as I did at the gym. Because at that point, just working out, and running… if you added up all the time I spent exercise-wise, it, yeah, dwarfed my actual time practicing on my instrument. So yeah, it was a little bit sobering. So now, finally, my practicing found a way to reverse that proportion.
Nathan Cole: Against your will. And yeah, I think just the day before you had run 10 miles.
Akiko Tarumoto: Yeah, that was disappointing, because it's been a while since I ran that far, as you know. And so it felt like a milestone to get back there, and it was. Won't be seen again for a while.
Nathan Cole: Well, I'm looking forward to you getting back to it, because you will. I know they didn't like the look of the fall and all that. So they called some paramedics who…
Akiko Tarumoto: They talked to me as if I were probably about 60 years old or older.
Nathan Cole: Wait. Did they ask you who was president and expect you to say it was Ronald Reagan?
Akiko Tarumoto: No. (I do remember that, by the way.) No, they asked me if I was on any medications, and when I said no, they looked really encouraging, and they said, "Ooh, very healthy." I'm not sure if they thought I was kind of out of it because of the fall, because they were trying to speak slowly to me, in any event. They seemed like they wanted to really cheer for me when I said I wasn't on any medications regularly.
Akiko Tarumoto: And then they asked me, I think more than once, if I really was used to exercising. It was a little bit insulting.
Nathan Cole: Covering their bases.
Akiko Tarumoto: Other than having just fallen on my rear, I thought I looked like I was in acceptable shape, like maybe this is something I do more than once a year. They didn't seem so sure about that. So yeah, a little humbling.
Nathan Cole: We got you to the ER with a little difficulty because you were in pain, and then ER did a cursory check plus an x-ray and said nothing was broken, take this Advil and all that. Which you did for a couple days, and it was not getting better. It was getting much worse.
Akiko Tarumoto: As you recall, I got home and was almost instantly sure something was not right. And I tried to sit down on the bed or something, and there was a terrible stabbing, burning sort of… It was strange because it was a pain that wasn't present until I triggered some movement or a nerve or something. And so everything would be fine, and then I'd sit down or try to stand up and then… it was horrible. I don't think there's any way I can actually describe how terrible it was.
Akiko Tarumoto: So I try not to be dramatic about it, but that pain stayed with me for the next week. I guess it was a solid week of going through that. So that wasn't so fun.
Nathan Cole: Right. I mean, anytime you tried to basically get down or get up.
Akiko Tarumoto: Yeah. Still, the doctors are pretty stumped by what that was. I mean, it was obviously some kind of nerve that I tweaked with this fall, but the doctors were stumped, in the hospital, anyway. The pain doctors had no answers, and so that's not so encouraging when-
Nathan Cole: Well, we're skipping the fact that we went back to the ER and then they did a scan and found there was a fracture-
Akiko Tarumoto: Right, which is why I ended up hospitalized, but yeah.
Nathan Cole: Yeah, yeah. Fracture of the sacrum, which… I pronounced "sack-rum" for the first couple days until I-
Akiko Tarumoto: I think we made a number of Rite of Spring jokes.
Nathan Cole: Right. That's true. So, yeah, seven nights in the hospital, and, yeah, go Percocet! That was the…
Akiko Tarumoto: Yeah. For anyone who's wondering what my painkiller of choice is for some horrible, horrible, otherwise uncurable pain, it's Percocet.
Nathan Cole: But it did have some side effects, and they did warn you to get off it within two weeks if you could. And you did.
Akiko Tarumoto: Yeah. So thank goodness for that. I was on so many medications in the hospital, it's kind of staggering. They'd come in every 90 minutes or so and shoot me up with something else that didn't work. Other than that, it was strange.
Akiko Tarumoto: I was actually, after a few days, thinking, "I actually have not been bored." Everyone was like, "You must be going crazy in this hospital room." Yeah, I literally could not get up out of bed. I think that it's possible that I'm exactly the kind of person who takes to bed rest very naturally. Yeah, for sure.
Nathan Cole: Yeah. And you discovered the Great British Baking Show-
Akiko Tarumoto: I did. I started-
Nathan Cole: -during your convalescence.
Akiko Tarumoto: It's an unfortunate timing, getting into that show and being unable to move very much because I rediscovered my obsession with sugar at the exact moment where I was unable to physically do anything about that other than bake and eat.
Nathan Cole: And we watched some good movies and had a few good take-out meals in the hospital.
Akiko Tarumoto: Yeah, but you didn't get into the things that I actually made, thanks to my-
Nathan Cole: Oh, well, since you got home, yeah.
Akiko Tarumoto: Well, because of my newfound courage, I… after watching the show, I thought, "Well, these people can throw together a tray of cream puffs. And on top of it, they can make a showstopper cake with the cream puffs involving an entire chocolate sculpture." And I was like, "These people can do this in three hours. I'm sure I can put together a halfway decent birthday cake for you."
Nathan Cole: "Halfway"? That was an amazing… First of all, it wasn't even a cake.
Akiko Tarumoto: It depends on what you call a success. I didn't burn down the house, and I didn't burn my hand off, so…
Nathan Cole: I mean, this was a sculpture of cream puffs. I have a picture. I should post that picture. That was amazing.
Akiko Tarumoto: My little half-tower of cream puffs. So yeah. But it was, I think, a nice surprise for you.
Nathan Cole: It was amazing. I was shocked.
Akiko Tarumoto: So one of my projects during my convalescence here has been-
Nathan Cole: Was this sort of, does it relate to performance anxiety on the violin, performance anxiety in front of the mixer?
Akiko Tarumoto: I mean, my personality is just… I really become sort of paralyzed by my inability to predict how something's going to turn out sometimes. And there's just definite, I wouldn't even call them parallels. I think it just translates so directly to playing for me.
Akiko Tarumoto: So maybe I need to watch hours and hours of a show about playing the violin. Maybe that would inspire me to just get out there and do it. But fortunately, since no one's expecting me to turn out world-class or even high-level baked goods on a regular basis, I think that when it happens, everyone's astonishment is reward enough for me. But I think that that's not quite the case on the violin.
Nathan Cole: Well,...
