Vistas of Clarity

New song and video remembering my brother Robert

Jun 11, 2025

I was sitting down to dinner when my mother called to tell me my brother Robert had died. It felt like an earthquake ripped through my body, my heart seeming to turn over and inside out, my stomach closing up tight. I could not eat another bite until the next day. My mother’s voice, frayed with shock, echoed in my ears.

That moment changed me forever. How could the brother who had always existed from my first tiny universe of family be gone? Reality shifted permanently, as it does when we lose someone so central to our lives. He was 68 years old.

Robert was an avid fly fisherman, a swimmer, a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of University of Washington, a philosopher, a prolific writer, an earnest seeker, a world traveler. His homes had a beautiful Zen-like and spartan aesthetic. At one point, he was a master gardener, cultivating potato seeds from South America. Many people loved and admired him. He was charismatic and smart. Truly an original. From the time he was a little boy, he insisted on carrying a briefcase to school when no other kid did that. They made fun of him, but he didn’t care.

As a young man, he engaged fully with life and the people he met. My parents received letters from friends he made on his travels, writing to let them know how much they had been impacted by spending time with him.

In one postcard sent home from Sri Lanka, Robert wrote:

It’s lovely: green rice fields, coconuts, bananas, palms, lush deciduous forests. You walk beside the irrigation canals, rivers, and ancient dammed lakes, and the people swimming there shout, “won’t you join us!” When I can, I do. These are people who properly appreciate the value of H2O!”

Robert taught me to play chess. From a very young age, his example taught me to eschew running mindlessly with the herd.

In the latter part of his life, Robert suffered from a severe delusional mental illness that isolated him from me and almost everyone else in his life. He stayed connected to my mother and sister, (and my father when he was alive). They did all they could to help him. It was nobody’s fault. The mental illness was probably a result of a brain tumor discovered and surgically removed when he was in his late 20s. Robert died of natural causes, but his mental illness may have been a contributing factor. His delusions were harmful for his health. They were also a heavy burden on the rest of my family, especially my mother.

When I got the call from Mom, I was in the middle of helping a close friend move to a new house. I was physically exhausted and didn’t have a lot of time to process or think about Robert’s passing.

A few days after hearing the news, I abandoned a half-packed box of plates and bowls and went outside for a break in the sparkling spring sunshine. The sun shimmered through the new green maple leaves. The hard conical buds of the irises by the walkway were back once again, foretelling a splendid sea of purple glory. I dug my toes into the warm grass, resting my eyes on the tufts of clouds in the brilliant blue sky. I took a deep breath.

from the Sea of Irises that come back, year after year

I remembered again: he is gone. An enormous wave of grief and love for my brother washed through me. Walls of pain that had long circled my heart dissolved and were swept away. Sitting alone on the grass with only the sun and sky as serene and silent witnesses, I wept. My heart hurt with love.

The next day I wrote “Vistas of Clarity” on the piano to process these feelings, and to support my mother who was hurting more than anyone. I don’t know what I believe about the afterlife. But in some way that I cannot explain, I also wrote the song for Robert’s spirit, a musical prayer to help send him off to a better place.

The title comes from Rob himself: at one point in Seattle, he had a window washing business called Visionary Window Cleaning. The business card included a tagline: “Make Your Windows Vistas of Clarity.”

I had been thinking about Visionary Window Cleaning a lot while trying to wash my friend’s windows—it really takes some patience and skill! My mother loves that his words are immortalized in this song. I love the idea that he finally is free, his mind sparkling clear and brilliant once again. No more streaks, sorrow, or pain.

Many of the beautiful scenes in the video (from Getty Images) were shot in places around the world where Robert travelled as a young man. It was fun to create and feel like I was sharing some of those adventures with him. The first scenes from Steamboat Island include the view from my house described in the first words of the song. Other scenes in the video were shot by my husband Brian during a recent private family memorial weekend with my mother Betty, sister Penny, and Penny’s husband Derek.

We all gathered at the confluence of the Columbia River and the Pacific Ocean where Robert wished his ashes to be spread. Mom made the long trek with her walker to the jetty between the ocean and the river where we said goodbye. You can see her determined walk in the video, wearing my father’s hat. It was sunny and almost windless, a perfect and beautiful day.

The grief I feel about my brother runs very deep. I not only mourn his death, but I also mourn the long-ago lost relationship between us. I mourn who he could have been.

But I also believe life is for the living. I think grief is an essential part of the journey of becoming wiser and more complete versions of ourselves. We who loved him carry Robert in our hearts forever, as we also heal and grow more fully into our own sunlight, as we adjust to what it means to be still alive in a world without him.

In her daily emails (now just to Penny and me), my mother uses the subject line, “On we go.”

For me, “only love is left.”

I’m so happy to share the new video “Vistas of Clarity” with you here. I sincerely hope you enjoy and would love to hear from you in the comments.

Elizabeth Hummel

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