Notes from a Piano

            I remember my parents paying for me to take piano lessons.  I would attend lessons once a week.  I would practice and practice but the section of my brain designed to understand musical notes saw nothing but blotches lined up in little rows.  I never got it.

Much later in life I ended up buying a piano from a friend of mine.  I didn’t need the piano but he needed the money so the deal was made.  As soon as he could pay me back he’d once again have the piano.

 

          For years after that exchange the piano sat quietly in our house like some 1000-pound tribute to Chopsticks.

         

          Back in 97 my friend passed away.  At that time I laminated the last picture taken of the two of us together and I put it into my wallet.

 

          Over the years that photograph has been working its way out of the lamination.  

 

          Keep in mind - the inside of lamination plastic is very sticky and once you apply it to a photograph, well let’s just say you don’t get a second chance if you don’t get it straight the first time.

 

          So here you have it, one wallet sized photo - laminated front and back, kept undisturbed within my wallet and the picture keeps working its way out from between the very sticky laminations.

 

          In a process of elimination experiment I took the photo from my wallet and put it between the pages of a book and left it there for over a year.  This way we were removing the possibility of any inadvertent movement. 

 

          When we opened the book to check the photo we saw that the picture was still working its way away from the protective plastic covering.

 

          I’d like to think that if the spirit of my friend is attempting to contact me it is for him a casual activity, like doing a crossword and not some involved, frustrating torturous process that he is going through while I, like some dolt, are seeing only blotches.

 

         

         

 

         

 

         

 

 

             

 

Sometimes age shows up all by itself

 

            I remember it all started when I was very small.  They were all bigger than I was and much older.  They were called adults.  They would tell me what to do, how to act, where to be and of course – what not to do.  They would smile and laugh when they were pleased and yell and hit when they were angry.

 

            As I grew I watched.  I paid attention - not just to the adults around me but to all adults, even the ones on the television.  I would see them do all kinds of things.  Very strange things; most things I didn’t understand. Many things were quite mean-spirited.

 

            Eventually I started school.  Those adults were called teachers, assistant principals and principals.  I watched them as well.  They would gather in groups and laugh, smoke cigarettes and complain about management and paychecks.

 

            When I entered the workforce I discovered layer upon layer of adults called bosses.  They too would smile when pleased and yell when they were angry.  Actually, they weren’t all that different from the little kids I saw on the playground when I was much younger, and they too were mean-spirited, just like the ones I saw on the TV.

 

            The strange thing was, even though I too was now grown and as tall as they were, they were still telling me what to do, where to be, how to act – and of course, what not to do.

 

            Ever since I can remember I would make mental notes of the rights and wrongs of the adults who were actually good and of those who were a great deal like the evil and nasty ones I saw on television.  I saw their mistakes and then their cover-ups.  I saw them take credit for things they didn’t do and point blame onto someone else for things they did.

 

            I have witnessed them start wars and wave flags.  I have seen the sad, vacant stare of those left behind and I have seen the Oak tree on the hill where they buried my brother.

 

            I don’t need to travel there to read his headstone; I already know what it says. 

 

 

Wisdom doesn’t always come with age. 

 

             

Bic is a pen name

I had been previously despondent, gray - colorless.  Nothing mattered, not spelling nor punctuation, syntax… nothing.  I lay about like some exhausted verb drained of its action and lacking the substance to be a noun.

 

I knew this wasn’t a healthy state to be in but I couldn’t afford movers.  My friends seemed to all have lives going on, they were happy – spondent.  So what was my problem?

 

          Then suddenly - like some whirling pancake batter being flung from a mixing bowl it hit me.  I needed to start using a quill.  Yes, I was sure of it.  That would perk-up my writing.  It would put the spark back into the thingamajiggie.

 

          Oh I know, it was going to be hard making the switch.  I have been so long using this pen - with its nom de plume -

 Monsieur Bic   

It was just something I needed to do but it would have to be a clean break; no second guessing, no third person, no forth trip to the hardware store, just a quick dip into the ole’ ink well and voila’.

 

 

          Now I am morose.

 

          

 

 

 No inkwell.

 

 

 

We're gonna need a bigger boat

 

            I’m not a mainstream movie-goer.  The vast majority of movies being violent and or vulgar tend to be a great cure for any popcorn craving I might have.  I avoid them all - as well as any movies about animals.  Hollywood has always fallen short of compassion and doesn’t hesitate to show Nature’s less attractive side as a form of entertainment.

 

            I do however pick up on famous movie lines even if I’ve never seen the movie.  They become popular and bandied about by the general public; they are referenced in general conversations and over time even people like me find themselves using them.

 

            Exactly what it is that catapults a line or phrase to popularity eludes me.  Perhaps it is the momentary comic relief in the story that lets the audience relax for a moment.  They get to step back from the action and remind themselves that it’s only a movie; these are actors and no one is really getting chopped up by some crazed lunatic zombie.  

 

            Then again maybe it is simply good marketing.  Maybe the catch phrase is designed into the overall selling strategy.  It is put into the trailer and run and rerun to generate interest.  Tossing the line out into the general pool just knowing that the fish will bite and once they’re hooked… Box office receipts skyrocket.

 

            Frankly my dear – I don’t give a damn.  We don’t need no stinken badges. We’ll always have Paris. The thing you gotta ask yourself is, do you feel lucky?  Well do ya? What we have here is a failure to communicate.  Toto – I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.  I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore.  I love the smell of napalm in the morning. We rob banks. Tomorrow is another day.  Well I’ve dragged this out long enough, so here’s looking at you kid.  May the force be with you.

 

 

            Hasta la vista, Baby

Lost in Thought

 

          I had been looking down the whole time I was walking - my gaze hypnotically upon the sidewalk - these segmented pads of concrete so evenly spaced they created a rhythm in my mind as they passed beneath me. 

 

          Step down, road, road, road, road – curb, and back up to the rhythm.  I had been walking long past my own neighborhood, right through lunch and now into dusk; yet, I had not looked up.  I was walking now and that is who I was, I was walking guy.  Like some extra in a movie, Guy walking past.  That was me.  Watch for me in the credits.

 

          Step down, road, road, road, road – curb, and back up to the rhythm.  There were different sounds to this neighborhood, I didn’t recognize them as typical neighborhood noises; lawnmowers, teenagers washing the family car, music coming from someone’s window, no these sounds were noticeably muffled, different and somewhat quieter.  Still, it was dusk and general activities would be less than those of afternoon.  I would be able to distinguish city noises, should I end up walking that far but not having had my lunch I am sure my thoughts of dinner would soon hold some influence over the direction of my shoes.

 

          Step down, road, road, road, road – curb and step up.  Maybe I might forgo the evening meal and walk right through dinner.  Surely, I’m not about to whither away.  I just remembered a line from an old movie.  I’m not sure why that popped into my thoughts.  The line is, “I could always live in my art but never in my life.”  I’m not sure why thoughts of dinner would spring an old movie line into my head.  Every now and then a writer will hit upon a line that is a true gem and they know exactly when it happens.  They read it repeatedly, bouncing it against the character tasked with speaking the line, making sure it is going to flow and not be trampled by the laughter or applause of the pervious dialog. 

 

          It is an exciting moment causing the writer to re-read the entire previous scene, taking thoughts quickly away from the drudgery of syntax and plunging them into the mental challenge of getting back on track - heading towards the thread that leads to the final scene. 

 

          Often times that gem of a line quickly evolves into an obstacle.  Momentum is lost and the thoughts of the writer begin to stray, “What critics will be in the audience?”  “Will I be killed in the reviews?” and once these thoughts take over it is best to just walk away.  Shut it down for the night, step down, road, road, road – THUD.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Memories (without the sand)



Faucet with Leak