House Arrest has now gone on for a month. Each crevice is cleaned six times over and then once more for good measure. Laundry hung, no more mismatched socks. Everything has a place now even the junk closet I have is organized.
While digging through the treasures buried within I pulled out a dusty tattered box. I opened it up to reveal a worn gold looking instrument. Memories began to flood back to me:
- The acronym FACE and EGBDF
- Reeds and more reeds
- Mr. Dawson, Mr. Crockett — stay on tempo
- Marching – left, left, left right left; “A yellow bird…”
- Halftime shows – nerves shot always, uniform on, hat straight, I’m going to puke
- Band Camp: Hot summers, hours of practicing, field shows perfected, on your toes, “This one time at band camp…”
- Band Competitions: Kanckle, cheese fries, 9/11, Queen, The Beatles, Endless bus rides
- Family
- St. Louis trip
- Parades – frozen fingers and faces, fair rides
I played the alto and tenor saxophone for 7 years. I wanted to quit after middle school but that would let my amazing teacher down, so I decided to continue through high school. Plus this made moving to a new state, new town semi-easier to make friends. Looking back now, I should have spent more hours practicing to gain more confidence to continue through college.
This old beauty needs to be serviced: new pads, cork, mouth piece, oil, brackets and a good shine will make her good as new. At one point I started to compose a piece but not knowing music theory I felt that it wasn’t good enough so I stopped. I locked her up in her case never to be heard from again.
-WN
