Piano Man

And the waitress is practicing politics
As the businessmen slowly get stoned
Yes, they're sharing a drink they call loneliness
But it's better than drinking' alone

On her belly, one step at a time, the Monkey maneuvered down the stairs. Mama maintained a watchful eye from mere steps away. The girls were heading downstairs to swap the laundry. Slack-ass Daddy sat on the sofa, sipping a Sam Adams, while surfing through a sea of basic-cable sewage.

One step at a time. The Monkey concentrated on foot placement and her relative distance from Mama. She's a careful girl, if not borderline compulsive.

It was then, in the Monkey's mid-descent, that Daddy decided to stop on one of those non-MTV music-video channels that actually show music videos. Shakira, it must have been. (Daddy was always a sucker for writhing belly flesh.) Lured like a stripper to coke, daddy's flipping faltered and the volume spiked under the pressure of his thumb on the button.

If you have ever witnessed one of those fake-hypnotist stage spectaculares at the state fair, (the one where the snake-oil salesman whistles the Chicken Dance and his sleeping subjects peck the stage like hungry hens) then you will have some idea what the Monkey's reaction to Rhythm looks like. Same response to all music, really. Fast, slow, loud, soft, any tune will transfix my daughter, and summon the secret spirit of clapping and stomping.

As the sultry Columbian belly dancer declared the honesty of her wiggling hips, the stair case-rappelling tot rose from her safety-crouch to dance a little ditty. As she was perched precariously upon the mid-flight step, she promptly propelled herself ass-over-tea-kettle down to the landing below.

As you can imagine, this caused quite a stir. Ultimately, though, she proved to be unharmed, and lessons were learned by everyone.

What left me in a post-crisis pre-blogging ponder was where this musical Pavlovism came from. To be sure, Mama marched in a band many years ago. Her specialty was blowing in and on a variety of horns and flutes. (I'll let you make your own jokes here...) However, she will be the first to tell you that all of her flute tooting was the product of practice rather than any mystical musical muse.

And Daddy? Daddy got a drum set for Christmas, 1977. After 128 renditions of Little Drummer Boy, the drums mysteriously vanished from the house.

There were two attempts at guitar, both ending badly. I can still play the C-chord. (I know, you're impressed.) Look out Esteban!

Of course, there was the Jr. High hand-bell choir at church. White gloves. Brass bells. The only thing I recall from that musical safari was the redhead girl who played the half-octave to my right. She had developed at an early age, and if we could pling through the Hallelujah Chorus quickly enough, there was usually enough time to make out and grope her sweater puppies behind the bus barn before my mom arrived.

And that's about it. Well, I guess, there was the piano. A light-wood pre-owned upright thing that my mother imposed upon me. With the purchase of the accursed instrument, came six months of free lessons. Those lessons, please believe, were all intended for me.

The piano instructor was an old woman who was born before the internal combustion engine. Seemingly in the South, as all of her instructional melodies were horribly offensive. "Blackies Toting Bales" and "Negroes in the Field" etc... I was ten years old, and even I knew something was wrong. Oh, and she also smelled like urine.

Needless to say, my musical education went the same way as my foreign-language education. Don't ask me to strike up a song at your next party. However, that leaves me with a dancing monkey and no clear vision of what to do with her tuneful obsession. Lessons of course, though in what, I cannot say. Lessons with someone who is not a closet clucker with a weak bladder I suppose. That much I can say for sure.

Reading for comprehension:

1. What video did Brian stop to watch, and what does this say about his masculenity?
2. What does Brian think about stage-show hypnotists?
3. Why are all old people urine-stained biggots?