First off, let me start by saying that I love music–I really do. In fact, you could even say that music saved my life.
Once upon a time, way back in grade school, I was waiting at the bus stop with my sister, Kim, who–despite being two years older than me–was my size or even smaller (she got carded going in to R-rated movies well into her twenties). With us were all of the other neighborhood kids–nearly a dozen (this was 1975, when kids still rode the bus)–who were doing their best to use up some excess energy before the bus came, because even though our bus driver was a nice man [with a quaint habit of turning down the radio every time a swear word came on, thus turning “Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown” into “the baddest man in the whole (mute) town”] he was also a bit of a bad (mute) himself, and was rumored to carry a paddle up near the front of the bus to use on unruly children. ( Remember, this was 1975.)
Anyway, there we were, waiting for the bus, when out of nowhere I was laid out by an ENORMOUS (cantaloupe-sized in my original retelling, but probably more the size of a sickly plum) rock; it seemed that Sammy Gale had decided to work off his excess energy by throwing rocks up into the air. Now, being grade school students, you wouldn’t expect any of us to be intimately familiar with the work of Sir Isaac Newton, but even I knew that what goes up must come down, and therefore also knew that despite all of his protests that “it was an accident,” Sammy was far from blameless in this incident. Which was all I needed to utter the two words known to strike fear into children everywhere: “I’m telling.”
Of course, what I was forgetting was that there was no one there to actually tell at the time, and so, recognizing the impotence of my threat, Sammy picked up an even BIGGER rock (this one, I think, really was the size of a cantaloupe), and told me to “shut my mouth.” Then he stepped towards me.
And that’s when it happened: like something out of a ninja movie my big/little sister was in between us, and that odd whistling sound we all heard was the noise her flute case made as it reached terminal velocity before connecting with Sammy’s chin. The end result, of course, was that this time it was Sammy who was laid out, and Sammy who was screaming “I’m telling!” Which he did, as soon as we got on the bus. And for which the bus driver teased him mercilessly over the next few years, on account of him getting “beat up by a little girl.” (Again, this was 1975.)
Needless to say, Sammy Gale did not grow up to be a great lover of music. On the other hand, I did, which makes it even less fitting that I should now be the one who is regularly assaulted by a musical instrument: Clementine’s double bass.
Now, I know that roadies often suffer from the unstable temperaments of the musicians they serve, and, having served under Clementine in many other capacities (maid, chef, chauffeur, personal assistant), I expected no less. I expected to be yelled at, berated, cajoled, and then yelled at some more. Which I was. However, what I did not expect was to be regularly beaten about the head and shoulders as I attempted to wrestle an instrument larger than myself into a Honda, nor to have that same instrument launch itself at me like some kind of amorous drunk once I had finally gotten both of us on the road. But, what I expected the least, was to actually start feeling a wee bit sorry for poor old Sammy Gale–the little (mute).