Phone Follow-Up

Well, I talked to the supervisor. It was helpful in that he had lots of suggestions as to why our service might be spotty. It was unhelpful in that it was all spoken in a way that suggested it's because my housemates and I are too stupid to use a phone line, and he's doing me a favor by talking to me. The thing is, I'm not technical, I don't know my routers from my filters, and even if I put on a confident voice, I'm probably not going to impress anyone with my knowledge of my own computer set-up. What I do know is that everything worked fine until we started making changes to our Verizon account. When I call them on it, either their knowledge is too limited to fix my problem, or they fix it but it comes back, or now I get a guy who makes me feel like it's my fault for not using all their shiny new equipment, which they'd be happy to send us (and bill us for).
Not OK. Not OK. Not OK. And now, in addition to this being not OK, I feel chastened. I didn't back down, but I feel like I need to go check all our home equipment for weaknesses, and I have no idea what I'm looking for. And it worked before, darn it! Do they do this on purpose? Do they work it so you have to buy the new stuff? Can they do that?
I'm still at work, at 6:45, trying to fix this. I gotta go home.

Verizon, Again

We're still having trouble. Our email systems are not functioning. And our Internet service is down yet again. How many times has that been now -- once a week at least, right?
FOS, you mentioned a Chapter 39A letter in one of your comments. Can you elaborate on that? Something needs to be done. Not only do I need to find a way to get them to fix our problems and stop them from coming back, that company needs to know what's wrong with its service. I don't know how such a big company can be successful with so many whopping shortcomings in its service.
In a way, it makes it harder that the phone reps are friendly. I know what it's like to be in customer service, so I don't want to yell at them, because it's not directly their fault that our Internet service bites. But I'm beginning to think that yelling at someone may be the only way to get a satisfactory resolution to our problems. That's no way to run a company, and I intend to tell them so in writing.
In the meantime, if anyone else has any ideas about what kind of action to take, I'm open to hearing them. My idea is to write letters to high-level Verizon executives, then stick those letters to arrows and shoot them into the tires of those executives' cars. Would it be too much to set fire to those arrows? Could the smell of burned rubber total a car the way skunk smell can? Mmmm, burning rubber...
This is so not OK. I am actually on hold right now, waiting to talk to a supervisor. I never ask to talk to a supervisor. But I'm responsible for the bills in our house, and with that comes the task of resolving issues with the companies that bill us. Every day my roommates go without Internet service and/or email, it severely inconveniences them and weighs on me. I may not be willing to fight for myself, but I'm not just Holly-angry, I'm whole-household-angry. I'm a hibernating bear, and she's slowly stirring. If Verizon looks cross-eyed at a cub, it will not be pretty.

Lies Men Tell

No, I'm not talking about no-good, two-timing scoundrels. I'm talking about dads, mostly. It would seem that the temptation to mess with the impressionable minds of children is far, far too much for even the best of men to resist. I grew up not knowing if I could believe anything my dad said. There was one time at a neighborhood picnic where he and another man (surely a father) tried to convince me that these really big corn chips were called "buffalo chips." I was in college when I learned that the word epitome is not pronounced phonetically - not because my dad couldn't pronounce it, but because he mispronounced it on purpose.
When I was in my twenties, I got a ride home from a church event with a young family. The father dropped the mother off at an Indian take-out place before driving me and the kids home. The little boy was concerned. "Where's Mummy?"
"Oh, she's spending the night at the curry house."
"She's not!"
"Sure she is."
This behavior is not confined to guys who have children of their own. I watched my brother do it when he was in high school. He and I had stopped by his best friend's house, and a little neighbor boy saw my brother and shouted, "Hi, J!"
"I'm not J, I'm Fred."
"No, you're J!"
"No, I'm Fred. J's my twin brother. He's not here; he's playing for the Sonics."
Ah, the old "I'm my twin" line. Who hasn't done that?
There's a notable exception to the title of my blog: the best female liar I've ever known, my college roommate, B. She could say anything with a straight face. She also had incredible endurance - you may not believe her at first, but she'd keep it up so long that eventually you gave in and agreed with whatever story she'd made up. Amy, a trumpet player we went to music school with, had lent a tuba player named Richie her car. Richie had spent his whole life in the city, and B managed to convince Amy that he did not posess a valid driver's license. She also persuaded another roommate of ours that mountain goats' legs are longer on one side than the other, so they could stand level while walking around the side of the mountain. The catch, of course, was that they had to go the right way; if they walked around the other way, they'd fall over.
I'm one of the most gullible people I know (although I like to think it's because I'm trusting). I have almost no ability to tell whether people are full of it. So when I watched the movie Napoleon Dynamite and was told that there really was such a thing as a liger, I didn't know whether to believe it. I didn't want to be taken in. It took me months to finally look it up on the Internet. Turns out that one is true.
Because we all know if there's one thing we can trust, it's the Internet.

Crimes Against the Seeing

My apologies for not blogging much over the last few days. I know missing a day of my blog is like missing a day of Oprah.
I forgot to wear makeup today. Didn't even notice till I got to work and saw myself in the mirror. To everyone who looked at me and thought, My heavens, is she ill? thanks for your concern, but it was just an absence of powder.
That was crime number one. The less serious offense, by far, because in the following area I am a repeat - nay, habitual - offender: Fashion. I have almost no fashion sense.
I can hear all my female friends saying, "No, you're not that bad, you just need some, uh, guidance." Thanks, but you don't have to sugar-coat this for me. No one's sugar-coating my wardrobe for you, are they?
My biggest problem is motivation. I like to be comfortable. I'm cheap (and poor). I'm in a hurry in the mornings. My desire to be cute is just not strong enough to overcome these obstacles. Oh, and I hate hate hate shopping. Hate it. Hate it.
A year ago, my roommates staged an intervention. I'm not even making this up. They took the sweaters out of my closet, put them in a pile on the floor, and said, "You're not allowed to wear these." OK, I'd had them since high school, which was 15 years ago, but apart from being hideously unfashionable there was nothing actually wrong with them, and I get cold a lot.
Suddenly everyone was forbidding me to wear stuff. My friend at work. My brother's girlfriend. My own mother refused to be seen in public with me when I wore a certain Elmer Fuddish winter hat. I also have this green ear-warmer thing. I've been told more than once, "You're going to take that off before we go anywhere." Even the band I use to tie my hair back when I wash my face at night gets disparaging remarks.
The flip side of this is that I've been getting help to be more fashionable, and to replace the forbidden items with things that don't hurt people's eyes. I don't always have the money (or the patience) to buy new things, but progress has been made. For my birthday, my brother and his girlfriend took me shopping; he provided the credit card, she provided the fashion sense, and I was the dumb and complacent model. Got some good stuff out of that trip. Brother says I need to "advertise," the theory being that men will be more interested if they can tell they're looking at a girl, not just a lump of flannel. It probably says a lot about the depth of my frumpiness that ever since high school, my whole family has been trying to skank me up. I'm finally coming around - not to wanton Tartdom, but to the notion that it can't hurt to wrap the merchandise in an attractive package.
My friend at work gave me a sweater for Christmas and was my shopping advisor on several occasions. My roommates help me out before I leave the house. My mom encourages me to spend money on clothes and other fun things, not just on boring practical stuff. (How sad is it that I'm so unused to having fun that my mother has to order me to do it?)
So I'm trying, kind of, most of the time. Except for little setbacks like today's makeup-less adventure (again, apologies to my coworkers for having to behold my zits in all their glory), I think I do OK. But then again, if it were only about what I think, I'd still be wearing those huge sweaters.

Book Recommendation: The Captain Underpants Series

Those who know me are surely rolling their eyes and saying, "Of course she reads books about someone called Captain Underpants!" These are written on a fifth-grade level, and I mean that in a good way. Dav Pilkey, the author, has basically polished up the comics he drew when he was a kid and got 'em published. They're great. They're all about a couple of boys who get a Super Secret Hypo-Ring (I have one myself) and accidentally hypnotize their principal, who strips down to his underwear, whips off his toupee, and skips off to fight crime, tra la laaaa. Among his foes are some Very Naughty Lunch Ladies, Terrible Talking Toilets, and Professor Poopypants. You gotta love that. I also have a couple of the Captain Underpants Extra Crunchy Books O' Fun, which have great activities you can do when the stiffs next to you on the Commuter Rail are doing Sudoku.

Blogging as Revenge: A Verizon Story. Part III.

The Not-Very-Christian Part

After that traumatic call to No One In Particular at Verizon, I called home. “Hey, Dad.”
“Hey kid, what’s up?”
“I called the phone company today.”
”Yeah? How’d that go?”
“I didn’t get anywhere. They didn’t give me the options I needed, and it wouldn’t take me to an operator when I hit zero, except for one time when it apparently routed me to New York and they said they couldn’t help someone in Boston.”
“The bastards.”
“Normally, I don’t mind automated systems, because I get shy when I have to make calls and talk to people, but this one made me want to break my own fingers.”
“You know, these people are so stupid. By the time the customer gets to a real person, they’re so angry that they chew the operator guy – or girl, what-have-you - out, so they’re afraid to talk to customers…”
“…so they create lousy automated systems and the cycle repeats.”
“They’re all bastards. So you didn’t get anywhere?”
“I got too angry and hung up. I might try again tomorrow.”
“Let me talk to ‘em.”
”Well, I should be able to be a grown-up about this…”
”No, you let me talk to ‘em. I’ll tell ‘em what their problem is, and if they give me a hard time, I’ll go down there in person and shove each individual phone up each individual ass. Let ‘em automate that. They can press 2 for a proctologist.”
It might be worth explaining here that my Dad is half-Italian, and from New Jersey. He’s a good guy, but I think he sometimes daydreams of being in a Mario Puzo novel.

***

The next night I went to the folks’ house for dinner. Dad was all pumped. “I talked to those dipshits at Verizon!”
“Oh, dear. Who got hurt?”
”Pissed me off.” He began to enunciate each word very carefully. “You were totally and completely right – their system is awful! I’m doing them a favor. I try to be civil and explain the flaws in their system to them. I am patient and articulate and I don’t raise my voice. So the girl on the phone, Gladys is her name – nice girl but not too bright, huh? – she puts me on hold while she finds a manager or whatever asshole they get to not help people with their problems. And he comes on and says, ‘Hi my name is Seth’ or whatever, and I tell him no one can use his system, and he doesn’t listen! This guy is talking all about ‘the heavy influx of calls’ and how they ‘strive to provide superlative service’ and this and that. He was givin’ me a superlative influx of bullshit, is what he was doin’. So I told him it’s people like him and companies like theirs that take this great country and flush it down the toilet with their incompetence and carelessness and bullshit. And I said if he wanted to keep your business and my business and the business of everyone we know, he’d stop making excuses and start making things right. So your phone or your computer service or whatever is fixed and you’re getting the next three months free. And if they charge you, you tell ‘em to talk to me.”
I stood there for a few seconds. Dad looked at me expectantly. Finally I said, “Did you really?”
“Indeed.”
I was now stunned both at the force of what he’d said to the Verizon guy, and by the fact that he’d just used the word indeed. I repeated it, “Indeed?”
Dad was calming down, and starting to smile. “Indeed I did. Yes indeedy.”
Now I was stunned and bemused. The thrill of victory was rushing to his head. “Yes indeedy?”
He tried to suppress a giggle. “Weedely deedely doo.” And with that he lost it and doubled over in laughter. He gasped again, “Weedely…deedely…”
Oh my word. It was Tony Soprano meets Ned Flanders.
He eventually raised himself again and wiped away a tear. “So, are you proud of your old man? I did good, huh?”
“Thank you, Dad. Three months free. I’m impressed!” I kissed him on the cheek and let him cook me dinner.

Ha! Take that, Verizon.

Blogging as Revenge: A Verizon Story. Part II.

II. The Mostly True Part

[Music, then a friendly woman’s voice.] Welcome to Verizon. You’ve reached Verizon Online Internet Services. [Man’s voice.] Para Espanol, marque el dos. [Woman’s voice again.] Is xxx-xxx-xxxx the number you’re calling about?
Yes.
Sorry, I didn’t hear you. Is xxx-xxx-xxxx number you’re calling about? Please say yes or no.
Yes.
You’re at the main menu. To start over at any time, say, 'Main menu.' [*Ping!*] Which are you calling about? Tech support, your account, or orders?
My account.
If calling for a technical issue, say, 'Tech support.'
My account.
…If calling with billing questions, say, 'My account.'
My account, what is wrong with you?
…To place an order to check the status of an order, say, 'Orders.'
MY. ACCOUNT.
All right, your account. Are you calling about billing, password reset, or your profile? Or, to disconnect your service, say, 'Cancel.'
(Uh-oh. What’s a profile? Which one do I want?)
To ask about changes on your bill, say, 'Billing.' To reset your password, say, 'Password reset.' To change your account information, such as your name or address, say, 'My profile.' To cancel, say, 'Cancel.'
(I press zero for an operator.)
I’m sorry, I didn’t get that. To ask about changes on your bill, say, 'Billing.'
(Is it me, or is her voice starting to sound snitty?)
… To reset your password, say, 'Password reset.'
You smell like boiled cauliflower and I'm reasonably certain your mother was a prostitute.
…To change your account information, such as your name or address, say, 'My profile.'
Urge to kill, rising…
…To cancel, say, 'Cancel.'
Billing.
Because Verizon Online Services are billed a month in advance, your first bill may appear higher than your regular monthly charge. There is also a one-time shipping and activation fee of $19.95.
Blah, blah, blah…
If you would like to review a copy of your invoice online, you can do so by going to start.verizon.net. You can say, 'Repeat that,' or, if you have another billing question, say, 'Continue.' Otherwise, just hang up.
Excuse me? A recording is all I’m getting? “Just freakin’ hang up?”
I’m sorry, I didn’t get that. You can say, 'Repeat that…”'
No way do I want you to repeat that.
…or, if you have another billing question, say, 'Continue.'
Continue!
…Otherwise, say, 'Main menu' or just hang up.
CONTINUE!
Which billing information are you calling for?
(If I smash this phone into the wall, will I regret it? I think I might.)
…Account balance, bill explanation, copy of my bill, or say, 'I’m calling for something else.' If you’re not sure, say, 'More information.'
I’m calling for something else.
I’m sorry, I didn’t get that.
More information.
I still didn’t get that. You can say, 'Account balance…'
(I hit zero again and again and again.)
Please hold while I transfer you to the next available agent. [Silence.]
“Hello, this is Shawna, how can I help you?”
Yes, I have several questions about my account.
“Can I have the phone number on the account, please?”
xxx-xxx-xxxx.
“Are you in New York, ma’am?”
No, I’m in Boston.
“I’m sorry, this is a New York office. You’ll want to call a Boston office for help.”
I called a Boston number and this is where it sent me.
“I’m sorry about that, ma’am. I’m afraid I can’t help you from here.”
OK, thanks for your time. (At this point rage is seeping from my pores and I want very much to do violence to someone or something. I eat lunch instead.)

Blogging as Revenge: A Verizon Story. Part I.

I wrote this last night in a fit of half-rage, half-manaical glee. It has bad words in it, so you might lose all respect for me. But that was bound to happen sooner or later.

I. The Disclaimer

1. You know how some people write fictionalized autobiography, and they use it to get back at everyone who ever wronged them? I deliberately notified a wide range of people about this blog as a way to keep myself accountable; I wouldn’t be able to write mean things about a person or group of people without their reading it directly, or at least without word getting back to them.
2. I’m also pretty good when it comes to raving about products or services that I appreciate. 3M band-aids with dinosaurs on them (“for all your dino-sores,” ha ha!), which don’t come off in the shower? Totally worth the extra money. Neosporin with pain reliever? Worked quite well on a minor burn I had. The honest mechanic I found in Maryland? I called home about him, I was so happy. All this is to say that I give credit where credit is due.
3. The individuals I’ve talked to at Verizon, when I finally get through to them, are very friendly.

All that said, this isn’t the first time I’ve had trouble with Verizon. Once service is up and running, things are fine – great, even. I get better cell phone reception than anyone else I know. But they seem to suck when it comes to setting things up. In Maryland, I went a week or two without a phone because things were complicated, confusing, contradictory, and slow. A month ago, simply to change the name on our household DSL account, we had to shut down service, and it couldn’t be reinstalled for almost 2 weeks. Now, this week, we changed a password, and service was shut down again, without warning or explanation, and no word as to when it would be restored. They’re such a pain in the ass, my ass isn’t big enough to carry it all. So I hereby break my own No Vindictive Blogging rule.

Part II is taken from actual transcriptions I made of their truly horrid automated call-routing system. (Yes, readers, I intentionally listened to this stuff more often than I had to in order to make this accurate. I may have a word or two off, but I am very, very close.) This is an amalgamation of my many interactions with this thing, but it is not – repeat, NOT – an exaggeration.

I confess I made Part III up. It was fun, though. (And Dad, if you’re reading this, you know you say this kind of stuff. You totally whoop ass in my story. Don’t take me out of the will.)

I wrote a song

Who hates Verizon?
I do, I do!
Why hate Verizon?
Cuz they eat poo!
What did we do to deserve this
Stupid, stinky, poopy service?

In the 3 minutes before I start work...

I would like to say:
Thanks, Mom, for pointing out my spelling mistake. I'll have to fix that pommuhgranit word.
I hate Verizon. Loathe. Despise. A month ago we had to pay $19.95 for the privilege of going 3 weeks without Internet access, and it looks like they're doing it again. 2 of my roommates are in the middle of job searches, and the 3rd is self-employed and works from her home computer. This is not OK. I wrote a story about it, but I can't post it on this blog because of said lack of Internet access. Very, very angry.

Book Recommendation: Lonesome Dove

I wasn't an English major, but can I still claim to be an English geek? Some of my biggest pet peeves are grammar and punctuation mistakes. I cheered out loud as I read Eats, Shoots and Leaves. I read The Catcher in the Rye and The Great Gatsby for fun. So, do I qualify, or am I still just a poser?
I probably don't read enough to count as a bookworm. I'm a very, very slow reader; as I read, I envision everything as a movie in my head, with vocal inflections and facial expressions and pacing. If I don't understand something, I'll reread it until I do. It takes forever. And I often set the book down to watch TV or a movie, because I like to watch while I eat. All that aside, though, I like to read, and I'd like to humbly recommend a book to you: Lonesome Dove.
I read it 3 three years ago and it's stayed with me this whole time. I've read the other books in the series - Dead Man's Walk, Streets of Laredo, and I'm now on the last 20 pages of Comanche Moon - but the original is a complete experience in itself. (Actually, I'm pretty annoyed with author Larry McMurtry for what he does to one of the characters early on in Streets of Laredo. If you've read it let me know, so we can complain together, because I'm sure if you have any heart in you at all you'll agree with me on this.) I was never interested in anything Western, for the same reason that I didn't like cop shows - no color. Westerns were brown, cop shows were gray, and I get bored quickly with people shooting each other. But Lonesome Dove changed everything. My brother and I have talked endlessly about how genre doesn't matter much; it really comes down to writing style. And I loved McMurtry's style in this book. He held my attention for 900 pages. He states things so simply. No rambling sentences, where you get the impression that the author just likes to hear himself talk. But he communicates so much with that simple style. He lets you into characters' heads, which is fascinating because you don't necessarily understand why they do what they do, but you know what they're thinking while they do it.
Perhaps my favorite thing is that I felt I could make judgments for myself. I hate being told how to feel and when to feel it. It ruins a work of art for me when I'm surrounded by people spouting opinions about it (like I'm doing right now about this book), or when I feel the artist himself is manipulating me. But I get totally sucked in when I feel like the artist has something to say, says it, and trusts me to have my own response. And I definitely responded to Lonesome Dove. I didn't realize to what extent until later, when I found myself recalling scenes or phrases months and years later. The characters and their stories are as complicated as real life, so I find that I'm still trying to figure them out, and the fact that this is a source of intrigue rather than frustration may also be a testament to McMurtry's ability to tell a good story. Of course, I'm not sure what to make of it, that I sometimes live my life in reference to a work of fiction. But that's my problem. It should only serve to further recommend the book to you.
So there you go. Holly, Book Reviewer, at your service.

Snort, Dog of the Future

Someday I will own a great big dog and I will name him Snort. He will have lots of soft fur and he will outweigh me by 30 pounds. I will train him to obey when we're out of the house, and everyone will be impressed with what a good boy he is, and with the fact that a lithe, willowy female like myself can control such a powerful beast. No one will mess with me. If I fall in a pond at the park, he will fish me out. When we're home, I will teach him to behave like various household items: "Snort, slippers!" and he will lie across my feet and keep them warm. "Snort, pillow!" and he will lie next to me on the couch so I can recline against something warm and furry. "Snort, TV tray!" and he, who by virtue of his size has no business being a lap dog, will flop himself over my lap, pinning me to the couch, and I will set my dinner plate on him while I watch TV.
Good boy.

Oh hey, I forgot to mention...

In relation to that last post, check out the Sara Groves song, Less Like Scars.

The Reconstruction is Pink

"Now, I told you that last story to tell you this one." -- Ron White

I've never been a pink girl. When I was a kid, I wasn't girly. As a music student in the '90s, I was all about flannel shirts and baggy pants. I've gone through a few extended periods where I didn't wear makeup. For years, my favorite color was a deep, wintery green.

This is going to look like a subject change, but stick with me: My time in Maryland was a Dismantling. God took everything apart - everything I thought I was supposed to do with my life, all I had envisioned my life to be - and I had to watch it go. When I came to Boston, I thought the hard time was over and things would change 180 degrees. But it's been very slow going. Things aren't bad anymore, but they're not great, either. I've asked myself and God so many times what the problem is - are the deficiencies in my life a result of deficiencies in me? - that I've had to stop thinking about it altogether because it drives me nuts.

Then, two weeks ago, I was at church getting prayed for. The girl kept praying for patience, patience, over and over. My internal response was, No! I don't want to need patience! I want the pieces of my life to fall into place, and I've waited so long already. But she kept on praying for patience, so I asked God why I needed it. And here's the answer I got: He is reconstructing what He had dismantled, and it takes time to do it right; Rome wasn't built in a day and all that. Suddenly it all made sense. He hadn't lost the pieces He'd taken apart, nor had He thrown them away. What's more, I realized that God was doing all this in response to crazy prayers I'd prayed years ago when I had no idea what I was in for. I remember sitting on my bed in Brighton, telling God that I wanted to be solid, substantial, that I didn't want surface without foundation. No gaps, I said. Take me all apart and rebuild me from the ground up if You have to, I said. Geez, what was I thinking? (See, this is why God doesn't often tell us the future, or when He does, He doesn't often get specific. Not only would we not pray crazy-bold prayers, we wouldn't leave the house.)

But here I am, 7 years on, in the time of my Reconstruction. And it is pink. When I think of potential finally being fulfilled, vague desires solidifying, things I'd stopped hoping for coming back into view - these thoughts are all pink to me. My new favorite colors are red - deep, velvet blood red; flirtatious, dangerous pomegranite red. To me, the color of this blog is like the glow of a warm home to a stranger who's been out in the dark and cold.

I don't understand much of what happened in Maryland. I have no color for that. But this I do know: The Reconstruction is pink.

Fact: People were once locked in asylums for this.

About 3 years ago I read an article in Smithsonian Magazine about how some people associate colors with things like numbers, sounds, or physical pain. A composer named Christopher Rouse has composed music based on the colors he sees in his mind when he hears certain melodies and chords. One woman thinks of the color orange when something hurts her.
I associate colors with numbers, letters, and sometimes words and the things those words denote. Up until I read this article, I had no idea that not everybody did this. I'd assumed it was part of everyone's experience of the world, and took it for granted to such an extent that the only conversation I remember having about it was with my mom, wherein we disagreed about which colors went with which items. (I say 7 is yellow, she says it's purple. I don't know what's wrong with her.)
For those of you who are wondering what on earth I'm talking about, the best way I can describe it is to say it's like Sesame Street. (If you haven't seen Sesame St., then I can't help you.) When they introduce a letter or number, they put it on the screen, and it's always a color. "S!" they'll say, and there will be a big yellow S on the screen. It's like I have a screen in my head, and when I think of S, it's always yellow. I would be frustrated if somebody go me something pretty with my initials on it, and the colors were "wrong." H is light blue, K is light pink, and S is yellow. Anything else is incongruous to me.
Does anybody else out there do this?

I watched a sad romantic movie last night.

A coming-of-age story, where the 18-year-old heroine concludes, basically, that it's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. When I was that age, I assumed that adage was true simply because people said it. Later, when I got involved with a church that emphasized "guarding your heart," I assumed the opposite - that it's better not to give your heart away unless you had some reasonable assurance that it would be well taken care of.
Now, I think you have to make that call on a case-by-case basis. It depends on who you love, and how, and why, and whether they're free to love you back.
After watching this movie, though, I realized something:
If it's not wrong to love the one you love, and
if it's better to care and be open than to close yourself off,
...then my relationship with music was not a waste, nor was it a failure.
I cared. And I tried. If love is measured in sacrifice, then I did that, too. And maybe that experience in itself was good for me.
Although in place of classical music, perhaps I should learn the blues. Music is the man that done me wrong. But I'm not sorry I was his.

Back Again at the Back of the Orchestra

The Setting. North Hall, Peabody Conservatory of Music, Baltimore, MD. 2:30 P.M. Rehearsal for Stravinsky’s Firebird. The complete ballet. No short and “suite” for us. And it’s one of the first rehearsals (translation: string and woodwind sectional, slow progress). Tacet City for the low brass. Let’s take a closer look at this rag-tag little section, shall we?

Holly. Her trombone sits on its stand while she examines her fingernails. A bomb could go off and she wouldn’t notice.

Gary. His trombone is on the floor, the mute in the bell. He’s looking at the ceiling. It’s very interesting. No matter what you said to him right now – statement, question, hostile command – his response would be the same: “Hmmm?”

Karl. His mouthpiece is out of his horn, and he’s putting it into his mouth, taking it out, looking at it, and putting it back in his mouth again. His gaze wanders around the room absently.

Eric. His tuba is on the floor, upside-down. The low brass are the jocks of the orchestra, and Eric is perhaps the most die-hard low-brass player in the group. He’s reading, of all things. He’s not even moving his lips. How boring. Let’s move on.

Eli. Last in the row. As 2^nd tuba, he has less to do than anybody, which is saying something. He’s slouching in his chair, his eyes fixed straight ahead. Is he thinking hard or not at all? It’s hard to tell…

Gary: (flipping his music) We don’t play till 102.

Holly: Really? (flips her music) We’ve got an eighth note at 98.

Gary: Hey, waddaya know, we do. Where are we now?

Holly: Probably around 6.

Conductor: (to orchestra) Can we have the flutes at 4?

Holly: We’re at 4.

Gary: Oh, joy.

Eric: You know, we should all get whistles, and play whenever the flutes play. No one would know.

Karl: They’ve got those whistling lollipop things in the cafeteria.

Gary: Those things are cool.

Eric: Hey, you all wanna switch parts?

(General assent)

Holly: Eli, can you read tenor clef?

Eli: No.

Holly: Do you care?

Eli: (shrugs)

Holly: Here. We won’t get to where we have to play.

(They all switch parts. The paper shuffling is the most noise they’ve gotten to make so far. They sit happily for a minute or so, pleased at the thought of how funny it will sound to all play the wrong parts.)

Conductor: OK, let’s take it at 17, a little under tempo.

(A few eyes roll, someone sighs, and there’s a general shifting in their seats as everyone gets comfortable again, eventually falling back into their original positions.)

ARTHUR II:The Undead Palm Tree

When Mom and Dad settled in to their dream home, they got some big plants to put in it and around it: pine trees to line the boundary between our property and our neighbors’, a garden, blossoming bushes around the front porch, and two indoor trees. My mom has a black thumb, so Dad took over plant-watering duties years ago. It’s been a little ironic, then, that Mom’s garden has flourished and the indoor plants have been slowly and painfully making their way to the great Victorian Dream House in the Sky. The upstairs tree was “Newton” (a fig tree, get it?). Downstairs, with his own place in the bay window, was Arthur Fronds-erelli, a palm tree. His remains have now been removed to the back porch.
One day I called home for advice on my taxes. Dad was home. “We’re getting a new tree to replace Arthur,” he said. “It’s from California. It’s real, but it’s preserved somehow so it won’t die. I’m not sure what it is, but they do something to it…”
“Like plant taxidermy,” I offered.
“Yeah! Plant taxidermy!”
“So it’s not alive, but not dead, and you can’t kill it.”
“Yeah! They’ll send it to us. We have to put it together.”
They got their un-dead taxidermy tree in the mail. After a technical support call to their California supplier (“Where are the holes to stick the branches into?” “You have to take off the burlap wrapping, sir.”), they assembled the tree. His name is Arthur II. Long may he not die!

OLLIE

We had a Viking in our basement. His name was Ollie. I asked him once if he minded living in our basement, and he said no, he didn’t mind. Spending all that time in the dark reminded him of winter in Norway. It was an extra treat for him when our basement flooded – he converted an air mattress into a raft (he called it the Inflatable Conqueror), went exploring, and discovered a continent of eight-tracks that my father could have sworn he’d gotten rid of along with his sideburns.

One day I went downstairs to bring Ollie some lutefisk, only to find him kicking the cement wall with his bare foot. “What are you doing?” I cried.

“Takes mind off of pain in the face,” he explained, stopping his kicking long enough to turn and show me the huge shiner around his eye. Then he winced in pain and resumed punishing the wall. I went and grabbed him by his horns and turned him around.

“Don’t pull my horns, he said, looking like a pouty little boy.

“Don’t’ kick the wall,” I answered. “What happened?”

“That Hun next door.”

“Is he at it again?”

“Ja.”

“Hm,” I said angrily. “Try and sit still while I get some ice.”

“Mmm.”

That Hun next door is the neighborhood bully. Nobody knows his real name; we all just call him “that Hun,” and he likes it that way. I guess he feels it gives him an aura of mystery. (Yeah, right, just like the stupid hat he wears makes him intimidating. Whatever. But if I’ve learned anything from Ollie, it’s to not make fun of stupid hats on aggressive people. It seems these conquering types are very sensitive about their headgear. But I digress.)

Ice in hand, I headed back downstairs to comfort our injured warrior. He was being very good, and didn’t complain when I put the pack on his eye. In the other, not-swollen eye, I thought I noticed something more than just wounded pride. “What’s up?” I inquired.

Hesitantly, Ollie began, “I already explore your basement and make map of all cardboard islands…” He paused, and appeared to be having trouble. An uneasy feeling began to grow in my stomach. “There is leak in Inflatable Conqueror…”

“Where are you thinking of going?”

“The Nordstroms have in-ground pool, and floating alligator. I hear there are even sea monsters painted on the floor.” He smiled weakly, wanting to be sure it was OK with me. I tried to smile, too.

“I hear they make good lutefisk.”

Ollie seemed relieved. “My face will be OK,” he said, smiling as much as he could without hurting his eye too much. “I like ice,” he added, and then turned around and began organizing his oar collection.

Slowly, I climbed the stairs, thinking about how quiet our basement would be without Ollie banging around. My parents were sad, too, but we all agreed to support Ollie in his venture into new territory. “Perhaps a party would be nice,” my mom suggested. “We can invite all his friends.” And so the plans for the great Bon Voyage, Ollie! bash began.

We sent invitations to all his friends – the Lombard brothers and their dog, the Saxon and his whole family, a Burgundian who’d been stand partners with him in the local chapter of the Banjo Revival Society, and a whole band of Celts who lived down the by the Wilson’s pond. They all brought presents (mostly jewelry and ornaments made from leaves, twigs and rocks – but they meant well) and we gathered in the living room. Every week Ollie came upstairs to watch old reruns of Home Improvement (he liked the animal noises). It was one of the few times he left the basement, but he was as reliable as any clock. This time, as he turned the corner, we all jumped out and yelled, “Surprise!”

“Uffda!” he said. That was all he was able to say. Somebody broke into “For He’s a Jolly Good Warrior,” and everyone joined in. I saw a tear slide down Ollie’s shiner and into his beard. “You guys are the best,” he whispered.

We played a few games (Charades, Pin-the-tail-on-the-Dragon, Twister – which is as awkward for people wearing helmets as you think it is), had some cake, and slowly folks headed home. Ollie just sat and stared at all his presents while we cleaned up. Thought he didn’t say anything, I knew he was deeply moved. So as not to embarrass him, I just slipped a little note into his bag of loot that said, “I’ll miss you, too.”

* * *

I went to visit Ollie at the Nordstroms’ the other day. He was rowing happily around their pool and occasionally splashing their Labrador retriever playfully. He beamed when he saw me, and beamed even more when I presented him with some homemade lefse. He balled up a slice and shoved it into his mouth gleefully, and set the rest on the alligator as it floated by. “You cook good,” he said with his mouth full. Then, shoving his oar deep into the pool and sweeping it upward, he created the suburban equivalent of a tidal wave that soaked me through. He laughed harder than I’d heard him laugh in a long time, and I went home satisfied that Ollie was where he belonged. We all still miss him now and then, and the basement is a painful reminder of times gone by; but while it hurts to let go, if anyone asks me whether I’d recommend having a Viking as a friend, my answer would be a hearty, “Ja!”