Tuesday, January 5, 2010
3:23 AM
Never Let A Pawnbroker Show You His Instruments
This post is about the time I got a clarinet and joined the school band. Why? What did you think that title meant? Gross! Get your minds out of the gutter!!!
Freaks. : )
When Jerry Hull (remind me to tell you about THAT creature someday!) came to William Gay at the beginning of my 5th grade year to sign new members up for band, I was SUPER excited and I wanted in immediately. In our school, you had to be in the 5th or 6th grade to be in band and I had waited years for my turn so when it finally arrived, I set out about the task of talking my parents into buying a horn for me. If you knew my parents well, then you would know that that was no small task at all. If I wanted toys, they were all over that but when it came to expensive school-related items, they were a very hard sell, not because they didn't want me to get a chance to participate in various things but because they held a lot of misguided presumptions about the price of such things. My parents were the world's worst about getting their information from their stupid friends. Rather than look into things themselves, they would often just make decisions based on that which old so-and-so told them and taht habit made me absolutely crazy when I was a kid. It also reduced me to being a professional beggar because convincing my parents to actually look into something about which they already had preconceived ideas was a monumental undertaking. Such was the case with my request for a musical instrument for the band I so desperately wanted to join.
After watching a demonstration of various horns that Jerry Hull did at our school, I decided that I either wanted to play a cornet or the drums. However, there was only one other person in my class who was interested in playing the drums, and because I knew so little about school band at the time, I decided against being a drummer because I mistakenly thought it would be really boring with only two people playing snare drums. (I wanted to play the whole trap set and didn't understand that I needed to start out on just the snare before taking the leap to a full set of drums. Major error on my part as I STILL long to play the drums very, very much. I'd have a trap set in my house right now if I had the money and space for it.) So I settled on the cornet. I liked brass instruments. I hated reeded instrument. So I told my parents that I wanted a cornet but also told them that if they couldn't find a good used cornet in their price range, then I would settle for trombone or flute. (Flute is a woodwind instrument, though it doesn't have a reed but I thought it was a brass instrument because it was metal rather than wood.) I loved music. The truth is that I would have settled for ANY instrument just to get to be in band. And settle, I did, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
My dad was a musician. He loved music and he liked the idea of me learning music. He always had a dream about Brent and me playing music with him someday. So the joining band part, he was quick to approve. It was the instrument purchase that tripped us up. He didn't want to spend the money for a horn. How I was supposed to join band without an instrument, I do not know but initially, that seemed to have been what he had in mind. My mom, not yet realizing my deep love of all things music, was o.k. with me joining band but she really thought it was just one more silly obligation for me and for her so if she had had her way, I wouldn't have joined simply because she didn't want to get sucked into attending anything else at school. lol We went down that particular road a LOT when I was growing up because going to my school events was as difficult and painful as chemotherapy to my mother. I didn't understand it back then, but now that I suffer from the same social anxiety disorder that had no name back then, I fully understand.
So anyhow, my mom tried to talk me out of being in band but she wasn't mean about it or anything and she told me that if I could talk my dad into buying a horn, she would let me join. So I went to work on him. I called him every single day at work and I hit him with it every time I caught him at home. I tried to convince him that he could get me a brand new horn from Saied for a mere $10 per month which was a really, really great deal for a brand new horn with a brand new case but because my parents were too shy to look into it, they just couldn't believe that a "big store in Tulsa" was going to let them walk away with a brand new instrument for $10 per month so they refused to take me to the Holiday Inn the night that Saied brought a truck load of instruments down for all of the M******** parents to peruse and rent to own. My mom and dad were very suspicious people. That was especially true of my dad. My mom is still like that today to some extent but dad was always the worst when it came to that. He was always sure that there was a catch in everything. lol So his position was that he was not going to go out there and get "rooky-doo'd" as he called it, by signing his name to a contract with some "big city company" because he was sure that the $10 per month was just an introductory ruse. He was absolutely convinced, as was my mom, that when my friend's parents received their SECOND monthly bill, it would demand much, much, MUCH more than $10 of them. It became an epic battle of wits between my parents and Saied Music and my parents were determined to be the only parents in the neighborhood who didn't "fall for" the scam that Saied was supposedly playing on everyone else. Oy, freaking veh. I cried for hours the night of the Holiday Inn event because I knew that I was missing out on an opportunity to get a really nice instrument from a reputable company. There was no way that my parents were going to drive me up to Tulsa to get one, even if by some miracle, I managed to change their minds later (which was never going to happen, but I always had hope because hope springs eternal when you're 10, lol) At one point, it began to look as though I was not only not getting a new instrument from Saied, but I was also not going to be able to join band because my parents just weren't finding a horn priced to suit their non-existent "buy our daughter a musical instrument" budget.
The following Saturday, my mom had to do some shopping at Anthony's, which was just a few doors down from the city's main pawn shop. I knew they had instruments and a couple of my friends had told me that their parents had found instruments fairly cheap there so I used that opporunity to slip away down to take a look for myself.
When I walked in, the very bored salesperson asked me if he could help me. When I told him that I was looking for a cornet because I was hoping to join my school band, he informed me that he didn't have a cornet at the moment and then insisted that I should instead, seriously consider the clarinet he had. I had never considered playing clarinet for even a moment. I had zero interest in it. None. But I was convinced that the pawn shop prices were the only prices my parents were going to be willing to think about paying so I listened to the man's passionate sales pitch. That man went on for several minutes about the alleged "fun" involved in playing the clarinet. He took the one he had down and put it into my hands and let me mash the keys, etc. By the time he finished giving me his spiel, which included an assurance that the price of that horn was so inexpensive that my parents would readily agree to purchase it, (that was the one that pushed me over the edge of desperation) If I remember correctly, the price of that horn was $40. I'm not positive about that but I think that's correct. That was a lot of money back then but not nearly as much as my parents had been told to expect a brand new horn to cost. (I don't know where their friends got their info but they convinced my parents that horns cost hundreds and hundreds of dollars. Most of them don't even cost that today so they most definitely didn't cost that back then.)
So I gave up my drum/cornet dreams and decided I'd better ask for the clarinet because that's the horn I had the best chance of talking my parents into purchasing. My mom wouldn't buy it (and to be fair, at that particular time, such purchases were not really her parental jurisdiction, lol) so I hit my dad up the first chance I got. I don't remember if it was that same day or the next but either way, I put on the full court press for the pawn shop piece of crap clarinet. Still, I couldn't get any kind of committment from him. He didn't say no but he also didn't ever say yes so I didn't know what to expect.
Fast forward a few days when my dad surprised me by bringing home a very good but used clarinet. It wasn't the one from the pawn shop. He had gone to Ramsey's Music Store to get my horn because they offered a better price and/or agreed to let him pay it out. I'm not sure which of those things convinced him to take the plunge but I also didn't ask many questions because I was afraid I'd cause him to second-guess himself and take the horn back.
So for the next three years, I played clarinet in the school band and although I was pretty good at it when I tried, I never, never liked it. I thought clarinet was one of the most boring instruments in the world to play and even more importantly, I HATED those wooden reeds. I get chills and goosebumps just thinking about them. I could not STAND putting those things in my mouth. It wasn't the taste. They really didn't have a taste. It was just the dry texture. I truly cannot find a word strong enough to convey to you just how much I HATED those reeds.
Near the end of 6th grade, my horn broke. It was nothing serious or particularly costly and technically I could still have played it but I used that as an excuse to get out of playing it. I told my parents that I needed it repaired knowing full well they would not agree to pay for said repair work. lol I got to sit in band class for the next few weeks, doing my own thing (homework, writing notes, reading, etc.) because my band director had no power to force my parents to rush the repairs on my horn. I didn't want out of band. That wasn't my deal at all. I had just finally reached the point of no return with my reed hate. I just couldn't take it anymore.
Long story made just a LITTLE bit (and ONLY a little bit) shorter.....the school year ended and during the summer, I messed with my clarinet enough to get it working again. I did not want to play it the next year but I also loved band and did not want to drop out so I resigned myself to giving those nasty reeds another try.
Fortunately, God had mercy on me and somewhere mid-7th grade, my band director announced that he was in need of more trombone players. I still preferred drums or trumpet but I liked the trombone and it was a brass instrument, which had always been my preference so I jumped at the chance to switch instruments. The best part was that he had an extra horn that belonged to the school so I could switch without having to depend upon my parents to buy me a trombone. (Thank goodness, I didn't have to go through THAT again......until 8th grade, that is. lol)
I switched to trombone, loved it, worked hard, and made my way to 1st chair of beginning band (I had to change my schedule and agree to start over in beginner band in order to be allowed to switch instruments because he had no idea of knowing how quickly I would pick it up) and was given a short solo in the spring concert. I was also invited to join Honor Band (the school's top band) for 8th grade. When I did so, I immediately won 2nd chair just behind the school's top trombone player who had been playing since 5th grade. Not too shabby, huh? And a couple of times that year, I surpassed him and won 1st chair. I took to trombone quickly and effortlessly. And lest you think I'm bragging, let me just assure you that that is not the case. I don't take credit for any of my musical talents. I don't know why God chose to make music my gift in life but He did and because of that, it's just something that I've always been able to do. There is no rhyme or reason to any of it. I just "can". It's all Him. Every ounce of the talent comes from Him. It's from Him, through Him, because of Him, and for Him. I'm just the ragamuffin vessel He chose to use and for that, I am truly grateful. As I always say, there is no other gift I would rather get to have while rattling around in this big old world. Next to God and my family, music is everything to me. And nothing on earth ushers me directly into His presence, where I continually bow in awe of His goodness, mercy, magnificence, and grace.
After all of this, there is still the story of the summer of '75, when I begged literally every single day for my parents to rent me a brand new trombone. But this post is already quite long so I'll save it for next time. I'm sure you're just dying to hear all about it. LOL
The dreaded clarinet reed. Have I mentioned how much I hated the
*Bernie: You played cornet in band, which I would have used, since that was one of my chosen instruemtns. However, by the time I joined band, you no longer had it. It just dawned on me while writing this post that I've never asked you where it went or how hard it was for you to talk Mom and Dad into getting it for you. We had a lot more money when you started band so you might have had an easier time? lol I'd love to hear the story.