88 Keys

Tuesday is piano day around here. Piano lesson in the morning, practice in the afternoon. By Tuesday evening, my piano is lucky that I can't pick it up. I'd have it out on the curb on more than a few Tuesday nights. By Wednesday afternoon's practice, my husband is known to have said "You're killing me......." more than a few times. By Friday's practice, he's wondering himself if he can pick up the piano. By Sunday afternoon's practice, either we're both more than willing to try and get the piano out to the curb, or we're both enjoying the week's lesson because I have mastered it.

My first piano lessons began when I was five years old and in the first grade. In a Catholic school. With nuns. Not only did the nuns teach all the classes, but the piano teacher was a nun. I learned quickly. Having a black-and-white-suited nun using a three-foot wooden ruler to point out each note is a great motivator.

My piano teacher now is my friend "K" -- not a nun, doesn't even dress in black and white, and there's not a ruler in sight. At her house, I play on her beautifully rich ebony grand piano. I'm sure there are Tuesday mornings when she wishes she could pick me up and put me out on her curb.

I don't remember it being so hard to learn how to match written notes to the 88 keys on a piano. I think it's harder to learn something new when you're older. There's just so much more stuff already in your brain and having to squeeze in new things just causes confusion in the brain matter. Before this past summer, my lessons were going along at a steady pace. But summer being summer, my husband and I went away a few times, and "K" and her husband also took vacation time. There were weeks of this summer when I didn't play, practice or even see a piano.

Not a good thing. Because when you get yourself back on schedule with regular weekly lessons, you can find 'middle C' on that piano, but blessedly little else. And believe me, I tried. So much that my piano seemed to be begging for mercy. And on one really bad practice afternoon, my youngest cat jumped up on my piano bench, put his front paws on the keyboard (I think he hit an 'E' and an 'A') and he grabbed my music sheet with his teeth and ran into the bedroom. No lie--- I can show you his teethmarks on the second page of "It's A Wonderful World."

I'm determined to get over this little rock in my piano road. Even if I have to beg "K" to put on a nun's habit and hold a long wooden ruler. All those piano lessons years ago... beginning at 5 and ending at 9 when we moved and couldn't take the piano because there was no room for it. My grandmother had a piano in her living room, but you need to practice every day, not just on Sundays between dinner and dessert. I tried to keep playing at least one song on Sundays back then, but without the daily lessons, I wonder now if my grandmother sometimes wanted to put her piano out on the curb.

So there I was last year.... room for a piano.... the money to buy one.... the time for lessons. Everything just seemed to fall into place. Ah, but the brain. Filled up with such stuff. Is there room for 88 keys up there? I'm begging...... let me learn these blessed notes. Whole notes, half notes, sharps and flats.... and now octaves. Music has no mercy.