The Piano

Mr. Espinoza would come over to our house once a week and teach us piano in the dining room. He had wavy black hair and a big furry moustache. He dressed in jet black polyester and looked just like a bullfighter if he only had a cape. We all thought he was super cute. I can only imagine what he thought of us. There was so much chaos going on during every lesson. Doors slamming, kids yelling, dog barking, and mom clanging pots in the kitchen. In the midst of all this, we took turns on the bench. Our hands on the keys and our eyes shifting between the music, Mr. Espinoza, and the gerbil.

We had a gerbil that lived in a cage on top of the piano. When you looked up to read the music, you were also looking at the gerbil wiggling its bony hands and bunny mouth to the beat of the song. That is until the gerbil disappeared. We looked everywhere for that gerbil, but we couldn’t find it, so the cage just sat there empty. Eventually we found it dead behind the piano, but I still stared at the cage like something would change, but it didn't. I wanted to play the “hat dance” song, which was near the end of the book, but I never did. I think we quit. Mr. Espinoza just stopped coming. No more piano. No more gerbil.

When I helped my parents move 40 years later, it was still there, the cage minus the gerbil.

My mom said, “You need to learn to play the piano first, then you can play another instrument”. Which was a huge bummer because I wanted to play guitar. My mom didn’t play piano at all, but she got to play ukulele in a singing group called the “Mellow-Aires.” She sang and played a solo “Bali Hai” from the musical, South Pacific, in a swimsuit and grass skirt. I called this to her attention, but it didn't get me anywhere.

She wanted to audition for the part of Laurey in the musical “Oklahoma” and sing “Surrey with the Fringe on Top”. We’d seen it on TV and she even looked like Shirley Jones. We were all riding in the car together after church one Sunday when my Dad said he had a question for us. “How would it be if your mom was in a play? It does mean she’ll have to be gone a lot” I screamed out “NO MOM…DON’T LEAVE”.  She didn’t audition, and I blame myself. But in my defense, all I could think about was being stuck with the babysitter Helen.

Helen in the housecoat with the saggy nylons who wore something resembling a shower cap because she had no hair. She had fuzz. She was a grouchy old witch. My mom didn’t like her either. Eventually my parents got rid of her and we got Betty Ann. She was awesome and would play with us on the rug. She’d let us take turns staying up late. But we didn’t have Betty Ann yet. So, I screamed “NO”. I’m sure it’s just one of many resentments my mother has stashed away in her apron. Oklahoma hangs out there as something she would have done but couldn’t because of us, primarily me.

When I was in the first grade, my mom took me to audition for the part of Gretl in “Sound of Music” at the high school. I don’t know whose idea it was. She didn’t seem very happy about it. We walked into the auditorium and sat way in the back, off to the side by ourselves. When they called all the kids who were trying out for Gretl, the youngest of the Von Trapp family, I literally took off running for the stage.

Each of us had to step forward, say our name, and sing “Do Re Mi” by ourselves. All I knew was “Do a deer, a female deer”, and then I just sang Re, Mi, Re, Mi, Re, Mi. When I heard the director say, “I think we need someone a little taller”. I inched up on my tiptoes and raised my chin as high as I could. Then he said, “well, maybe not so tall” and I shrunk back down in my shoes. I got the part. It never entered my mind that I might not be able to do it, that I wasn’t good enough, that I should be afraid. These things never occurred to me.

We rehearsed at night and I was up way past my bedtime with the big kids. The director, Mr. Schomas would buy me a soda pop from the machines. Soda machines in school. What? How cool. My mom was always late picking me up, so I’d roam around with him backstage checking on things and then I’d follow him through the halls to his office, running my hand over the lockers, row after row of them. I wanted a locker. Mr. Schomas told me I would get one, but not until I got older. I couldn’t wait.

I wanted to grow up just like Leisel, my oldest sister in the play. She had long cascading hair tied up in ribbons. She had a beautiful voice. I tried to tag along wherever she went. She fixed my hair like hers when we took pictures for the newspapers. I was always in front because I was little. On opening night, my Dad gave me a bouquet of flowers. My mom said it was just a nose gay. They matched my dress which was blue with yellow polka dots. I wore yellow tights and yellow patent leather shoes. I felt like a movie star. I draped my red coat over my shoulders and sauntered from the wagon to the school entrance with my nose gay. We got to wear lots and lots of make-up. I didn’t want to ever wash it off, but they told me if I didn’t, I’d end up looking old before my time. I made a mental note. I made a mental note of everything.

But I never got to do another play. My mom said the late rehearsals were the reason I was walking in my sleep and I needed to get to bed at a more reasonable hour. I thought to point out that they had been blocking my door with pieces of furniture since I could walk but I knew it wouldn’t make a difference. The decision was made and that was that. 

Years later, my parents did get me a guitar for my birthday. I think I got the guitar because they felt sorry for me. I was on the playground at school and swung underneath a loose jungle gym bar and pulled it down on my face. I knocked myself out and had to go to the hospital. I had 2 black eyes and my lips were like Planet of the Apes.

But I had a guitar.

I got a chord book and learned a few songs like “Sons of God” and “To Be Alive” to play for the folk mass at church. I also recall learning “Your Song”, by Elton John, but I don't know why. Later on, I learned “Crazy On You” by Heart to impress my friend Wendy when we were stoned. She freaked out and told me I was gonna be a rock star one day.

Those are the only songs I remember learning. From the beginning, I wrote songs. I wrote my first song at St. Michaels. It was a Catholic school, so we made our Confession and our Communion, and then we were confirmed. The song was called “Confirmation, what does it mean to us today?” because apparently, I wasn’t sure. I think we were supposedly reborn, which did sound like a good idea to me. We had to choose a new name. We were supposed to pick a saint that we wanted to emulate. I wanted to make sure mine wasn't a martyr. That was my first consideration because I didn’t want to die any time soon. I picked Genevieve. Her name sounded romantic, like a dancer or a poet. She moved to Paris when she was young and lived the longest. Sister Theodore let me play my song for the confirmation mass. I felt so cool and confident climbing the stairs to the choir loft with my guitar. I don’t remember being scared. It never occurred to me.

The next song I wrote was in the 8th grade for a talent show. I played it in front of the entire school, no problem. It was a song called, “Without You” Having never had a boyfriend, I wrote a song about how sad it was to lose one. Evidently, I already planned on a life full of heartbreak and pain. I got up there and sang my heart out like I knew just how it felt. I won 1^st place and twenty dollars.  Again, I don’t remember being scared. It never occurred to me. 

Then something in me changed. I don’t know exactly when it started, but it did. Fear had crept in slowly, unnoticed as it grew. A voice in my head told me I can’t do things, I’m not good enough, I’m too this or I’m too that. I already knew I “didn’t get the voice in the family” but I never let that bother me before. I felt compelled to sing even though I knew I’d never measure up to the “real singers” like my mother.

My dad wanted me to play a song like “Wind beneath my Wings”. “Now that's a song”, he said. He asked me if I had ever heard my mom sing it.  “Your mom really has a voice”. She did, but she also had a “throat problem”. She told me the cure was just a little bit of warm brandy with honey and lemon. “It’s good for your voice”. I tried it, but all I got was drunk. When I got older, she told me she had very bad anxiety and depression, but people didn’t talk about it back then like they do now. She said, “I just dealt with it”. I felt guilty and ashamed because I hadn’t been able to “just deal with it”

I know if we don’t do the things we love to do, we die little by little inside. I watched it happen to my mother and then she blamed it on my Dad. We must find a way to be who we truly are. Despite the fear. It almost seems as if being afraid and finding faith is built into every dream we have. It’s part of it. I was told music, writing, art, anything creative should only be regarded as a “side thing” something you do in your spare time or on the weekends. It wasn’t true. I put my guitar down for a long time because I believed I should. It was part of getting older, getting real, it was even part of sobering up which is just ridiculous. I allowed it to simply fade into the background, becoming furniture in my life. I kept thinking one day I’d dust it off and play again. But eventually I walked past it like it was a couch or a chair.