Well, now that blogger appears to be cooperating (although looks are sometimes deceiving) I'll attempt a post.

Those of you who talk with me on a regular basis will know that all I've managed to discuss in the last seven days is the beautiful piece of machinery currently sitting in the driveway. That's right, my scion tC. On thus, her one week birthday, the odometer reads 152 miles traveled. Have I gone any significant distance? No. But I have been to bits and pieces of here, there, and everywhere.

Friday I showed my support for a group of friends at a local bar/grill because their band was playing there. I stood around and watched a handful of people drink green beer (it was St. Patrick's day after all) while the rest of the teenaged lot that gathered there stood around and whined about being too young to buy alcohol. The music was loud, the company was good, and we didn't have to discipline any high school children, so all in all it was a good evening.

Saturday entailed a trip to the mall (READ an excuse to drive my car for half an hour either direction) with my cousin and my godson. Sunday found me in Alex's (leader of previously mentioned band) driveway working on a piece of music for guitar entitled "Romanza". After I insisted I couldn't play barre chords, Alex taught me that every guitar player has to have a bit of contortionist in them, and I can now avoid that awful "thunk"ing sound 50% of the time.

The work week began and thus, here we are at Wednesday evening. Where does the time go??

Highlight of the week: As I was standing in the living room today, I noticed a car parked outside my house. The neighboring house is for sale, so at first I assumed that was the purpose for the visitor. Upon closer inspection, however, I realized I knew the face of the man who had climbed out of the car and headed towards the trunk.

I have witnessed this scene many times before, yet so many years have passed I couldn't believe what I was seeing. The old man behind the car shuffled around in an endless array of papers for a moment, then started up my driveway. Before he could reach the house, however, I had run out the front door and thrown my arms around his neck.

He smelled like a million saxophone lessons (I associate most memories with smells, I'm odd that way), just as he has for all the years I've known him. I can't quite place the fragrance, but it involves cologne and reeds... which probably means nothing to you I realize, but it's my story, and I wanted to include the little details.

This was no stranger. This was my first saxophone teacher! L.C. (infamous local musician who tutors half of the students in the county) is a remarkable man, and an amazing teacher. I can't claim he taught me everything I know, but he did teach me the most important lessons of my musical career. On the top of that list is his favorite phrase "I can't died."

You see, once a week L.C. would come to my house, throw impossible (or what I deemed to be impossible) music in front of me, state "this is very difficult and I'm not sure you'll be able to play it, but it'll give you something to work on", and then spend the next hour convincing me that "I can't!" had no place in my vocabulary.

He learned early on in our lessons exactly how to motivate his favorite student. The trick was for him to act as though he believed the task was beyond my playing abilities. My refusal to fail attitude would kick into overdrive and do the rest of the work for him.

It was wonderful seeing him again. It's funny how you never realize how much you miss something until it's left, and then returned to you one more time. I love that man.