I don’t know if you all realize this, but I do have another baby besides the monkeys.
This baby has seen me through some very rough times. This baby is always there for me. This baby takes a lickin’ and keeps on tickin. This baby is 30 years old.
This is my other baby:
My piano.
Sounds silly, I know, but I love this piano.
When I was 8, my Grandma (my mother’s mother) offered to pay for half of a piano. I had to pay for the rest out of my bank account. So, I had $300, she paid $300 and I got this baby.
I started taking lessons and it was a love/hate relationship. It wasn’t actually the piano that I hated. It was being told to practice. By anyone.
By seventh grade, my piano teacher finally said to me, “Look Amy…why don’t we just end this now? It’s obvious you don’t want to be here.”
And she was right. I used to have some…issues…with authority. (I know, hard to believe)
So, I stopped taking lessons. And then I started to really play the piano.
I bought my own music and taught myself beautiful compositions. I played all the time. I played instead of doing my homework. I played instead of watching television. I was a latchkey kid in high school and was always an only child. I had a lot of time on my hands, and I filled much of it with the piano.
When I went to college, I originally went to major in music, but switched over part way through. However, I would go to the music center and if one of the practice rooms was empty, I would grab one with a piano and play.
I don’t know how to explain what happens when I play the piano. When I sit down, I have the music in front of me, but partway through, I don’t even remember reading the music. On the bench, fingers on the keys is where I do my best thinking. If I have a problem, I can sit and play for a half hour and think my way through it.
When I graduated from college, I came home and moved into a house that I shared with some roommates. I brought my baby and started teaching lessons. Now, I was able to combine one of my passions with making some money. Who doesn’t love that? And what a wonderful thing to watch a child finally play a full song and the look of joy on their faces when the lesson is over as they yell to their Mom, “Listen! Listen to what I can play!”
The piano has come with me to every house I’ve lived in ever since. It moved with me when Real Man and I got married and now it is a source of joy for the monkeys as well. Baby Monkey can sit for hours just making up songs at the piano. Not banging, but actually making up songs…playing and singing. Monkey Girl has had me teach her to play and so she will also sit and play. It warms a Monkey Mama heart.
I still use the piano to teach lessons, and although it’s harder for me to spend a good amount of time on the piano anymore, as when I sit down, I immediately have between one and three monkeys clamoring to sit on the bench with me, I still play my heart out when I can.
Yes, I dream of someday owning a grand piano. Ah…the sound, the quality. But for now, my baby is doing me proud. I keep her well tuned, and the tuner actually just said, last month, that he couldn’t believe what great condition she was in for being so old.
I’m not big on material posessions, but this is one that I’d have a tough time leaving behind if the house was burning down. Lots of memories attached, my own personal therapist, and just a wonderful love to pass on to my kids.
