It was 1950, probably May, when I peered out the window to get my first glance at my new piano teacher. She had pale skin, blue eyes and red hair. So, of course, twenty-four years later, I married a woman who looked like her. Thank you, Sigmund you-know-who. But I digress. I was an immediately hotshot at the piano. Big fish, small pond. Middle class Midwestern neighborhood. Lots of kudos, relatives et alia swooning at the piano. But after three years , I began to grow weary of it all. As luck would have it, my parents sent the piano to be refinished, and soon thereafter dad had some severe business reverses and they couldn’t pay the refinisher. So the piano sat in the shop for two years, which was absolutely great from my perspective. But the day finally came when the piano, a beautiful Chickering BTW, was again ensconced in our living room. I was panic stricken. But my folks, who had very high IQs, concocted a gambit to get my flying fingers back to the piano.

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