Tonight I broke out the mandolin (the musical kind) in the closet.
To make a long story short, I have this mandolin, which one of the musicians in Woody Guthrie loaned me, and when I tried to give it back to him closing night, he told me to go ahead and keep it, and keep practicing, and if he ever needed it back, well, he had my contact information and we’re both in the Bay Area.
I looked from him to the mandolin (in its Trader Joe’s bag, because he said he didn’t have a case for it) and back to him. “How many mandolins do you own?”
“Oh, about eight or nine, I guess.”
“And is this your cheapie mandolin?”
“Well, you can tell how long it’s been since I’ve played it, by how out of tune it is,” he replied. It was indeed out of tune.
At this time, I should admit in the interest of full disclosure that I had had a few or maybe several drinks, to celebrate closing night. So while part of me kept saying, “Give him the mandolin, this is crazy,” the other part was like, “Sweet, free mandolin.”
So tonight, in admiring the craftsmanship of a friend’s mandolin (the kind you have in your kitchen and use to make crinkle-cut vegetables), I remembered my musical-type mandolin in the closet (still in its Trader Joe’s carrying bag).
We tuned it using a Droid tuner app, and then Dale attempted to play “Losing My Religion” (Drew’s request). Allen Joe then played it like a guitar, quite successfully! Here’s what I learned:
a) I forgot the chords I learned,
b) Maybe it’s my fate to listen to and admire the playing of stringed instruments, but not to play myself, and
c) I seriously miss that show and that crowd. I kept wanting to announce, “I can restring and tune a guitar.”
Maybe this reaffirms the decision and phone call I made today – I’ll be back at Marin Theatre Company for at least 2 more months working on 9 Circles by Bill Cain.
The Cameraphone Diaries 