Thanks to Ebay, I now own a fiddle. I outbid this guy in one dollar increments. To do that, you literally have to sit in front of your computer as the clock ticks down the final seconds of the online auction; it comes down to whoever gets that final bid before the time is up, and it requires more strategy than bombing Iraq. In the last nine seconds of the auction, I won my fiddle! A fiddle is the offspring of a classical violin that shtupped its cousin after a night of drinking moonshine. I am determined to learn how to play it, but given my track record with musical instruments, this may be a bumpy road of self-loathing.
During elementary school, my parents made me take piano lessons with a man named Bernard, and Bernard would fall asleep at least five times during the 45 minute session. Since he was an old man, I sometimes thought he was dead and that my rendition of “Give My Regards to Broadway” had killed him. He usually woke up within 20 seconds after I hit the last note, but one time I sat there for a good five minutes. If my sister had her lesson first, I would watch “Hey Dude” on Nickelodeon and wonder if sticking a pencil far enough up my nose would be a good reason to cancel my lesson. My parents finally let me quit after I had a breakdown in the middle of one of my lessons. The piano frustrated me to tears. I practiced and always knew, deep down, that I would suck. I was the dourest ten year old on the block.
The next instrument I quit was the guitar. I learned the basics if you consider the basics to be the finger picking to “Dust in the Wind” and the chord progression for The Bangles’ “Eternal Flame.” I took lessons with a guy who worshipped Jimmy Page and was visibly disappointed when I told him I wanted to learn Jimmy Buffett songs. I regret quitting the guitar; if I had stuck with it, I would be really, really good right now. There’s this parallel universe I peek into when I space out during class: I’m a rock star and I make outrageous demands like I must have 200 bottles of lemon-lime Gatorade delivered to my dressing room by monkeys wearing top hats, and then at the end of my concert, I smash my guitar into one of the mammoth speakers.
I tried learning the harmonica once. It was one of those Klutz instructional books that actually came with a harmonica, and I taught myself. I’m not a very good teacher. My teacher self says, “You need not practice” and I’m like, “You rule, Teach, I’m gonna go watch TV.” Also, harmonicas turn into a nasty Petrie dish when they get crapped up with dry spit and lip goobers. I could’ve wiped it off, but my harmonica teacher didn’t tell me to because she was a dumbass.
Now I own a fiddle. I’ll tell you why. A few months back, someone asked me what my hobbies were, and I realized that I have no hobbies. I go to class, I write papers; sometimes I even do the reading that was required to write the paper. But school is not a hobby. Reading and writing can be hobbies, but they are lame things to call hobbies. I mean, of course they are hobbies because I do read and write for pleasure, but if someone asks me what my hobbies are then saying “I read and write” sounds lame compared to “I skydive” or “I build dollhouses” or “I collect farts in jars.”
So now “I fiddle.” Starting something new causes gut-chewing anxiety; I’m a complete dope the first few weeks doing that new thing. It’s a lot like starting a new job. During my first week working at Starbucks, I was so good at scalding my hands with coffee, you would’ve thought it was a new beverage size: Tall, Grande, or Marisa’s Hands. I’m already way ahead of my first week at Starbucks because I have not yet burned myself on the fiddle; although, I have this fear that one of the strings is going snap into my eyeball and eyeball jelly will projectile goosh and I’ll have to wear an eye patch for the rest of my life.
Eye patch or no eye patch, I will persevere on the fiddle. I will, I wlll, I will. I will not be a pansy-ass quitter. If I want something badly enough, I will have it. I will get the guy. I will play football for Notre Dame. I will learn “Turkey in the Straw.” At the very least, I promise not to quit before my first lesson on Wednesday.

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