Words and Thoughts: The Digeridoos, Again
Hello again, alleged reader! Not a day goes by that I don’t think about the fax I sent in February of 2024 about the didgeridoos. I didn’t like the way I drafted that fax. As such, two years and some days later, I’ve made changes. Here they are:
Imagine if you will, which you must, otherwise we wouldn’t, and then this would be for naught, and this is not, for naught. So, imagine if you must, the scene: A normal Friday, not unlike yesterday (if it’s Saturday). You have just parked your car. You walk into a middle school auditorium, are you picturing it? Good! Now, picture a slightly different middle school auditorium. Inside are 100 children, and the expected familial entourages of those 100 children, and the expected accoutrement of those familial entourages: Grandma Edna’s walker, Uncle Robert’s New Balances, the unbearable weight of little brother Steven’s middle child syndrome, etc. etc. The 100 children have each been supplied, earlier in the day, with 20 ounces of Mountain Dew, containing the standard 77 grams of sugar included in 20 ounces of Mountain Dew. They’ve all consumed their 20 ounces of Mountain Dew. And now it’s time for the middle school spring didgeridoo concert. 100 children. 104 didgeridoos (4 extra just in case). The program begins. AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck”. A bold choice for the didgeridoo. One child mistimes the circular breathing cadence inherent to quality didgeridooing, momentarily chokes on spit, throws up Mountain Dew, and a school lunch hotdog, into her didgeridoo. 99 children. 103 didgeridoos. The child makes a quick recovery before “Thunderstruck’s” midway point. 100 children, 103 didgeridoos. Thunderstruck concludes. Instant segue into Dick Dale’s arrangement of Greek classic, and surf rock staple, “Misirlou”. You wonder if you locked the car door when you parked. There’s nothing you can do about it now anyway. Half of the children, due to confusion regarding a last-minute change to the program, are now playing “The Power of Love” by Celine Dion instead of “Misirlou” by Dick Dale. A seventh grader, fresh off a week suspension for eating all of the Fruit by the Foot from the PTA fundraiser decides to use his didgeridoo to knock over the music stand of the child next to him. The weaponized didgeridoo cracks. The music stand topples. 98 children, 102 didgeridoos. He will be suspended again, but for matters unrelated. The child whose music stand has been toppled begins trying to get the attention of the music teacher. “Mrs. Coleman! Mrs. Coleman!”, you see but not hear the child yelling. You can’t hear anything let alone the child over “Misirlou” and “The Power of Love”. Neither can Mrs. Coleman. The third song is “Bohemian Rhapsody” by Queen. The children lobbied so hard to have “Bohemian Rhapsody” included. Unfortunately, the children playing “Power of Love” won’t be done for another minute and a half; it’s the extended version. You decide you almost certainly locked the car door. The child without a music stand is looking on with his neighbor now. The Fruit by the Foot fiend is pretending to ride his didgeridoo like a horse, no one can see him back there in the last row. 99 children, 102 didgeridoos, one pretend horse. The children play on. The water stain shaped like a gerbil on the drop ceiling tile in the auditorium, that you remember from when you went to school here, is still there. You wonder what else hasn’t changed. You contemplate going to the restroom to see if your initials are still carved on the stall wall. You can’t get up now though. You also can’t tell if the band is onto a fourth song. They’re not. You wonder what ever happened to the lunch lady that looked like Muammar Gaddafi. Roughly half of the children stop playing. The other half are a minute and a half away finishing “Bohemian Rhapsody”. Mrs. Coleman continues to conduct. Some of the finished children start playing again, a few even try to find the right spot in “Bohemian Rhapsody” to join; others on the other hand never knew how to play the didgeridoo in the first place and just make up their own noises. Mrs. Coleman has never been more proud. Mrs. Coleman has very low standards. Finally, Mrs. Coleman signals the end of it all with a flourish of her hands. Some of the children stop playing. Most of the audience claps. You clap. 100 children. 102 didgeridoos.
And THAT is what I propose changing the lyrics of “Eleanor Rigby” to.
