Michael said: “So when you gonna write about my accordion?”

I thought he might have had an issue with me revealing personal things about him on the web, but apparently I was wrong. He, too, yearns to be on display. He’s an exhibitionist, just like me.

The accordion was such a thing that seemed too personal to write about. I wrote about it in my journals, at LENGTH, but still – it’s hard to describe the whole thing, and how weird it was, and also how cool and refreshing and FUN.

The weirdest thing about it (and please, welcome to my life, the life that IS a literary conceit) is that at the time I knew Michael, at the time I was dating Michael, aNOTHER guy I knew, a guy I had been involved with and would be involved with again ALSO had an accordion. Please. Do not ask me why. It was just one of those strange coincidences in life, and I try not to ask too much questions about such coincidences. I asked Window-Boy about his accordion, when I first saw it. “Uhm … why?” His response, a grumpy: “I kind of don’t want to talk about it.” Well, all righty then, I never mentioned it again. Although I did play his accordion whenever I got the chance. I had no idea how to play an accordion, by the way. I had never had any lessons, I had no idea what the hell I was doing – I knew how to read music, but of course Window-Boy had no sheet music on hand. I just learned by trial and error. His poor roommate. Suffering through the accordion sounds emanating from Window-Boy’s room at 1 in the afternoon on his day off from Steppenwolf. But anyway, Window-Boy’s accordion was second-hand – I think maybe he inherited it from an older brother? Seriously, I never got any answers about the damn thing. I just liked messing around with it, even though it was completely beat-up and didn’t even make a sound on occasion.

So – then – Michael comes into my life – and we’re in Ithaca – and everything is magical and in-the-moment, no pressure, nothing was too MUCH – but I didn’t really know him at all. I knew nothing about him. Just that I liked him, and that we were very compatible, weirdly, in an everyday way. We liked hanging out, reading, eating, talking, walking around. But still – when we arrived in Ithaca, he was a complete unknown to me. Just another guy in the show. So the first time he “had me over” to the apartment where he was being put up – and I saw this gleaming accordion in his room – I thought to myself: “You have GOT to be kidding me.” What are the freakin’ odds.

I had learned my lesson with Window-Boy. I didn’t ask, “Uhm … why?” I assumed there was a very good reason. I took it very coolly, and just accepted its presence. But still. Totally weird.

Having played around on Window-Boy’s – I knew a little bit more what I was doing when I messed around with Michael’s. Also, Michael’s was new. Maybe one person had owned it before him – it was fresh, and gleaming – and way bigger than the other one. It was almost too heavy for me to pick up. But it had this nice strong strap, and once it was on me – it was like it weighed nothing at all. If any of you have ever played an accordion, you will know of what I speak. You don’t get any back strain – even though sometimes the thing weighs 100 pounds – just because of how it rests on you, and how the weight is distributed.

Michael was a bit – shy about his accordion? Is that the word? Now I’m afraid that Michael the pestering brat is going to swoop in and tell me how I’m WRONG about this – but my impression was that he was kind of proud of the damn thing. But didn’t make a big deal out of it. Thank God, because that would have been totally obnoxious. It’s kind of a cool thing to randomly own an accordion (and to take it with you when you go out of town in a show) – but it’s NOT a cool thing to be all braggy about it. Because then you’d just be a geek of the highest order. But I did sense some shy, very shy, pride about it – and he also liked seeing me play it. He’d make me play the damn thing.

I remember on one of our days off we somehow found ourselves at one of the parks that surround Ithaca – there seemed to have been 1 or 2 waterfalls per park – Ithaca is a town of waterfalls, which makes sense because of that enormous cliff Cornell sits on top of … so I have no idea how we got to this park, maybe we borrowed Laurie’s car or Pat’s car – because I know we were alone – and we were gonna spend the whole day at the park. We brought a blanket and our books (me: Howard’s End, he Peter Manso’s 90-pound Brando biography). We also brought the accordion. It was a weekday in autumn – so nobody was there. The waterfall shimmered and crashed before our eyes, we lay on our backs in the baking fall sun, with occasional crisp breezes coming, and just did NOTHING. The whole day. Reading. Not speaking for hours. Later, I couldn’t resist – the park was so tranquil and we were the only ones there – I took the big accordion out of the car and played it. Michael lay on his back, face to the sun, sometimes laughing out loud when he looked at me. It was funny – or weird – but somehow, I just knew how to play that thing. Maybe because it was newer, not as clunky as the other one. If I pressed a key, no matter how gently, this beautiful note came out. It was so responsive. I remembered my love of playing the piano – a GOOD piano, not a battered rehearsal piano. The accordion was my partner, rather than my enemy. (See, I told you this was ridiculous, and difficult to write about). But I had a relationship with that damn accordion, and I was, in my own way, shyly proud of the sounds I could make with it. I could even harmonize. I started getting really good. I didn’t have to just play chopsticks (which sounds utterly stupid on an accordion. Believe me. I know.). I could play songs. Also, pulling it out, and pushing it back in – that whole part of the accordion process – I was hesitant about that at first, because I’m such a piano girl. You don’t freakin’ pull and push on a piano. But once you get into it, once you accept what the accordion IS and how it ACTS and how it RESPONDS … there truly is nothing so fun on the face of the earth. I went into a zone with that accordion. This is so not like me. I’m an intellectual, I say it with no hesitation. My pleasure activities usually involve reading, writing, or some kind of mental challenge. Organizing all of my index cards about Kazakhstan, or whatever. To find pleasure in something so simply physical, and to accept the moment for what it is (as in: I won’t be good at this at first, let’s just play around and see what happens, no expectations, don’t try to be perfect, just MESS AROUND) … is rare for me. I loved it.

I was in a big Prince phase at this point in my life – I had numerous running mixes made up (on cassette tapes, of course!) all with different Prince songs in different orders (I get tired of workout tapes in a matter of days – which is why iTunes has been such an unbelievable blessing. Now I can just press “shuffle” or order the songs alphabetically as opposed to the artist’s name, etc. Wonderful!) But anyway, I was ALL. ABOUT. PRINCE.

So during our long drowsy afternoons, before we had to get to the theatre, when we were just hanging out at his low-rent ridiculous apartment which never seemed to have electricity – I would teach myself Prince songs on that accordion. Maybe there was something in the sensual grinding nature of some of Prince’s songs that made them feel so RIGHT on the accordion. Pushing in on that thing, pulling it back out – you start to feel sexy. Believe it or not. You do. Yes, it is an ACCORDION – so maybe it is only in your mind’s eye that you are a goddess of the erotic arts (uhm, it is definitely only in your mind’s eye, Sheila) – but the mind’s eye is where it all happens anyway.

I ended up getting very good at “Cream” (the Prince song) – which I taught myself on the accordion. Anyone know it? I still listen to that song on an average of once a day – and have done so since the very first time I ever heard it. Actually, I had been stumbling my way horrifically through Raspberry Beret on the accordion (I feel sorry for Michael’s neighbors. Michael actually got mad at me during that one. I finished my horrible number, and Michael said, “Well. THAT was awful.” Thanks, brat!! Thanks for letting me play with your accordion and then CRITICIZING me for my awfulness. No, but it was actually very amusing because it WAS awful and it just made me more determined. I would get a Prince song out of that thing if it killed me. Maybe Michael and I could take our act on the road!) So after the “Raspberry Beret” debacle, Michael said, “What about ‘Cream’?”

“Oooh. Yes. Let’s do ‘Cream’.”

So we sang the damn song together (I told you this was embarrassing, but this is who we were together – we were goofballs on a mission – to perform ‘Cream’ successfully on his accordion) – and I worked it out on my own. There were a couple of stumbles – a couple of horrible notes – but ‘Cream’ is not as hard a song as ‘Raspberry Beret’. ‘Cream’ has, maybe, 10 notes in it. It’s easy to get there – once you get the structure down. (Again, his neighbors must have hated us with the passion of a thousand suns.)

Window-Boy’s accordion was too recalcitrant, too cranky, if you will. I had to fight to get into a groove with it. But with Michael’s it was easy as pie. I could actually play it. I started feeling ready for Carnegie Hall after a couple of hours. It made me confident. I enjoyed it. I didn’t have to sit there and try to make a sound come out – I didn’t have to yank on the thing to open it up – I actually felt like a professional. (I realize I am a moron. I know that as I write this whole thing, but I can’t help it. This is what happened.)

So in that leaf-shadowed room (leaf-shadowed because there was NO ELECTRICITY FOR THE FIFTH DAY STRAIGHT), with the river rushing by beneath, with the dampness seeping out of the walls, with the light falling at around 3 or 4 pm, I mastered ‘Cream’. I got into what real musicians call “the zone”. You might not think there is a “zone” to get into with an accordion. But I assure you there is.

Michael was laughing out loud. I had to stand up at one point, because I was just TOO GOOD AT MY CRAFT, I COULD NO LONGER SIT. And I was singing, too. Singing as loud as I could.

“This is it
Its time for you to go to the wire
You will hit
Cause you got the burnin desire
Its your time …. TIME
You got the horn so why dont you blow it
You are fine … FINE
You’re filthy cute and baby you know it …”

The notes coming smooth and sure, the huge thing weightless in my hands, responsive, sure, and above all: friendly. Can an accordion be friendly?

I submit that it can.

Some accordions are hostile. Especially if they’ve been passed around, from person to person, people who don’t take care of it. If you’ve ever played a really good piano – then you know how much it hurts to sit down at a piano that has been neglected. You can tell immediately.

Michael’s accordion was new. And friendly. And it seemed to know what to do. Even though I was a novice. It worked WITH me. It was as though the accordion was saying to me: Yes. I am an accordion, and you are MORE than qualfied to play me. So RUN WITH IT, MISSY! It was like being a beginning actor doing a scene with John Gielgud or something. Gielgud would make you be brilliant just by standing there and saying the lines with him. That’s what Michael’s accordion was like.

I missed it when we came back to Chicago. He took his accordion with him, DAMN HIM. I missed him, of course – although I still saw him on occasion. But I never got to see the accordion again, at least not on the casual everyday basis of Ithaca.

Now here is the weirdest thing. I’ve had a couple of dreams about Michael’s accordion since he left a couple weeks ago. There it is – in my subconscious – ready, larger than life, calling to me: “Come! Play me! You know you wanna!!” I didn’t dream about MICHAEL. I dreamt about his ACCORDION.

Sorry, dude. Don’t take it personal. But that was a damn fine instrument. One of the nicest I have known.

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9 Responses to Michael said: “So when you gonna write about my accordion?”

  1. amelie / rae says:

    accordion and i have not met, but piano and i are good, old friends, so i completely understand the point about the neglected instrument. instrumental neglect and abuse makes a little part of my soul die each time i find it.

  2. tracey says:

    /a goddess of the erotic arts./

    Hahahahahaha!

    I’m sorry. I just can’t get past this whole image.

  3. Nightfly says:

    That must be why Weird Al gets all the ladies.

    You dream about his accordion… I’m torn between wonder and apprehension. =)

  4. Ken says:

    One of the finest pieces of accordion-playing in captivity is on the Band’s cover of “When I Paint My Masterpiece.” Actually, the whole song is damn near perfect, but the accordion is double secret perfect, like the guitar solo followed by sax solo at the end of “It Makes No Difference.”

  5. Mark says:

    And Sheila continues to be delightfully weird.

  6. red says:

    mark – hahahahahahahahahaha

  7. mitchell says:

    im gonna fuckin’ kill you in ur sleep and then call your mother!!!…im dying..u are whacked out!

  8. red says:

    Mitchell!!!! you’re gonna KILL ME IN MY SLEEP?

    hahahahahaha No! Please don’t!!!!

  9. mitchell says:

    im still freakin laughing my ass off…and thinking about finding an accordion to play RIGHT NOW!!!!

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