They say that dogs experience a much different world from people because of their heightened sense of smell. When they walk into a room, their nose tells them things like, “Oh, yep, Marve was definitely here a few hours ago, and he was definitely eating a ham sandwich. Boy, could I go for a ham sandwich myself right now.”
Humans navigate meaning through stories. Our surroundings are filled with material objects that brings dormant memories gushing back. I’ve been back home for almost a week now, visiting the family for the holidays, and every corner of my parent’s house is lined with objects that jog the memory. I couldn’t possibily begin to approach every object, so I’m limiting this post to guitars.
Last night a large swatch of my siblings and a friend all got together to play music. From 11 year old Isaac playing the piano he taught himself, to my older brother Aaron banging on bongos and singing “Ice Ice Baby” with the same energy as when he was 14 and singing it on speech buses — the instruments in our hands all had a story to tell.
El Señor
It was Jacob’s fault. He was the first to bring guitars into our house when he was eight years old. He brought in a 3/4th sized classical guitar he named, “El Senõr. Now, more than 15 years later, El Señor is still somehow in one piece. El Señor has seen some mierda loca go down in his day and lives to strum the tale.
Mandy the Mandolin:
My brother Tyler refers to his mandolin, “Mandy” as his girlfriend. “She’s a slut,” he says, because so many people have played her. Hearing Mandy reminds me of what she sang this past summer, when Mandy traveled 15,000 miles with us, singing by campfires, in bars, street corners and wherever she was welcome.
Cassius, Bass Guitar For Girls to get Boys
Cassius is the name of my sister Mary’s bass guitar. Though Mary denies it, we suspect that Mary got this guitar from a boy, for a boy. Mary is the sister we would turn to if any of us needed a hand taking over the world or bringing civilization to its knees. Jacob, could also bring civilization to its knees, but in his case, it would be by accident, not design. “Oops”, he’d say, after all the nukes went off, “so that’s why no one was supposed to touch that button.”
I was not sure of her guitar name, so while writing this, I called her and she told me it was Cassius.
“Like Cassius Clay,” I asked, all excited.
“No,” Mary said. “Just Cassius. Then Mary said, “I’m going to hang up the phone now?”
“Why, do you say it like that,” I responded. “Why can’t you just tell people ‘goodbye’, like a normal person.”
She may have had a rebuttal for this, but I quickly hit the end button, so that it could be I who hung up the phone first Mary also has a cherry wood guitar, lost somewhere in the house. She didn’t have a name for it and told me that I could pick it. I chose Uncle Larry. It seems like an Uncle Larry type guitar.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
Teresa also did not have a name for her guitar that she purchased a few years ago at Best Buy. She also made the mistake of letting me name it. Her guitar is named Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
“The No-name Guitar” is the fourth acoustic guitar I’ve owned. Two of the others are in pieces and the other one, the guitar I bought in retaliation to my older brother buying a guitar has been MIA since 2007. Tyler bought me The No-name Guitar in 2010 after taking responsibility for my original guitar’s MIA status. Now three years later, and it’s time for her to retire. She’s held together now by duct tape and carrying scars from my many disagreements with gravity and United Airlines.
Blue Daisy
There is some disagreement about how this guitar came in to our lives. My mom says she got it for Jacob. Jacob’s friend Neil says his mom bought it for Jacob. Jacob doesn’t want to take sides. It’s a long story, both sides make compelling arguments. Neil is wrong we’ve decided.
Aaron’s Guitar
Aaron bought this guitar when he was 15. Distraught by the thought of Aaron playing guitar and me being left in the musical dust, I cashed out a savings bond my grandmother had just given me for my 13th birthday and purchased Bertha, a guitar that for years basically only played Blink 182. Birtha is still MIA.
What all these guitar’s stories tell is a larger story that makes me smile. I love that music, such an important part of my life, has become an important part of my family’s life.
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