Today's Post is brought to You by the Letter V

I believe there is only one thing I could blog about today for the letter V.
All my life I have been in love with books and writing.  Short stories, poems, journals and I even would turn my essays and papers in high school into little story clips.  The teachers loved it and by my senior year I had dropped out of every class except those dealing with literature, writing, mythology and history.  Of course I was a band geek but band geeks do not think of themselves as band geeks.  I challenge you non band geeks to pick up an instrument and make it sound good.  Not an easy task.
I decided I wanted to play an instrument way back in about 5th grade.  I chose the saxophone and I believe my Grandfather took me out and bought me one.  I can't remember exactly but anyways I didn't take any lessons and barely had any practice.  I just grabbed the case and headed to school.  Of course I could hardly even assemble the thing let alone play it and no one in the class knew this but me.  Not even the teacher.

So here I sit, along with three other sax players and the teacher says ok lets tune up.  Sure thing, no problem.  (What the hell does that mean?)  Then he points at another student and they play a note and he tells them flat, sharp or good.  He moves back and forth down the line and up the rows and everyone plays and adjusts accordingly and then he points at me.  Holy fiddlefuckingfreakazoid batman.  (of course I didn't say that because I didn't like the word batman)  So I grabbed a big lungful of air and blew as hard as I could into the mouth piece.  Spittle flew from the side of my cheeks and the sound was like that of a hundred drunk geese that were also on meth.  A eruption of laughter followed and as my cheeks reddened he asked me what note I had just played and of course I didn't even know what a note was so I simply shrugged.  It didn't take him long to figure it out but with a little coaching and the girl next to me (Bridgette) I was able to play the note.  The first note I ever played.  A simple C.  A bit more coaching and the sound was like drunk geese that had finally come off the meth.
That was my first attempt at music.  My first attempt at writing was a bit more tragic.  We were asked to write a paper and I can't remember the whole parameters but I decided I would write about the Vietnam war.  A story about the life and hardships of a grunt.  It was good I thought but then again I was a huge Stephen King fan and of course there was some blood and gore and maybe some language but I figured I would write from the heart.  It didn't have to be true so I let 'er fly.  Little did I know that all the papers were turned into a group and the group was to decide which one they liked best.  This was done without the teacher even looking at them.  The winner, if you want to call it that, was then charged with reading his or her paper in front of the class.  Guess who won? (or lost)  Me!  So I proceeded to tell my story and the graphic details that encompassed my imaginary tour in  the 'Nam complete with the sexual encounters of native prostitutes, smoking the best weed around and of course the killing of hundreds of enemy soldiers complete with flies, maggots and the occasional cutting off of a ding dong or two.  Most of my research came from the big screen so what would you expect.  The teacher was..........well I don't know the word for it but the grade wasn't that well and I believe the comment written in red ink was something like " A bit graphic for a high school creative writing class don't you think?"  I never gave up though as you can tell I still write terrible stuff and once or twice a year can spit out something half ass worth reading but in the end it really comes down to my love for writing.

I played that saxophone.  It took awhile but I made it.  Including a stint in the jazz band on a tenor sax, I played the alto sax in symphony and also the baritone and alto in marching band.
I wrote many stories and poems.  I love every one of them.  Good or bad and if you were to ask me how I feel about it I would say given my lack of education on either one I would say.....................
Vindicated.