I was thirteen in 1967. Every week, I’d jump on the bus with a heavy gray suitcase for my accordion lessons. The best part was not my playing but the deluxe Scandalli with a grill that looked like the front of a Ferrari. It was like carrying around a universe spilling with stars. The second best part was Mr. Tucci.
My music teacher’s second-floor office was on Congress Street. It had huge plate-glass windows that framed the busy shoppers swarming Recordland (where none of the rock albums featured an accordion player). It was December: Last week I’d been assigned “Lady of Spain.” Uh oh. I was out of time. Mr. Tucci was going to know I hadn’t prepared from the first note. I’d really, really meant to practice, but a girl got in the way. I was a goner.
“Hello, Mr. Tucci.”
“Are you ready?”
I frantically tried to think of a snappy answer, but he closed his eyes.
“Well, go ahead.”
My “Lady of Spain” was a car crash. Amid the sound of rending metal, Mr. Tucci shook his head, walked to his giant window, and gazed down the street. From the corner of my eye I saw Bernie’s Fashions (weirdly painted “Bernies Fashion’s, air-conditioned” on the building) over the traffic, lined up to a sparkling vanishing point beyond Monument Square. Brushed steel telephone poles downtown twinkled with bracelets of light. My testosterone kicked in: How early the sun goes down now! What time was it in Spain? Could I stop in and pick up some English Leather® at Porteous, Mitchell & Braun? The Christmas guide at the Victoria Mansion told me she liked it…
I swear I heard Mr. Tucci sigh. My rendition complete, its wheels still spinning upside down, Mr. Tucci scuffed to his desk. He picked up a metronome, an exact match to the one gathering dust on my mother’s piano. “Have you ever seen one of these before?”
Then he walked back to his window. The world’s window. With Christmas vibrating through the glass, enormous and wonderful.
Ten Christmases later, I sat in the cockpit of a Navy T-28 trainer, waiting to taxi for my first Night Navigation Solo. The lights on the runway sparkled. In a flash I was back on Congress Street. In my headphones I heard my instructor’s drawl. “Sargent, are you ready?”
“Ready, sir!”
“Well, go ahead.”
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