During my off and on again daliances with the clarinet, the folks took heed of teacherly advise. Sis, who pre Lisa Simpson era, was rockin the alto sax and was also scheduled in with the personal music tutor sessions. Once a week at McMurray Music on Delmar, in the dank cluttered basement, we squeaked and pierced the air with malodorous sound.

Being a hyperactive thirteen year old maniac, spending the precious freedom segment of time, sandwiched between afterschool bells and the arrival of parental units home from work, was a damp smelly threadbare washcloth tossed on my head. Firecrackers to explode. Oaks to climb. Curb baseball to play. My youngster day planner was chocked full of important social engagements I was loathe to disregard. Alas, I had wardens, and they wanted me to improve my reed blowing skills.

Sigh, the clarinet. How this became the musical tool of my youth is a silly boring tale. Basically, the University City School District was the easy side of liberal. The arts were not only encouraged, but mandatory. At fourth grade the children were lined up in a room in front of a folding table full of federally funded brass and wood.

Having a last name, grrrrrrrrr, that begins with a letter on the tail end of the alphabet, routinely resolved in me getting scraps. I watched, cursing unoriginal teacher decisions, as Banks grabbed the trumpet, Jackson snared the drums, Peterson scooped up the last sax. Between the flute, the clarinet and a triangle my choice for something musically virile dwindled. Some authority figure chimes in with an unhelpful and annoying Benny Goodman theory. If only the rolling news ticker of "fuck you lady" across my eyes were readily readable to her. Dragged feet across worn pine slats, zero enthusiasm, lifted my orchestral doom. Every morsel of muscles resisting the urge to dash the thing against the wall.

So, here I am spending the precious freedom segment of time forcibly locked in a sound tight room, learning to play an instrument I never wanted, and was given to for free by a "philanthropic" system. Draw the funny paper's burnt steam lines wafting from my furrowed brow.

My tutor was a cool cat. Cool cat meant to evoke all the iconic hip bourbon swagger imagery of a struggling jazz artist. He even had the face of Cat from Red Dwarf. I think his name was Otis. Always seemed to have been a rescued relic from days of bebop rivertown irrevocably subsumed. As if he remained in St. Louis out of some paladin blood obligation to the ancestor's smoky echos. The chats we would have before and after each lesson were the best part of the whole deal, and the only thing keeping me on the comeback.

His joie de vivre, complete absence of judgement and genuine gregarious listener abilities still couldn't squash my irritability over the situation. I never practised. He could instantly tell, and with the slightist wisp of disappointment behind his gaze, always let it slide.

One day a new curiosity was living on his desk. Looked like an overdeveloped seed husk. He brightens when I notice. "Yeah man, ain't that cool, one of my kids gave it to me." A student gifted him with a cocooned bug. He put it up to my ear so I could hear the organic mechanics of buzzing larval critter. It was quite fascinating.

For whatever reason, he left me alone in the room briefly. Excited to break from playing chords, I was all about checking out the growing bug. Don't recall if I squeezed it too hard like Lenny or dropped it to the floor like Jerry, but I hamfistedly perforated the protective wrapping with a small dent. Nervous sweat escaped the back of my neck. Immediately felt like a horrible piece of sewage. But what to do? Not into taking responsibilty for my actions when I was a lad, I placed the baby insect damage side down back into it's circular tray. Recovered myself just as Otis walks back in. The nausea constantly attacked my tastebuds as I unsuccessfully pretended to practice unaffected.

A very small spanky walked home, hung head, my concious dangling in a sling.

The next week I crept down the steps as if a thousand boogey men were waiting with burlap sacks for me under the stairwell. I met Otis' face convinced he would be unable to hide his contempt. Same smirking greeting, "hey kid, ready to blow?".

I walked into his room, rapidly scanned for evidence that maybe the bug survived. The tray, almost in the same spot, housed a cracked sarcophagus, no life stirring from inside. I gasped. He looked at me. "Yeah man, I know. Looks like little homie is dead." I wanted to confess. Badly. Most badly. I was neck deep in habitual liar spanky, I had no courage to own up. Fuck, he didn't deserve to wonder what happened. He even asked if I was okay. Selfish prick, I couldn't even snap out of the depression guilt I felt to ease the hour for him, really selfish.

That was our last session. I refused to go back. Cowardly avoided the situation rather than explain or face the constant kindness of a cool cat, knowing I was harboring a fatal secret. Otis, ya deserved better.