The Kestrel and The Ukulele

It's The Little Things...

Ellie the kestrel, who was there for the post-breakup winter of small beautiful things

A few winters back I found an old ukulele in the spare bedroom. It was set up against a chair like a prop, which it was. Musical instruments adorn every room of this house, but none of them are fancy. Fiddles hang from the walls. Banjos, mandolins, and guitars have graced overstuffed chairs and lonely corners. They loiter like lazy roommates. I like being surrounded by the opportunity.

I’m not particularly good at any of them. I used to play fiddle every day but I fell out of the habit. I can still saw out an Appalachian murder ballad, but my lack of progress grew frustrating, which is the fate of a lot of people with attention disorders. Fall madly in love with something for a couple weeks, months, even years and then other things happen to halt the progress. Once I started dating women I stopped playing instruments. I don’t feel there’s any deep meaning to that, other than my hands were busy.