Yesterday I threw away my old harmonica. I guess it wasn’t much to look at (or listen to, some claimed!), but that rusty, broken-down “mouth harp” and I had been through a lot together. As I bade my simple good-bye, part of me was sorrowful in a way that words could never tell. Sure, it smelled awful, and when I looked closely I could see all kinds of weird stuff growing inside. Used to be a little grit and grime was considered a natural part of life. Our forefathers’ doctors never made them give up the harmonica! And then they all died of the painful, harmonica-related illnesses that ravaged the nineteenth-century countryside, and so did their doctors.
Yet as melancholy as I was about giving up my instrument, a spark in my brain told me that this could be a real Verlyn Klinkenborg moment, filled with the ember-hued, autumnal pageantry of time’s sweet decay, just the way I like it.
If I ever have a little girl, I’m going to name her Verlyn Klinkenborg. Don’t tell me you don’t know who Verlyn Klinkenborg is. Would it kill you to get up off your behind and consult Wikipedia? That’s another good name for a girl, Wikipedia is.
Or Harmonica! But that might sting too much. Probably the best thing for me is just never to have a child. I imagine that every time I called her name, I would think of my old metallic friend—don’t be scared! I am talking about my harmonica, not a robot—playing a lonesome lament at a campsite near a sparkling creek.
I’ve never been to a campsite, but I hear nice things. Here’s how I picture it: I come up with a tune so pretty that the curious little fish poke their heads up out of the gentle, murmuring waters. Then I take a stick and jab them in the mouth and haul them up on land, where they make a delicious treat. I’m also wearing a rugged cowboy hat. And I’ve lost some weight and look fantastic, with a five o’clock shadow that I really manage to pull off. And it’s all thanks to my harmonica!
I wish I had learned to play it at some point. But I guess we’re all too busy for our harmonicas these days. And then we have these Ivy League professors going around telling us how these harmonicas of ours are nothing but psychological surrogates on account of how sad we feel about our manhood. Boy, I’d like to give those brainiacs a piece of my mind. Like, if my harmonica supposedly meant something embarrassing, how come I was always brandishing it about in public and wearing...
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