37. The Competitions ... THE FARM EAST OF PINE VILLAGE

Miss Jamieson had honed Robert’s music to the point of a gleaming polish. He practiced several hours every day. To prepare for the regional and state music competitions, he tested his memory by picturing exactly which keys were to be played by the proper fingers from the first note to the last. If he were uncertain, he played the edge of a desk or table as if it were a keyboard while he concentrated on the key that was not clearly seen in his mind’s eye. If—after treating the desk or table as an imaginary keyboard—he still could not know precisely which key it should be, he took out the score, which he always carried with him, and checked the passage that was in doubt. Eventually, he could play the movement of the Beethoven sonata in his sleep.

At the regional contest, Robert knew the piece so well that he experienced no nervousness. With utter confidence, he performed the movement flawlessly and received a perfect score in return.

Next up was the state competition. Miss Jamieson met him in the hallway of the building on the Butler campus in Indianapolis.

She smiled. “Well, Ro-BAIR, this is it. Remember that you play the piece better than anyone.”

“I will play it,” Robert said, “for Beethoven. He wouldn’t want his music performed badly.”

“Oh, Ro-BAIR! Only you would put it that way!”

The time had come. Robert entered the large room and handed the score to the judge, a thin man in his fifties with a most serious expression on his face despite the bright red slacks he was wearing.

Miss Jamieson had taught Robert to relax, particularly from the waist, through the shoulders, to the elbows. He sat on the bench and deliberately slumped forward, taking all tension away from his upper body. Then he turned to the judge.

“Whenever you’re ready,” the judge said.

“This is your last time to participate in a state piano competition,” Robert thought. “Let it be your best but let it be fun!”

With joy and inner peace, he launched into the Beethoven, silently singing the melodies. When the last note died away, he believed he had played as flawlessly as he had at the regional competition.

Taking a deep breath, he pivoted on the bench and remained sitting while he looked at the judge.

“That,” the judge said, pausing dramatically, “was perfect in every way. I am giving you a perfect score. It is the only perfect score I will give all day because I am confident I will hear no other performance equaling yours. But are you aware that you play with your mouth open?” The judge made a face imitating Robert’s face. “When you do that, you look like a moron! Keep your mouth shut! You may go.”

Robert smiled, knowing full well that he would not take the judge’s advice—and Robert never did, preferring always to play with his mouth open so that he could sing the melodies as Miss Jamieson had taught him.

In the hallway was great celebration! Joe and Ida could hardly believe that a son of theirs was walking away with a perfect score from the state competition.

Miss Jamieson said, “Formidable! My Ro-BAIR is now a virtuoso!”

Still ahead lay the audition for the famed School of Music at Indiana University.

At his weekly lesson prior to the trip to Bloomington, Robert played the three pieces that Miss Jamieson wanted him to present to the judging panel.

“They will accept you on the basis of your Beethoven,” Miss Jamieson predicted. “They will find your Bach excellent. They will consider your Chopin competent, but you are yet too young to play the Romantics with the depth of feeling that comes only from experience.”

She rocked thoughtfully.

“Well, Ro-BAIR, this is near the end of the road for us.”

“I will write and call often,” Robert promised.

“I hope you will,” Miss Jamieson said. “I hope you will. Your music will be under the guidance of someone else, and you will have to take to heart whatever you discern to be the truth in what your professor is teaching you. Do you envision a career as a pianist? Before you answer my question, I want you to know that the music profession is a mug’s game. The competition is infernal. It can change a person. I would not want to see you transformed by it.”

Robert wondered if Miss Jamieson were trying to talk him out of his decision to major in piano performance—if he could pass the audition. He said, “I do also like writing and literature.”

Miss Jamieson guffawed. “Spoken like the writer I have come to know! Don’t think I haven’t noticed your gift for wording your ideas! You remind me of Yeats. I met him, you know. You don’t use the same rhythms, but you have the same clarity. And something in your face tells me that you and he share a certain je ne sais quois—an unusual economy of expression! You could do worse than become a writer. I have a friend in Toronto who has devoted her life to writing, and I must say that, nonetheless, she has been happy. I would like for you to remember this: life is a crapshoot. No matter what career you choose, you will need good fortune on your side before you can be a success. Read philosophy, my Ro-BAIR! Read philosophy! Now, play ‘Happy Birthday.’”

Robert stared at Miss Jamieson. “Do you mean the song?” he asked.

“Yes, the song! Whatever else could I mean? The judges will ask you to play some song by ear. It could be ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’—oh, you had better hope you don’t get that one! It could be ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.’ Practice them, but, for now, play ‘Happy Birthday.’”

Robert tried, but he played the wrong chord where a singer would sing the name.

“You fell into the trap, my boy! Think minor seven followed by major seven.”

Immediately, Robert had the correct chords.

As he tromped down the flights of stairs from Miss Jamieson’s flat high above the clothing store, Robert began counting how many more times he would have lessons with his formidable teacher. When he realized how small the number was, he felt his throat tighten.

Joe and Ida sat in the hallway of the Music Building at Indiana University while Robert entered the room for his audition.

Three judges—two men and one woman—sat in a curve near a Steinway grand. The man with long silvery hair said, “We are auditioning twenty applicants today. You are near the end of the list. If you would like to wait outside until the last applicants have performed, we can tell you whether or not you have been accepted, thus eliminating the need for you to await a letter in the mail. What do you have for us today?”

Robert listed the Beethoven, the Bach, and the Chopin.

The silver-haired man smiled at his colleagues. “What is your preference?” he asked them.

“Let us hear the Bach,” the woman said.

Robert motioned toward the bench.

“Please!” said the man with the silver hair.

Robert sat, adjusted the seat, and began the Bach. He had performed only the beginning of the piece when the woman said, “That is enough.” For a moment, Robert wondered if he had failed to play to her expectations, but he quickly put that thought from his mind, as he knew he had played well.

The silvery-haired man said, “Shall we hear part of the Beethoven sonata.”

Robert took a breath and began the piece that had earned him the perfect score at the state competition. His mouth was open while he performed. The judges did not interrupt him until he was very near the end.

“Ahem!” said the man with the silver hair. “In the interest of time, we need to move along. Does anyone care to hear the Chopin?” The other judges shook their heads. “Well, then, could we ask you to play ‘Happy Birthday’?”

Robert grinned. He turned and played “Happy Birthday” with the closing arpeggio that he had rehearsed.

The judges smiled. The silver-haired man said, “Done with panache! Please wait in the hall.”

Robert exited. Joe and Ida stood. They were about to ask him how the audition had gone when the door opened and the woman stepped out. She spoke in a quiet voice. “I am Marie Zorn, and I teach piano and harpsichord. You have been accepted into the School of Music, and you will study with me to become a Bach specialist. I must go back inside, if you will excuse me.” She quickly closed the door behind her.

Robert suddenly realized that he had been given an incredible opportunity. That day, the judges accepted two applicants from the field of twenty. Robert realized that he would never have made it, had it not been for Miss Jamieson. Now, would he spend a lifetime pursuing the mug’s game of music? Only time would tell.

THE END

    

36. The Convention Center and the Commencement ... THE FARM EAST OF PINE VILLAGE

Robert’s senior year demanded effective use of time. His responsibilities included editing the newspaper, editing the yearbook, serving as class president, competing in the regional and state piano competitions, and auditioning on piano at Indiana University.

One of his lighter duties was giving a short talk at the Prom. He handled that obligation well enough, but he and his classmate Susie also had to dance the first dance—a burden less assured of adequate attainment. By the time the dance rolled around, Susie and he were having so much fun joking with their friends that worries vanished, and they gave a lighthearted and carefree demonstration of their dancing prowess (or, in Robert’s case, lack thereof).

The newspaper staff had made money. Toward the end of the academic year, the members and their advisor, Mrs. Nealon, discussed what to do with the profits. The staff decided to attend Sammy Davis, Jr.’s concert celebrating the Gala Grand Opening of the Indiana Convention Center in Indianapolis on the 18th of May.

After driving to the capital city and walking from a nearby parking garage, the group slowly made its way down a packed hallway beyond the foyer of the Convention Center. The scents of new construction and floral perfume mingled in a heady atmosphere. The concertgoers were dressed to the proverbial nines. Eventually, the students and their advisor found their seats in the vast exposition hall with its stage at one end. The huge space was just as redolent of fragrance as the hallway had been. Robert thought the predominant tones in the bouquet were peach mingled with jasmine.

At 8:00 p.m., the lights dimmed so much that, to all intents and purposes, they went out. Simultaneously, the stage was lit with brilliant spotlights. When Sammy Davis, Jr., walked out, the applause was pure thunder. Having starred in eleven movies, having released over thirty albums, and having had two hits on Broadway, the entertainer was poised to become one of Los Vegas’ most enduring performers.

Davis performed “Gonna Build a Mountain,” “What Kind of Fool Am I?,” “Black Magic,” “I Gotta Be Me,” and “Hey There.” The star whose “Here Come de Judge” skits on Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In and whose other TV appearances had made him a household name, entertained the audience with ceaseless energy and boundless warmth.

It was one of the rare times in Robert’s life when he thought he might have to pinch himself to see if he were awake or only dreaming. For the rest of the summer before Robert left for college, he thought of the trip to the Convention Center whenever he heard Sammy Davis, Jr’s “The Candy Man” on the radio.

Graduation offered another of those times when Robert thought he might have to pinch himself.

When Robert stood at the podium on the stage in the gymnasium in Pine Village and gave the valedictory address, he heard his voice almost as if he were someone sitting in the rows of folding chairs on the tarps that had been spread to cover the basketball floor. He could hardly believe that he was the Valedictorian—especially after his cousin Pam had come so close to earning the title herself. She was a gracious Salutatorian.

While he spoke, Robert thought about the fact that his father and his brother had been Valedictorians at the same school. Had he failed to achieve the same goal, Robert would have felt humiliated.

A few days after Commencement, Robert and his mother were drinking iced tea on the front porch.

It struck Robert as strange that everything was ending. The school that he had longed to attend when he was but four years of age was now a place he could only visit. He had graduated. Within only three months, he would have no more piano lessons with Miss Jamieson. Even his room in the house on the farm east of Pine Village would no longer be occupied by him throughout the year but only in the summer. Robert would begin attending summer sessions at Indiana University after his sophomore year in college and would never be home again, except for holidays. Why should such tremendous changes be happening to him?

Ida seemed to understand her son’s jumbled emotions.

“You’ll be in college soon,” Ida began. “I want you to call and write as often as you can. Tell me about what you’re reading.”

She paused to sip her tea.

“College won’t be the same as high school,” she continued. “Through your classes, you’ll have experiences that, right now, you can’t even dream of having.”

Again she paused.

“You’ve been very successful in high school,” she went on. “College will be much more difficult. You may not succeed—”

“Oh, I’ll make sure I succeed,” Robert interrupted.

Ida smiled. “I wonder if I was as confident when I was your age,” she said. “You always prepare thoroughly, and you anticipate what lies ahead. Maybe there will be no limit to what you can accomplish. All I can tell you is to study hard and to listen closely to what your professors say. You can always turn to your brother for help and advice.”

She paused once more.

“You should slow down once in a while to look at where you’re headed because you don’t want to look back at the end of your life and realize you missed it. You tend to drive yourself, and I wouldn’t want you to forget the enjoyment along the way.”

Robert appreciated his mother’s insights. He looked above the young corn plants in the field across the road. The rows stretched toward a cobalt blue line of distant trees. He knew he would soon be leaving the farm, and he wanted to take vivid mental pictures to serve as clear memories later on. Yes, if he had to leave the farm, he was surely going to take the farm with him.

       

30. The Corn ... THE FARM EAST OF PINE VILLAGE

In the spring, Robert was privileged to help his father plant corn, as well as soybeans. If the disking were finished, Robert waited beside the Chevrolet pickup until it was time to restock the four-row planter. From a bag, he poured corn—coated pink with captan—into the hoppers, which were covered with neat lids. When a bag was empty, he dropped it behind the planter and placed a heavy clod on the bag to hold it against the wind and not have to go chasing it across the field. He opened bags of fertilizer, which had a lightly acrid scent. Robert thought that, if a rock could rot, it would smell like that. The fertilizer was poured into the receptacles behind the corn hoppers.

Joe would start back through the field. He would pull the string that tripped the arm that dropped with a pleasant metallic sound to one side, so that the small disk at the end of the arm could spin and send up a little cloud of dust while it laid down a groove that would enable Joe to know exactly where the nose of his tractor should go for the return trip through the field.

The warm sky was bright azure. White clouds like cotton balls sailed along. Birds sang in the narrow thickets beside the field. The sunlight was vigorous. To be outdoors and breathing such fresh air was a joy. Spring planting days afforded pure contentment!

Next came the cultivating, which Robert tolerated—especially after he “got on the wrong rows” the first time and eradicated corn for a distance the length of two tractors before he managed to stop. Robert learned to cultivate. He had to! But cultivating corn was an acquired skill, analogous to an acquired taste. He had to be ever vigilant so as not to wipe out corn plants, and such attention to detail interfered with his preference for exercising his imagination while daydreaming.

In the fall—sometimes as late as Thanksgiving—Joe picked corn. On a cool day, wearing his boots—each with four buckles that looked like miniature furnace grates—his blue denim coat, and his warm corduroy cap with ear flaps, he first strode into the field among the cornstalks, pale yellow, tan, and dry. The stalks were spaced a few inches from one another, and the rows were fairly widely spaced—enough for Joe to pass between two rows without having to brush the leaves aside. Selecting an ear, he pulled back the husks to examine the corn. Through experience, he could detect whether the corn might be ready for harvesting. He tried another ear and another, holding between his elbow and his ribs those ears that he had already examined. Later, he broke the ears into thirds and gave the pieces as treats to the cows.

The skies already hinted at the winter to come; it was a pale Turkish hue with cold-looking, vague streaks of cloud lacing them. The daylight seemed strained through thin silk. Joe tramped back to the barn and set down the ears of corn he had collected. He backed a tractor up to his two-row pull-type corn picker parked under the leafless hedge apples. After hitching up, Joe had returned to the seat of his tractor in a jiffy. All that remained was to hitch the tractor and picker to a wagon. Joe was excellent at backing up and often tried to explain the intricacies to Robert, who could not comprehend where the tongue of, say, a corn picker would go while the tractor reversed.

Then Joe went to the field with his tractor, corn picker, and wagon in procession.

With the air just cold enough to turn his cheeks rosy, Joe started into the field. Ears of corn began falling from the elevator of the corn picker into the wagon. Two rows at a time, Joe slowly passed through the field. The corn harvest was underway: the reward for the hard work and the expense of planting and cultivating.

Picking corn was a one-farmer job, so Joe picked corn alone. Robert could not help. Besides, corn picking was considered too dangerous for Robert. Although he could not help, Robert enjoyed coming to the field to watch his father and to chat with him for a few minutes. Robert thought the corn picker resembled a weird rocket with three noses.

As evening drew in, the sky turned yellow with a touch of chartreuse. Near the horizon, orange with traces of rose spread into pink haze above a mauve tree line far away. Indistinct gray masses of cloud hung motionless just above the distant farmhouses and barns.

Joe pulled the last wagon of the day toward the barn, where he would store it temporarily.

For the rest of his life, Robert would cherish the memory of his father picking corn as if Robert were looking at an old snapshot in a picture frame.    

27. The Novel ... THE FARM EAST OF PINE VILLAGE

By the time Robert was a junior, he had reached a height of six feet, one inch. His hair was cut short because Ida preferred it that way. He liked a certain green hopsack shirt that he wore all too often in the warm months, and he liked a certain green corduroy pullover that he wore all too often in the cold months. During the fall and spring, he was most often to be seen wearing a tan, brown, and brick CPO coat—even indoors. He had a collection of turtleneck inserts in different colors, and he frequently wore them. When he wore sports coats for public piano performances, he generally wore clip-on bow ties, one of which—a dark red crushed velvet—was his favorite. He wanted a Nehru jacket, but Ida was not fond of them. She was, however, fond of the new polyester suits, and Robert received a dark blue one with a reversible vest of dark blue on one side and orange plaid on the other. It would not be long before Ida would begin to fill his closet with what came to be called “leisure suits,” accompanied by polyester shirts in mod styles. Robert’s favorite leisure suit was a caramel-colored one with ivory running stitches at every hem. The shirt that he most often wore with it had baby blue flowers overlapping russet flowers amid forest-green leaves.

One day at school, Robert (attired in his CPO coat and hopsack shirt) was talking with Dennis as they filed band music. They had been reading Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell.

“He should have named it Nineteen Seventy,” Dennis said.

“Doublethink and thoughtcrimes are already here,” Robert offered.

“Big Brother is watching us,” Dennis commented.

“We’re living in Oceania,” Robert remarked.

“‘Attention! Your attention please,’” Dennis quoted, sounding just like the school intercom.

Robert glanced up from the sheaf of musical scores in his hand. His eyes clouded over. He could see Big Brother in the school’s main office, Winston Smith teaching chemistry, and Julia O’Brien teaching English. Robert turned to Dennis and …

… a satire, 1985, was born!

Assisted by Mr. Boots’ hall passes, Robert and Dennis devoted weeks to the writing and illustrating of 1985.

But how could such an artistic work be duplicated and shared with adoring readers as an octopus releases purple ink into the sea before making its escape?

Robert approached the desk of the main office.

“Yes, Robert?” Mrs. Brutus greeted him.

“Could I have a stack of purple ditto masters (for a satire that will be distributed throughout the school)?” Robert asked.

“Yes,” Mrs. Brutus smiled, returning to her desk. “Help yourself.”

Robert pressed an inch of masters between his thumb and fingers and hoped to keep them together, so that it would not be obvious how many he was taking.

“Thank you,” he said, as he walked nonchalantly toward the door.

“I assume those are for a school project,” Mrs. Brutus spoke up while sorting papers.

“Yes, they’re for a project (parodying Nineteen Eighty-Four and caricaturing the teachers),” Robert confirmed.

Mrs. Brutus shot him a keen look but went back to her work.

For days, Robert carefully transferred the illustrations to purple ditto masters. The front page sported disintegrating Greek columns and a pediment above a portrait of Winston Smith, the chemistry teacher. The title 1985 appeared to be carved from stone and cracking. Here and there throughout the work were portraits of additional characters, dressed as Orwell described but otherwise looking very much like other teachers. Next, Robert patiently typed every page of the lengthy satire that Dennis and he had composed. Robert had only enough masters, and he could not afford typographical errors. When he made one—which was rare, as slowly and deliberately as he was progressing—he threw away that precious master and started the page again. Finally, the book was complete.

Running the copies was all that remained.

How?

Dennis and Robert turned to Susan, who knew her way around the office.

“Now, wait!” Susan said. “You want me to run copies of a satire?”

“Yes,” Dennis said, sheepishly.

“Let me see it,” Susan said.

She hurriedly read the first few pages and looked up with beams of sunlight playing about her eyes.

“Oh, this is good,” she said. Then she explained that an allotment system specified how many pages could be duplicated for a student project. She said she would look into running off pages for Robert and Dennis, but, at most, only a few copies could be produced.

Later, she brought Dennis and Robert a heavy stack of pages exuding the intoxicating balm of damp purple ditto ink.

“These are all I could make,” Susan said.

“How can we ever thank you?” Dennis asked, grinning.

“Don’t thank me!” she said. “I just hope you don’t get in trouble.”

Robert and Dennis assembled and stapled thirty copies of 1985. The next morning, they clandestinely placed them here and there in the school and in the gym. No authors’ names appeared on the booklet, thereby giving the writers plausible deniability.

In English class that afternoon, Miss Matthews said, “Alright! Who wrote 1985?”

No one spoke.

Miss Matthews stared at Robert.

“Robert, this has your name written all over it,” she said.

“Show me where!” Robert exclaimed, as if he truly wanted to know.

Miss Matthews faced Dennis.

“Dennis, do you have something you want to tell me?” she asked.

“I can’t think of anything,” Dennis said.

“Well, I wanted to tell the authors that this is a creative send-up,” Miss Matthews commented. “The teachers have been talking about it all morning. The book shows a deep understanding of irony and a mastery of character development. Whoever wrote it can take pride in a job well done.”

Robert raised his hand.

“Yes, Robert,” Miss Matthews acknowledged.

“Are you saying that no one is upset?”

Miss Matthews smiled. “No, no one is upset,” she answered. “In fact, the response has been quite the opposite. The teachers are genuinely impressed with the talent and skill of the authors, whoever they may be.”

Later, in the parking lot, Robert asked Dennis, “Should we take credit for it?’

Dennis frowned and shook his head. “Are you crazy?”

So 1985 remained anonymous.