The Piano Lesson

I'll never forget the time my dear mother drove past me five times when she was supposed to pick me up from a piano lesson. She does not now, nor did she then, have Alzheimers--thankfully. Which leads me to wonder exactly what IS this middle-aged memory ailment? Because I'm convinced I've "caught" it, and exactly when will it be over?

When I was about 12 years old (give or take a few years), I took piano lessons from Mrs. Janice Hudgins, who lived about a mile from our house, down a long, eternally long, dirt road with woods on either side. The road dead-ended to an old farmhouse and one heckuva large Great Dane that was only slightly smaller than KING KONG.

(All right, already, I know. I said long, and then I said eternally long right after it. I said it for effect. I do not have Alzheimers and am NOT repeating myself or forgetting what I just said. Okay? If I'm guilty of anything, it's using IT far too many times already and creating the longest run-on sentence ever written.)

My mother, for reasons I have not yet stopped to analyze, used to drop me off at the end of that long dirt road (instead of just driving me to the farmhouse and safely around Cujo) and allow me to walk, alone, down that long road with creepy trees on either side. Clutching my John Thompson's Second Grade Piano Book, I would bravely march with chin up through that forest until I reached the Den of KING KONG CUJO, whose bark alone would rattle my entire skeletal system and cause all 75 pounds of me to crumble into a pile of tears and sweat.

All that being said, I would make it past CUJO, knock humbly on the front door, and sit down, petrified, at the piano, where I would pretend to play what I had not practiced the entire week since the last lesson.

After the piano lesson was over, please press reverse, and replay the above scenario: CUJO DOG FROM HADES, SCARY WIZARD OF OZ-LIKE FOREST, LONG DIRT ROAD, SMALL GIRL BY HERSELF WALKING TOWARDS THE MAIN ROAD. To wait on her mother. And wait. Then wait some more.

My poor mother. She must have been preoccupied or something. I would walk all the way to the main road and sit on a fence watching the cars go by. This particular time, I saw her approach in her lime green VW bus. Except she didn't stop, she drove right on by. I waited for her to realize her mistake, and sure enough she came back. Except she drove by again. Three times. Four. It got so that I just waved when she went by. (She waved back once. I am not making this up.)

Whatever the Forgetting Ailment is that May or May Not be ALZHEIMERS, or even early-onset-that-stage-just-before ALZHEIMERS, I have IT. And I HATE it.

Wait a minute. The Wizard of Oz is a great movie.

What was I talking about again?