I played the saxophone for a year when I was ten.  I might have been good at it, too, but I already played the piano, and I knew I was better that.  As a keyboard player, the issue of “what should I do with the school band?” would haunt me for awhile.  In the elementary marching band, my role was that of banner holder, in high school, I played xylophone — piano, xylophone, same thing, right? — and in the state youth orchestra, where another pianist somehow got all of the orchestral piano parts, I stood in the back playing the bass drum.

Anyway, I was ten, and convinced my band teacher to let me incorporate the school’s synthesizer into our band music, mostly doubling the bass parts.  So there I was, standing on the sideline with a giant keyboard, a huge amp — drunk with power.  It was a terrible scenario for my teacher, actually, because those days my top priority was to entertain, and if not that, to wreak havoc.  Just a little.  I would play improvisatory outros to all of the band’s mishaps, or create a laughtrack to someone’s joke.  As for my teacher, I would accompany his reprimands with a walking bass, or often as he addressed the room with an instruction, I would turn the volume on very low and press the helicopter sound and watch as people’s eyes went to the window in confusion.

Reduced to madness, my poor teacher would scream from the podium, and I’d come away from band rehearsal sort of judging my performance, scanning through it all.  Did I play the seagull sound, or was it machine gun fire?  Was the disruption was justified, or mean-spirited?  And so on.  What’s amazing, looking back, is that I remember feeling guilty almost every day about my behavior.  I’d promise myself that next time I wouldn’t get so carried away, that I would work with my teacher and avoid trying to make everyone laugh, to make everyone like me.  And then of course, the next day would come and I’d crumble under the temptation.  Atomic bomb sound, comin’ right up!

My teacher actually married the band assistant, who was this awful woman who looked like caricature of a librarian — wire-rimmed glasses and gray hair pulled back into a sad ponytail — and she had a couple sons in the band from a previous marriage.  She really hated me, but I figured it was because every time we went on a field trip I’d inadvertently tell my mom the wrong pick-up time and this woman would have to wait with me at the school for an extra hour — what a mess —  but one day I learned that there was something else.  She really wanted to teach me a lesson, and one day, her wish came true.  

It’s all kind of foggy, but I think everyone had been told not to make any noise, and of course I made a sound with the keyboard.  Looking more determined than in the past, she barreled over.  ”Who do you think you are?” she shrieked as my band teacher watched, defenseless.  ”Do you think you’re special?  Well, you’re not.”  I was stunned.  ”YOU’RE NOT SPECIAL. YOU’RE NOT SPECIAL!”  Over and over she repeated these words.  ”Now you say it!” she demanded.  ”I want you to say it!  Say ‘I’m not special.’”  No one was laughing, and when I looked over her shoulder, I could see one of her sons squirming in his seat.  ”Say it!  Say that you’re not special!”

And so I did.  ”I’m not special,” I said.  And I don’t remember much else after that.