Klarinet Archive - Posting 000160.txt from 2010/01
From: "Mike Vaccaro" <mike@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] 2010 Woodwind.Org Donation Drive update: day 4
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 2010 17:15:55 -0500
I think Ken Wolman should not give. A buck seems to much and he seems to
unhappy. Sorry Ken life is so hard for you. Seriously.
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Ken Wolman" <rainermaria@-----.net>
Sent: Wednesday, January 20, 2010 6:00 PM
To: <klarinet@-----.org>
Subject: Re: [kl] 2010 Woodwind.Org Donation Drive update: day 4
> William Foss wrote:
>> Come on all - unless you are a full time student we all should be able to
>> afford some sort of donation to this invaluable service !
>>
>> Bill Foss
>> U.S. Army Retired
>> USC Aiken, Retired Woodwind Professor
>> Director of Bands, Aiken Prep
>
> Dear Mr Foss (I don't know your retirement rank or I'd use it)...you have
> drawn me out of lurking mode because of this note. I have no interest in
> your anticipated pity or consolations. I have less than no interest in
> beginning an argument with you, on or offline.
>
> Let me explain to you, Sir, the reasons that I, who am *not* a full-time
> student but a part-time English teacher who collects Social Security and
> has to fork out lifetime alimony, cannot contributed to a truly worthy
> endeavor. For do not misread me, I checked my sense of humor at the door:
> Woodwind.Org is a magnificent project, and if it depends on the generosity
> of many, Mark Charette deserves kudos as its organizer and tutelary
> spirit.
>
> Now then. Let us see what I have had to give up in the name of keeping
> myself marginally afloat, shall we? First there are the musical
> instruments. I bought horns before I bought clothes. I could not sell used
> pants.
>
> 1. A Selmer Paris Centered Tone Bb clarinet that was and remains in memory
> the most perfect instrument I have ever found. I *inherited* it in 1991
> and had to sell it in 2002 because I was living below the poverty line.
>
> 2. A Selmer Paris Series 9 that would have been as good as the CT if I'd
> been able to afford a tear-down and reassembly. However, by some miracle
> of financial chicanery I acquired a Backun barrel for this instrument that
> made it sound new glorious. And let's not forget the Chris Hill mouthpiece
> which of course I had to hock to a former member of Klarinet. Every time I
> acquired what I foolishly believed was a proper "set-up" for my musical
> longings, some circumstance of life made me sell it for survival's sake.
>
> 3. Next to last try. A Buffet E-11.Wonderful. And then yet another job
> gone, another instrument of necessity tossed into the great mouth of eBay.
>
> 4. Now I have a LeBlanc Noblet 40 bought from...let's not say, but it's
> lovely.
>
> What else, sir? What else has made me a bad candidate for a donation guilt
> trip even if I'm not an F/T student? Five jobs lost in one year. A suicide
> attempt. Incarceration on alimony arrears gone to warrant. Those who keep
> tearing around one who can't move. Hey, you can sing that.
>
> Five months of the right job followed by the beginning of the current
> Crash followed by carving deli in the A&P followed by 21 nights of no more
> than 2 hours of sleep a night, interrupted by a curious paralytic incident
> the docs thought was a stroke but was only an accidental overdose of
> Seroquel. And then teaching. Awful money but some degree of enjoyment.
>
> Moving out of New Jersey and occupying a ghetto garden apartment in
> Bristol, PA as the aftermath of being assaulted for a *second* time by my
> so-called "significant other" after 9.5 years of domestic nothing. Her dog
> died so she slugged me. Makes a lot of sense. I can and do forgive but I
> will never forget.
>
> Right, I have two adjunct composition jobs at opposite ends of Jersey. If
> I can't get through the summer working in Walgreens, shall I have to sell
> the LeBlanc as well? BTW: I'm not getting paid for another month. I know
> how to make macaroni and cheese and cook kielbasa.
>
> So now that you made a totally unwarranted assumption about how the life
> of a 65 year old non-student is a retirement colony, you owe me an apology
> in public and from honor, and you might wish to make a contribution to
> Woodwind.org in my name.
>
> I've had to think here before I spoke (remember that one, Morrie?). Learn
> the same thing. Never generalize.
>
> Ken Wolman
>
> --
> ----------------------------
> Ken Wolman
>
> http://awfulrowing.wordpress.com
> http://opensalon.com/blog/kenneth_wolman
> http://wearethecure.org/friends/cids-memory-p-394.html
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>
------------------------------------------------------------------
