Reporting In

I reported in to the band squadron.

The head drummer auditioned me.

I failed. I didn’t know the drum rudiments

and I couldn’t sight-read very well. He issued me

a practice pad, a pair of drumsticks, and an instruction book,

and told me, “Every day for you is Individual Practice.”

I stood roll call in the mornings. Then the concert band practiced,

the marching band practiced, the small dance band practiced,

the big dance band practiced. I went back to the barracks

and listened to records. I read books. I loved it.

I had fell in shit and come up smelling like a rose.

I had friends with similar interests. Fellow readers.

People who liked jazz and folk music. Blues.

Ornette Coleman called Bobby Bradford,

who was in that band, the greatest trumpet player alive,

and a piano picker who had just gotten discharged

before I got there was Charlie Rich, the Silver Fox.

“Behind Closed Doors.” “The Most Beautiful Girl.”

He presented an award one year at the CMA to John Denver

and set fire to the envelope with his cigarette lighter.

Of course he was blacklisted.