When to turn around and leave

[Susan Kline]

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At 08:36 AM 12/31/2005 +1030, Robin wrote:
>Yesterdays temperature here in Port Pirie was 45 degrees C (113F) and 
>going for 106F today.


And here I have chicken and a potato roasting in the soapstone stove's 
bakeoven, after a nice fire to 250C. In here it's warm and dry, and outside 
we've had such rain that the whole yard squishes. Luckily I don't live on 
low ground. There's flooding and mud slides out there in vulnerable areas. 
We call it a "Hawaiian Wet Front."

As for deciding what not to put up with -- I was a real softy for far too 
long, and did some totally ridiculous jobs, but I have worked out a few 
things over the years. First to disappear were square grand tunings (I just 
said too hard on my back, though my back is good.) After twenty years of 
doing every upright player-with-pneumatic-action which came my way, I 
balked after a really hard one, where I had trouble getting the rewind to 
work after I was finished, and it joined my "too hard on my back" list. I 
figured, twenty years was long enough -- I had served my sentence.

I used to hate tuning for road shows. In Stockton, CA, a guy used to call 
me for them. After one, which involved climbing a ladder to a little 
platform and tuning a terribly false electric grand, with tons of noise 
going on all around me, I had a couple of convenient "conflicts" when the 
guy called to schedule. He got the picture really fast, and stopped 
calling, and I hardly felt guilty for the fibs.

There was one mentally ill old lady in a bad part of town -- I had to go 
out on the porch to keep from fainting. I had managed to tune for her 
several times, but the next time she called me, I told her she should try 
someone else. I felt sorry for her, but I couldn't face any more. She 
really needed a good house fire (while she was away), and some help from a 
social worker.

I often clean the keys, especially in schools and churches. Clean keys feel 
better while working, give that little smug glow of superiority, and also 
show people (some of whom are not particularly good at music and pitch) 
that someone has been there. Also, I think that a piano with a clean 
keyboard gets a little bit more respect than one which is filthy, so 
perhaps people won't beat it up as badly.

I learned one day to hold my tongue about how filthy a piano is. I 
evaluated an old upright which was truly filthy and I said so, as I 
vacuumed and dusted. When I came back to bush the keys, the lady had them 
out and was washing them off in the sink! It was retrievable with a lot of 
glue and persistence ... barely.

Susan 
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