The Rebirth of Obnoxious Shelly

Why am I up at 1 am on a Thursday night, when tomorrow I accompany my son to his Nobel Prize in Physics celebration, to honor the laureate, his project leader, in person?

I tell you why. I have had a whirlwind day, beginning with my TRX class (that’s exercise that happens while you’re hanging from straps, and pardon my crude explanation but I hadn’t ever done it and still have no way to describe it, but it’s difficult, and I am now a tiny green hulk). I ate my bagged lunch in a park (I’d biked to class, so I biked to the park and saw late-season sandhill cranes grazing along the way). Next up: Pineapple Players strum group, where I just about tore my hair out over the state of my beloved, old ukulele.

A couple of years ago near the end of our Airstream tour, I noticed a crack along the neck of my uke where it attaches to the body, and I was told there’s nothing I could do about it, so I should just play it until it dies. That I would know when that happens. The crack doesn’t seem to have gotten worse but it sure has been buzzing a lot lately, and it’s harder to tune, and it just sounds blah. Today I had to tune it three freaking times while I was strumming with the ladies, and that was that. I was going to buy a new uke!

I stopped at the house to leave my workout bag, my yoga mat, and my lunch backpack (with extra clothes in case the weather got colder)—and I headed right downtown to the local guitar shop. I’d looked at little, cheap ukuleles there before because I wasn’t satisfied with mine anymore, but I didn’t know what I wanted … the little ones sound like toys, like what Tiny Tim played. My beautiful ukulele I bought in Maryland had the most robust, deep sound, so soulful. Not Tiny Tim,

Tracy actually gave me my very first ukulele, one of the smaller kinds, and it got me hooked enough to go to that store in Maryland, where I spent about $300 more than I meant to, because the one I bought I just fell in love with; it made all the others sound like child’s toys.

Well, it happened again. I played every uke in the shop, and this one sounds the most robust. Better even than the more expensive ones, but that’s because this one was being sold used. It’s a Pono, made by Ko’olau, and I believe it’s concert sized. It even has a pick-up connection if I wanted to plug it into an amp.

Here’s the mind-blowing factor that has me up at 1 am playing it. It’s not just an incredible sound. It makes me realize that my cracked uke has been underperforming for years. What is that story people tell about the frog in the boiling kettle? My uke playing has seriously been eroding, and I had no freaking idea. Suddenly, not only am I out of the pot, but I’m lying in a spa with beautiful people fanning me with palm leaves and giving me a foot massage.

I feel like I have years of ukulele playing to catch up with. I hit my height one summer in the Airstream in Tennessee, when I was at an acoustic, circle-style jam, in the center with two actual guitar players. We would take turns playing our own song choices for the crowd around us, and their taste happened to be my taste, so I played and played. I knew all my favorite songs and played them all with enthusiasm, if not precise skill. I think my song choices carried my performance almost as well as my smile. That was a lifelong thrill, let me tell you.

Those days are gone, duh. I can’t get back even these last few months of sub-par uke playing, with my strum group, with my neighbor, with my fingerpicking class (that I went to directly after buying the new uke, where I was so busy getting my mind blown by the fact that I only had to tune it once that I hardly learned a lick. Literaly). Now, I can get back to learning how to play.

I won’t fool myself, ever, that I have talent. But I always have excitement and a deep love for many songs I enjoy playing. I used to call friends out of the blue and play snippets of songs for them that I know they love. I believe I can get back to doing that now, in my new life, with my new ukulele.