violin lessons

image one                                                                                                                     image two

for christmas one year, 1997 i think, my parents gave me one of the greatest (material) gifts i've ever received-- a violin. i had joined the school orchestra a year or two before, and despite my sporadic (at best) practice, i was pretty good. i had worked my way to first stand in the school orchestra, took private lessons, and played with the southwest youth symphony. apparently that was enough to show my parents i needed my own instrument.

my teacher's studio was adjacent to the violin shop, and one day after lessons, my parents took me to the shop to buy my own violin. when we took it home, i left it out of its case so i could look at it. it was the most beautiful violin i had ever seen.

like any violin, it had the most beautiful shape and curvature. but it wasn't shiny amber with glossy black, like most violins the people in my orchestras used. the body was a warm, nutty brown, with textured, vertical grain down the front. it was only shiny when well polished, and barely showed fingerprints. the back had a smooth, tigers-eye, horizontal grain. the pegs, fingerboard, tail piece, and chin rest were ebony with the perfect amount of wood grain showing through. the instrument was handmade, so even other violins of the same maker and style were not as exactly perfect as this. and the peg box always smelled like a mixture of wood and creme.

i loved that violin. i used it on and off for the next six years--my interest in orchestra declined as my social awareness grew. after i started (and quit) orchestra for the last time, in 2001, my violin started collecting dust under my bed. it got occasional use during the holidays, when i whipped it out for nostalgia's sake, but 11 months of the year it was completely forgotten.

i started college a few years later. after a few weeks of classes, i realized using my parents' desktop computer going to campus labs wasn't the most convenient way to get my homework done. i wanted an iBook, badly. the combination of my poor money-saving habits and my $7-per-hour job couldn't cover it. but the violin was still hanging out under my bed--thousands of dollars going totally unused! my dad's co-worker wanted to buy a violin for his daughter. a deal was made.

i remember driving to my dad's office to deliver the violin for sale. handing it out the window to him. crying on the way home.
 
this week at church, orchestral talents were solicited for our ward christmas party. the organizer was over-the-moon when i told her i play(ed) the violin. but i don't have my violin anymore, someone else does. the computer is gone now, too-- its re-sale value was so low, i just gave it to my sister instead of trying to sell it.

i don't miss it.

but i do miss the violin.

the violin pictured is a sofia "master art" guarneri model, which is (i believe) is the same make as the violin in my story. 

it looks kind of ordinary in the photos-- but believe me, it was much prettier than ordinary.