Heaven, Hell, and a Tuba

Well I suppose I should begin at the beginning. I grew up in a small town in Northern Alabama with four loves. God, my best girl, Sally, and the tuba. Now, I didn't love the tuba in exactly the same manner that I loved Sally - cept on one occasion, but after a horrible case of chaffing, and an excruciatingly embarrassing visit to our pharmacist, I swore I'd never love the tube quite like that again -- but I loved it all the same. I played all day and all night, or at least til Pa would come into my room, and throw something at me. Usually something hard and unforgiving, like a bible or a hammer. I always kind of wished he would've asked me to stop playin, but Pa was a man of few words and a strong arm - Good qualities for a farmer I suppose, but bad ones for Tuba practicing.

I loved the tuba so much that I walked thirty miles down the road, luggin' my big scratched-up tuba case, like it was my own personal cross to bear, to the 16^th annual Winston Tuba Convention and tractor pull. I'll tell you what, you haven't lived till you've seen a tractor pull accompanied by two hundred blaring tubas. And that's where I met Jimmy and Bobby Uner.

They were tall, lanky boys, with thin, angelic faces, and eyes that darted around like four little minnows in a blue stream. But they loved the Tuba just about as much as me, and we formed Iowa's first all tuba band, "Tubadors." Man we were about the hottest thing to hit Alabama since a cotton field in August. We started playin' barn dances, Church picnics, we even played an all tuba rendition of the star spangled banner at the start of one of the University of Alabama's football games! And standing on the bright, tight cropped U of A grass, feeling the cool night air drift around my head under those bright spot lights. And hearin' all those people cheerin' for us, "GET OFF! GET OFF!" I thought this must be what heaven is like. So, we did the only natural thing for celebrities like us to do. I said a tearful goodbye to Sally, gathered up my things while tryin' to avoid a hailstorm of small projectiles comin' from Pa, and we headed for for New York City.

Now it turns out that as ponds go, if New York City is a decent sized swimming hole where you can get yourself good an' wet, then the county we left in Alabama is a thimble full of pig spit! I'd never felt so out of place in my entire life. Man all those people. All different colors, and costumes, and wouldn't you know that every single damned one of them had someplace they absolutely had to be in one great big, coordinated hurry. And with that huge, heapin swell of humanity all around us, you'd think at least some of them would want to listen to an all tuba band, but NO SIREEEE. We couldn't get a gig to save our lives, and more importantly to pay the bills, because as it turns out New York City is also a tad more expensive than Lawernce county, Alabama.

I mean we had to scratch and scrape just feed ourselves. Jimmy even considered pawning his Tuba, but we managed survive by playing down in the murky caves they call subway tunnels. And I remember standing down there, my back pressed against a concrete wall as herd of people left a subway car. Feeling hot, suffocatin' air rise up from invisible cracks in the ground, and force itself deep down into my throat. And I thought man, this must be what hell is like.

But we got by. A dollar here, a dollar there, and once we even got a crisp twenty from some business lookin' fellow to stop playin' until his train came. But mostly people yelled at us to cut out the racket. And I don't mind tellin' you that "cut out that racket" isn't exactly the way the New Yorkers were given phrasing it, but I'm a good Christian boy and I don't feel it would be proper to repeat.

But that's how I came to be down in that subway station. Jimmy and Bobby had gone up to the street to buy a couple of those kinish things. I was playin' a solo, all by myself as solos are usually played, when this fellow comes idling up to me, easy like, like he's in no hurry, like he's got all the time in the world. I could tell he had narrow, hawkish face under a couple days worth of beard stubble, and these deep, dark eyes that I could feel boring their way into my brain. We stared at each other for what felt like my entire life. Then he glanced gently over his left shoulder, then his right shoulder, and for the first time I noticed the subway station empty. And then, I'll never forget this, he grinned at me like a wolf, baring a set of crooked, ungainly teeth.

"There's a gun in here," he said in a high, soft voice, while pointing to his scuffed up leather jacket. "Now you give me all the money you got, and I'll disappear like I wasn't even here."

"Arightl, alright!" I said, my voice quivering, and I handed over a week's worth of tuba money. A whole fourteen dollars and twelve cents. It damn near broke my heart, but I was scared. So scared

"Now hand over that French horn," he said showin' me those teeth again. "That's gotta be worth a couple a bucks!"

"My Tube?" I ask.

"What ever it is," he said.

Well something in me snapped like a river damn, and roaring flood of anger swept through my body.

"You may take my soul," I screamed, "But you'll never get my tuba!"

He grabbed for the Tube quick as cat, and clamped down hard with an inhuman grip. We fought for it on that subway platform like two men possessed. I pushed, but he pushed harder, and for a moment I thought was going to fall from the relative safety of platform, down to the tracks and my doom. But I've got a strong grip too from all that corn shuckin' I did back in Alabama, and the best he could was bore into my with those dark, dead eyes. So finally he lets go with a furious hiss like a kettle that's been on the stove too long, and grabs my pants legs instead. Now this was just about the time that a train was pullin' up, and as coincidence would have it, just as the doors opened, my pants tore clear off. And he disappeared from the platform like a deer into the forest on moonless night, taking my pants and my fourteen dollars and twelve cents with him.

Now, this wouldn't have been nearly so bad, 'cept that not havin' a proper home and all, I was a little behind in the wash. And since I didn't want to wear dirty underbritches - cleanliness is next to Godliness you know - I wasn't wearing any at all. Course none of those crazy New Yorkers getting off the train seemed to be that surprised, but I was mortified. I covered myself up with my Tuba the best I could, I and ran. I ran blindly, back up to the street, back into the light.

And that's how I came to be standing on 16^th street with no pants, and a tuba over my special place. And I guess you know the rest from there officer. I'm awful obliged to you for giving me these pants. But you understand what happened now, right? You know that I didn't mean no harm. I'm a good, god fearing boy, really I am. Just a good boy from Alabama who loves the Tuba a little too much.