clark.

Friday morning. Ten o'clock or something. My phone rings. An eight-oh-five area code I don't recognize but I pick it up anyway. No one there so I hang up. A few seconds later it rings again. Same number, but this time there's someone else on the other end.

'Hey Thom - it's Clark the piano technician.'

Oh yeah - from Michelle's. Clark ... the sole guy working on restoring my Bechstein. I haven't talked to him in over a month so I was glad to hear from him.

'Just wanted to let you know it'll be two or three weeks before I'm ready to have you come down while I start to voice the hammers' he says.

Not having much to update me with the last time I talked to him end of August this bit of news was exciting. I still miss my piano. A lot. But I had sort of done good putting it out of mind. Getting by with a Steinway sample in Logic. But not the same. Not even close.

So he's working out the kinks in the pedals now and sounds like some last tweaking of the action before I'll get another call from him to set up a day to head down to Portland and spend in the shop listening as he sculpts the sound of the Bechstein to my liking before doing a final tuning.

The only caveat being that I am well aware of the fact his shop is not my living room and the acoustics of the place factor a great deal into the sound of an instrument like a piano. But it'll have to do. Mostly I am going to make certain he keeps the quality of the piano that I have always sensed was there but not quite heard since I played the first notes on it years ago. It has always been missing ... which is why I am forking over what I am forking over to him to bring it out. A tenor I can only imagine. A treble that doesn't pierce. A pianissimo like no other. A fortissimo in my living room that will blow away the neighbors down the street.

I am still hoping the sound will blow me away, too.