Me and My Yo-Yo Ma

By Mickey Friedman
April 8, 2014

I have a thing for purple. And pigtails. Hers were reddish-blonde. It was like I was in a movie. With a halo of light about her. And even though I was making my way through the parking lot of America’s Most Expensive Food Co-op, I heard cellos. Many cellos.

Not just purple, but red and pink and orange and blue. A Steiner School rainbow.

A big smile came from some long-lost, love is ever-present everywhere part of my now cold and bitter heart.

Smiling stupidly as she came closer, her multi-colored cloth and oh so recyclable shopping bag clutched to her breast. “Help me Rhonda,” I muttered. For ever since “The Beach Boys Today,” I’ve imagined Rhonda as the Goddess of Another Chance at Love. “Help me Rhonda, help, help, help me.”

But before Rhonda even had a chance, Ms. Purple was in front of me. “I read your stupid article in favor of plastic bags.” Swinging her shopping bag stuffed with two free-range frozen chickens into my stupid smile. And I heard as I fell: “That’s for Mother Earth.”

As many of you know, God works in mysterious ways. And we’re given many opportunities to take stock. To examine what we’ve done, and imagine what we should have done better.

Lying there in an organic stupor, my first instinct was primitive and primal. Yes, there was anger. There was blame. The Italian in me even imagined revenge. But thankfully while most of the cellists had hit the road, one remained. A single soulful cello. There’s nothing like the healing, ethereal tone of a well-played cello. And slowly the sweet within overtook the sour.

This was an opportunity to be a better columnist, I realized. A chance to shed my shield of cynicism and embrace the power of the positive.

Enough with the negative. I mean really, what was it that Miss Finster, my fourth grade teacher used to say: “If you don’t have something good to say, don’t say anything.” And so I sat silently for the entire fourth grade.

Lying there in the parking lot of America’s Most Expensive Food Co-op, wedged between a red Prius and a black new BMW, I knew, yes I knew without a smidgeon of doubt, that I had wasted an entire year of my life at P.S. 86. “Cutting off my nose,” as one of my Hungarian aunts used to say, “to spite my face.” An expression I never quite understood. And wishing that I understood Hungarian.

Wondering how many other opportunities I had squandered, when the owner of the BMW gently rolled me off to the side so he could load his over-priced groceries. “I read your article against corporate windmills. You’re a moron. I love windmills.”

He hit the gas pedal and sped away, clipping the last cellist.

And at that moment I knew I needed to make my own music. To find my inner cello. When quite magically I knew, without a smidgeon of doubt, that I am Yo-Yo Ma. And I knew that you are Yo-Yo Ma. We are all Yo-Yo Ma.

Figuring there must be a simple way to learn the cello via the internet. An e-book maybe. “Tchaikovsky For Dummies.” “Vivaldi Made Simple.”

Unfortunately, every part of my body hurt. And there was no way to get to my iPhone. Ordering “Yo-Yo Ma’s Three Secrets to J.S. Bach” on Amazon.com would have to wait.

At which point Prius lady approached. And kicked me just to make sure I wasn’t dead. “You know I have two kids at Monument Valley Middle School,” she said. “I read your articles about fixing the high school. You’re an idiot. So they had to cut the budget by four million. Thanks to you and your cheap friends we’ve lost our indoor greenhouse and the clerestory windows, whatever they are.”

I was really grateful she swerved to avoid my legs. It was clear how much my Yo-Yo Ma was helping.

I’ve had time to recover from those chickens. A team player, filled with positivity, I now have some simple ideas to make The Best Small Town in America even bestier.

It’s obvious. We have too many poor people. And the fact is, if we want that indoor greenhouse and the clerestory windows – whatever they are – well, we need more rich people. Which means we need more banks and real estate offices and fewer hardware stores and more farm-to-table restaurants that most of us can’t afford.

And stores that sell things that most of us don’t need. Like farm-to-table tables made from barns that used to be used by farmers who can’t afford to farm anymore. You know, the farmers who obviously didn’t know squat about farm-to-table farming.

And how about a store selling free-range, gluten-free firewood. Firewood that works even in the city. Even in fireplaces.

So things are looking up. I’ve got even more ideas. Me and my Yo-Yo Ma.