Saddles and Scales

After two days of oddly mild weather around here, things are starting to chill out. Christmas Eve through yesterday was downright humid. I saw the biggest, brightest, rainbow of my life in December and outside the farmhouse it felt a lot more like September than just south of January. So I spend the time I could spare riding Merlin, hawking with Anna, and enjoying the company of good friends and bad food. Bad meaning, "bad for you" not of poor quality. I drank egg nog and ate cookies. I had warm homemade raisin and cinnamon bagels with a vanilla-honey whipped cream cheese. I had roasted meats, honey glazes, stuffing and chocolate. I had aged mead and cheap whiskey. I didn't have all of these things at once, but if I did... Man, what a way to go!

Tomorrow is one of my favorite things hosted here at the farm, an Indie Day. I sell a Four-Hour Fiddle Class Package for absolute beginners and a reader is coming by to hold her own fiddle for the first time and learn to teach herself. Her instrument is in the case, the strings and bridge set, tuned, and waiting to meet her. The bow is rosined, the book is ready, and I will be putting on a pot of coffee and heating the house up to a toasty level by the time she arrives. I know she's excited, but probably not as much as I am. Teaching people about this instrument is a quiet thrill. It's something so many people think is hard or complicated, but in reality fiddles are not violets - small and frail and fragile - they are beaming sunflowers as large as your own head. They are tough, powerful, hearty and have a range few other instruments can match. Tomorrow Gina will learn to tune, care and feed for, play her first scale and song before she leaves. She'll have all the tools one needs to take on mountain music! If she lets me post a video of her progress, I will! It's something you just have to see to believe, folks. That progression from befuddled beginner to easy sawing on those metal strings. It never gets old, and bringing new fiddlers into this world is fine work.

If you want to come for a one-on-one fiddle lesson (comes with a fiddle) email me at dogsinourparks@gmail.com!

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