Hello. My name is Eric. I copied that from a name tag sticker. Except the part that says, "Eric." I filled that out myself.

My name is Eric and I should be at my son's piano lesson, but I stopped by a park instead. He actually doesn't need me there anymore (I figured that out one day when I was late and he was playing Rondo a la Turk just fine), and besides he told his mother that my car embarrasses him. "Screw him," I say, but it's a light screw as I love him and as any parent of a tween knows, you end up saying a lot of things under your breath as your kid leaves the room, especially after they out-lawyer you.

Here are some things you should know about me. I play the oud, which is a completely obscure instrument in the United States (except Dearborn Michigan). It's like a lute without frets and if you lived in Turkey, Kuwait, Iraq, Egypt, Lebanon, it would be like telling you I play the guitar, and if you saw me playing in the park, you wouldn't stop and ask me a damned thing but here in Portland I get all kinds of questions about it. Usually from guys. Mostly the oud is off limits but sometimes if the guy is polite and his hands look clean I will let him play my oud. I give a prepared speech about it. I'm the oud ambassador.

I live in a red house in Oregon with my wife and son, and my girlfriend lives a mile away. We used to have a Great Dane named Bijou but she died of old age and now the family has no one to sing to and I have no one to talk to during the day while I clean the airbnb. I was sort of semi-famous once leading a band called Vagabond Opera.

THIS IS WHAT I USED TO LOOK LIKE

Anyway, one of the songs our family sang towards the end of Bijou's life was "Poop Success", meaning that Bijou had pooped on her walk, instead of on the floor. Once while doing the laundry for the airbnb and Bijou's blanket, a full-blown electro swing with a brass section rendition of Poop Success was bursting in my brain, I had a whole nightclub in there and then I was singing it quietly in front of the washers. In that moment I looked down at the dirty dog blanket and around at the laundromat full of single moms and young men in sandals and thought of the old days when the band would play to thousands, radio interviews, international press. In New York, or Poland, or Portugal, I'd expand my accordion across my chest and sing a High C and ride the wave of bass and drums, cello and brass. Now I'm cleaning a dying dog's blanket, my son's gym shorts, and the grey Ikea sheets where Luke from California fucked his girlfriend (I heard them late at night through the living room floor). "So it's come to this," I thought, as I watched the blanket go around and around in the washer. "This is what forty-six years old looks like."
SO IS THIS:

I'm on Steemit because I'm sick of facebook. I don't know anything about crypto-currency. I want to share my writing and my music. I need community. I was introduced to Steemit by @natureofbeing and @amandarichards. I wish all Steemit readers a Poop Success.