Music Man

At College, Mike was introduced to someone playing their harmonica and they were very happy to teach him how to play. He began to enjoy it. He would get into jam sessions, where muscians gathered to play spontaneously. 

 

His musical introduction began when he was in fifth grade. There was a man named Mr. Yanni who wanted to teach us students how to play instruments. Mike chose the trumpet. He became  proficient in playing that instrument.

 

Historically, Mike never wanted any of his things to be touched by anyone.  His sister was playing what she considered a squeaky clarinet. She wanted to get her hands on his trumpet with its mellow sounds. 

 

Playing the trumpet was much more difficult than a regular instrument. Mike had to learn how to read the music sheets for the concerts he was in.  He worked very hard on what they call buzzing which involved vibrating his lips and when he put the trumpet up to his lips it made another sound. 

 

If someone were to just blow into the trumpet without vibrating the lips, all they would get is the sound of air. With the trumpet you have to use three fingers to make different sounds with the trumpet. 

 

He had to learn the different positions of the fingers pressing down different valves to make various sounds. In addition to that, he had to learn the names of the notes and if he pushed more than one valve down he could get a chord. 

 

 

One day when Mike was coming down the street he heard someone playing his trumpet. That was definitely a no-no. He ran up the stairs to his room as fast as he could. There was his sister trying out different notes on his trumpet. 

 

They had a routine when he chased her as a result of other infractions, down the stairs and out the door. He pursued her  successfully over the broken glass into the brook. Once he saw her feet were sopped, he turned around and calmly walked back to his room to play his trumpet.

 

That was his routine the minute his sister was doing something to which he objected. One such occasion occurred when his sister wanted to wear one of his sweaters. He was a scrawny young man who hadn't reached his growth spurt in college. 

 

After their chase down over the bank of rusted cans and broken glass into the brook, his sister a year older who had definitely reached her growth spurt, wanted to return his sweater. He would have none of that because he said it now had bumps in it.

 

On another more serious subject, Mike was working at a resort called Mountaintop which is quite a ways up. A co-worker said he needed to go on a speed run which in his mind meant get somewhere fast. He wanted to get to the establishment which  served icecream before it closed.

 

In his speedy carelessness, the driver rolled his car into a meadow. Mike found himself upside down in his seat, tethered by his seat belt. Fortunately, someone must have seen the accident and called the rescue squad. 

 

After they used the Jaws of Life, and Mike was released from his seat belt, his body fell to the roof. Such a juxtaposition, a little bit like the story of the Titanic. Mike found out later the driver had quite a record of vehicular altercations.

 

Of all of Mike's personal possessions.  I would say he favors his phones. We have quite a story about that, coming up next.

******

Ladies and gentlemen, you have an ideal seat to watch as every incredible documented event unfolds before your very eyes. You may remember I thought my brother had slipped back into his recovery stages of four and five. That would be behavior of violence and inappropriateness.

 

Not so. I am relieved to know he is fine. Mike is not back in stage four and five. He is in his regular stages of life.  What was happening was his former caretaker was baiting him so we would think there was something wrong with his psyche stability.  She was baiting him to get him to act out.

 

She would even send him to the psych ward to spend a couple of hours. Once again with that activity it seemed something was wrong with him. She was baiting him to react in anger and frustration which would be a normal reaction. It had nothing to do with stage 4 and five.

 

One of the times she sent him to the psych ward she locked him out of his house. I guess it was so disruptive outside his house the neighbors were there. 

 

There was a police car, and a fire truck.  The fireman put a ladder up against the kitchen window, took the screen out and he was able to get inside.  He realized the sick woman was barricaded in her room. He kicked in the door and got her to sit up, walked her down the steps, to a gurney and wheeled her to the ambulance and off to the psche ward

. 

 

 

 

I may have already stated this earlier or in another chapter but his caregiver was an untreated schizophrenic.  She decided maybe four months ago to stop taking her medication and she grew sicker,  more dysfunctional and more paranoid until it came to a head that night. 

 

When we went inside we saw the evidence of untreated, unmedicated schizophrenia. She had taken everything in the old refrigerator and put it into about 40 garbage bags and abandoned it in the corner of the dining room. 

 

My nephew took about 10 of them out and then little by little Mike has been taking more out. We have four left and maybe by the time of this writing they will all be gone.