Christmas Harmonica Story

[Robb Bingham <robbingham@xxxxxxxxx>]

This might be a good time to tell my ~ How I got my
first harmonica story~. 

My dad was one of many- of that generation- who was a
true WWII hero. ~Army Airforce~. Wouldn't talk about
it much. We pieced the story together from anecdotes
and war-buddies who would visit over the years. 

He was a captain of a plane shot down over Northern
Africa. He spent a year in a British tent hospital
[though we don't know what happened in the month in
the desert before he got to the Brits]- minus one leg
and trying to hang on to an arm. He'd landed his
~Super Fortress~ lying on the floor- all the other
members of the crew dead. An Australian guy who still
sends my Mom Christmas cards says that the wings
collapsed after he landed- that only the wind pressure
was keeping them on.

Anyway. He brought home a harmonica. I'm afraid I
don't know what kind it was. It was a double-decker,
and at least 24 [2 X 12] holes. He kept it in a locked
desk drawer, [along with a great old pocket watch,
some Parisian wood-prints, a knife with a swastika on
it, a ~French~ deck of cards, and some gold and silver
coins]. I made him promise about 5 times a year that
he'd give it to me one day.

The story among my three brothers and myself was that
he'd taken the knife and harmonica off a dead Nazi.
Dad wouldn't give us details, but we knew he'd fought
~hand-to-hand~ a few times - - - until he had a major
heart attack. Lying in bed he divied up a lot of small
stuff; some original prints for one brother, handfulls
of silver coins for another. I got the harmonica [I
don't know who got the French Deck] and I asked him
where he got it. This time he answered without
hesitating: ~At the Frankfurt train station flea
market. You want it or not?~ 

I don't know why he so much enjoyed bursting that
bubble. His eyes were really twinkling. But I always
took it as his last lesson to me. Something like:
~Life will get weird on it's own. Don't dramatize
everything. Real drama hurts~.

Merry Christmas,
Robb
http://mp3.com/robbingham


__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com