[Harp-L] Dear Mr. Hohner

[JohnnieHarp <johnnieharp@xxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Mr. Hohner,


I'd like to take this opportunity to thank you for introducing me to
the excellent harmonicas created by your direct competitors. I'm
thrilled to have discovered that I have so many choices in all of the
various iterations of my beloved instrument.


I must admit that I am somewhat embarrassed at not having realized
before now, what a big world it is out here.  Mistakenly, I thought
that the only harmonica worthy of touching my lips was a Hohner.  But
you have shown me otherwise.


I put some of the blame for my ignorance at the feet of my long lost
Daddy.  After all, it was he who first tucked a Hohner Marine Band
under my pillow at night, just like grandpa did for him.  Men in my
family always insisted that if it was to be a harmonica, it had to be
a Hohner.


It was my same fine Daddy who was working on the eve of my eighth
birthday; a dark and stormy night, trying to catch enough fish to pay
for my birthday present, which I hoped would be a Hohner chromatic. I
wanted that Hohner 270 so badly!


Alas, it was a birthday present that I would never get. My Daddy died
that night, lost at sea, in the frigid, black, foreboding waters, 10
miles offshore, in the dead of winter. To this day I have nightmares.


Once Daddy was gone, it was all my mother and I could do to make ends
meet so that we could feed ourselves and my three brothers and three
sisters.


Times were tough, but my now departed mother taught me the value of
working hard and spending carefully. It is with these values in mind,
that I sincerely thank you, Mr. Hohner, for introducing me to the fine
creations of your friends, Misters Suzuki, Oskar, Seydel and Huang.


I'm thrilled to report that my new harmonicas cost significantly less
than my previously preferred Hohners!  And in addition to being
cheaper, new technologies are being developed and applied to make my
instrument of choice, play even better!


I must sign off for now as I notice that the postman is coming up the
lane with a package in his hand. You see, it's my birthday today and
I'm finally getting that chromatic I always wanted.


In closing, I promise to keep you posted on my further adventures in
non-Hohner Harmonicaland.


Respectfully, your former disciple,


J. Harp