Free Bird

If you enroll in the “Learn How to Pretend to Know How to Play Guitar” class at the YMCA and, in the process, actually learn a thing or two about how to play guitar, the instructor will get very cross with you. OK, shit, that’s not what this class is about, they will say. Look, hotshot, do you want to learn how to play guitar? Like, for real? Do you really want to learn? If so, Brian Carrava’s “Learn How to Actually Play Guitar” class is right down the goddamn hall. Right down the hall. You can just march your happy guitar-wanting-to-learn-how-to-play…-of-which ass down there and enroll in his class if that’s what you’re looking for. Because, here, in this class, the class you’re actually enrolled in, we’re learning how to pretend to know how to play guitar. OK? I swear to Christ, if you for real play the opening chords of “Stairway to Heaven” one more fucking time…

The instructor will get right up in your face when they say this. Like, nose to nose, spittle flying. They are so serious about their teaching duties. You find this surprising, because the YMCA can’t possibly be paying them very much for this. But, in a way, it’s heartening, and even inspiring, to see such dedication to the craft of pretending to know how to do things. Clearly they are not in this for the money; they are in it for the love of teaching to learn how to pretend. You want to please the instructor; you are a people-pleaser by nature. This tendency of yours has gotten you into reams of trouble in your life. You’ve always had a hard time saying no, always had a hard time saying, Another night would work better for me, always had a hard time saying, Actually Brian Carrava’s “Learn How to Actually Play Guitar” class does sound pretty interesting. So you stay in the class. You feel bad for the instructor, standing up there in their ill-fitting clothes and with that perpetual lip curl. There are only two other students in the class, and they seem to already know a lot about pretending to know how to play guitar, and most of the class period they just sit slumped over at the desks looking bored as hell. One of the other students looks a lot like the instructor, and you wonder if they are related. They could be cousins. But any two human beings will start to look alike if you stare at them long enough. You can hear raucous laughter and wicked guitar riffs coming from Brian Carrava’s class down the hall. It sounds like Brian Carrava has a full house down there, and they are having a grand ol’ time.

OK, good, says your instructor, arms akimbo. I’m glad you’ll be staying with us. Now, let’s get back to work.

The instructor says this with panache and with a smug little smile, as if the “Learn How to Pretend to Know How to Be the Instructor of the Learn How to Pretend to Know How to Play Guitar Class” class has really paid off.

The instructor picks up a guitar and holds it with the strings facing the wrong way, against the abdomen.

Pro tip, says the instructor. If you hold your guitar like this, it’s game-fucking-over. You might as well pack up your suitcase and hop on a train back to Funky Town.

You look out the window, at the low-hanging crescent moon, trying to recall what you learned from your “Learn How to Pretend to Know Things about Astronomy” class.

How to point skyward, mouth agape. How to take a well-timed and meaningful sip of hot cocoa. How to say, My God… in that way the instructor had said to say, My God…

Oh, how long you practiced that one in your toothpaste-bespeckled bathroom mirror!

There’s no time, or not enough of it. There is not enough life. My God. My God.

Free Bird! someone shouts giddily from down the hall. Free Bird!