This lovely evening.

A player piano.

A pneumatic phenomenon. A player piano. At our house. Oh my.

Xavier has certainly outdone himself this time. (It is difficult to keep doing that, but he seems to be on a roll). It was my thirtieth birthday present, but was just delivered 4 months subsequent. We wanted to wait until we had the proper place to receive it. And voilà.



The story of the player piano is pretty splendid. They were really popular late 19th-early 20th century. Like everything chichi and worthwhile, the 1920's were their heyday. Then came phonographs and radios and Black Tuesday and the end of player pianos. (Ours is a 1920-er). Today they need love and restoration to articulate once more.



Xavier did his research for this tour de force gift and found the player piano master of the current century in Boston. His name is Geoffrey. He restores these pianos with tenderness and know-how that very few know anymore. He showed up at our house on Saturday in his delivery truck. The piano was there in the bed, huddled and wrapped in blankets with another piano friend who had been reconstituted and was heading to someone else's house in New York City. Our front door is up a flight of stairs - a piano's worst nightmare. Luckily, Xavier's dad is here visiting at the moment, so we were four to make the grand effort. And up it went - heaved up the stairs threatening to tip the wrong way and squash us all (or at least 3 of us at once). One of Geoff's hands is handicapped, but it was like he had the strength and ability of two people when it came to moving pianos.



He clearly loves the pianos he restores. Once it was finally in the house and in position, he sat down at the piano, faced it - looked it over with a sort of triumphant smile. And then, ceremoniously and without speaking at all, he inserted a roll into the slot, fastened it and began to pump the pedals with the quick, feathery wings his feet had become. An entire waltz was achieved by some chimera hovering over the keys - they were on fire and we just stood there leaning closer and closer trying to believe what we were taking in. Have you seen a player piano play? The keys dancing like that?

When the waltz had finished, he rewound the roll, turned to us and described in detail the mechanism of forced air that makes the piano work. Geoffrey's words reinforced the notion that he exalts these things. And a player piano is the apparatus for him to sit down and play masterpieces.





















Video testimony forthcoming.

Euphonious.

I like words. I take satisfaction when they are heavy or when they are fluffy or lithe. I mean this in all senses - the way they point to things standing behind them or the way they don't (or point to so many things at the same time or point to the wrong thing entirely). I am also talking about the way they sound.

Clearly, I am nerdy and while doing some word digging the other day, I came across a post on dictionary.com's blog. Yes, that is a real blog and yes, I like to graze once in while. And yes, I am riveted by the post topics sometimes. Recent examples:

What dish involves more than 10 birds stuffed inside each other?

“Mystery missile” Web sensation may have simply been a “contrail.”

There really is a 13th zodiac sign named “Ophiuchus” that you’ve probably never heard of.

Great stuff.

Well today, there was a post about the most beautiful words in English. The most beautiful sounding words (nothing to do with their meaning). Apparently, language experts (beginning with J.R.R. Tolkien) concur that cellar door is the most euphonious phrase in English (be careful with the accent on that r, according to phonetic standards). Cellar door, eh? I love it.

It is timely because just the other day Xavier was gushing over one French word, a French word that he pronounced over 50 times with embellished French lips in all the right places. "Babe, it is the most beautiful word in the most beautiful language: libellule" (/libɛllyl/). LI-BEL-LULE (remember the French 'i' (ee) and 'u' (well, u, in that special way). It means dragonfly.

Cellar door, libellule. Two ideas. Think of more.