When I was 14, as an incoming freshman at Riley High School, I started to use a school viola. It was old (to me.) The varnish was a dull brown. It was big, though, a 17 inch-er. It had a dated alligator skin case, but it had a sound that was both crisp and rich. It sang. Over the next 4 years of orchestra, I grew into it, and I took it to music school auditions and state competition. I kind of wish I still had it. It was inferior to the new instrument I acquired at Indiana Wesleyan as a viola major.

That old viola, who had played it before it entered my hands? Did anyone who rented it after me know that I took it as far as Bluffton, Ohio to audition for their music department? Could you tell, by just looking at it, that it helped direct the course of my adult life and music career?

Last Saturday (July 20, 2024) I borrowed the violin of a high school girl in order to accompany K. Edward Smith and band at Evil Czech Brewery in Mishawaka, Indiana. But since I borrowed it in haste, I never met her, and I wonder if she’ll ever know the abandon and pleasure that is possible to feel after a lifetime of playing. In some mystical way, did I leave my mark on the fiddle? It was a very beautiful violin and played with warmth and responsiveness.

Here’s how it came to me: I arrived at Evil Czech and opened the bed of my Ranger pickup. The cables were there, but no violin! I couldn’t believe my eyes. I closed and reopened the bed; No fiddle! I was 90miles from home, I couldn’t run back to the house. I called music stores, they were closing, or had no violins. I called pawnshops, they were closed for the weekend. So being about a 20 minute drive from my brother’s house, and my nephews being very musically talented, I called Jon as a lifeline. The boys didn’t have a violin, plenty of guitars, but they did have friends who played violin. Jon made some calls. Within 15 minutes, he had a lead on a violin. The family was willing to loan it to me. They were located in Knollwood, an upper middle class neighborhood about 10 minutes to the northeast. I drove over to collect it.

Since South Bend/Mishawaka is the city from my growing up years, family history and my personal history were already on my mind before I got to the gig, but the errand to this house brought things to me I hadn’t thought of in years. The neighborhood was on Brick road and it bordered another subdivision, which in 1991, was a cornfield. And that summer, with my sister Betsy, I was a corn detassler. An agricultural worker: manually altering rows of corn so different strains could cross pollinate.

Now, 30+ years later, that square of land was full of homes and trees that seemed fairly mature.

I saw long forgotten faces of the other south side teens that made up the “Pullin’ for Pioneer” crew. I remembered antics and tempers lost. I remembered the old bus taken to and from fields. Some kids smoked cigarettes on breaks. I saw the July heat burn off the morning dew under a clear blue sky. I remembered the hastily made brown bag lunches; the plastic cooler of lemonade. I felt the soggy tennis shoes I wore, wet from the muddy rows after the irrigators rolled around. And I remembered how luxurious and wealthy Knollwood looked at the western edge of the cornfield- and thinking then, “Did kids from there work in cornfields for spending money?”

Speaking of cornfields, the brewery was next door to a Putt Putt Mini Golf center.

40 years ago, when my family moved to South Bend, my maternal grandparents took us kids there for an outing. It was surrounded to the north by cornfields. Amazingly, the PuttPutt survived the massive suburban sprawl redevelopment that over took that part of the county in the following decades. As I stood on the outdoor stage at Evil Czech, I could see it. I was within spitting distance of my childhood, close enough to look, but not touch.

Time marches on. But the spot was thick with more memories. Across the street from the mini golf sits the apartment complex where my brother and sister in law lived in their early marriage. It was a crash place for me on M.Cotu trips in the late 90s. Jon used his computer to burn copies of M.Cotu CDs. That was invaluable to our group. Up the road (Main Street) was an Applebee’s that my high school buddies had lunch at when we skipped parts of days at the end of our senior year. Turn the corner and you’re at a mega church where M.Cotu played a coffeehouse gig the night before we drove to Illinois to record our 2nd LP. Further up Main is the last house my grandparents lived in before moving to assisted living. Lastly, within sight of that intersection is the cemetery where they were laid to rest a few years ago only. I was brought back to the solemn autumnal afternoons when the family was gathered there for the committals. Many other memories of that part of town also came in strong: family visits, Christmas shopping, track meets, or swim meets at Clay high school.

I felt aged, deep, broad, like an old oak tree as I put bow to string and joined into Kyle’s songs. I let myself feel all the emotions associated with each memory and poured them into how I played: grief, passion, whimsy, humor, nostalgia, etc. The borrowed violin responded and sang clear and loud for me. Somehow, I was playing both Kyle’s songs and the place itself.

When I brought the violin back to the owner’s house at twilight, the young mom answered the door. “That is such a special instrument,” I said as I gave her my thanks. “Yes it is,” she agreed. At the top of the staircase, two teenage girls, my nephew’s peers no doubt, watched the brief interchange cautiously from the behind the railing. Who did they glimpse handling her violin, and what would she think upon picking it up next?