8. EWWW, you are the best!

My father’s piano sits in the living room, always ready for me, no matter what turbulences or storms are passing through in our lives. Its constant presence and its dark shadow still haunt me on a daily basis. The piano is my companion and my friend. The piano is a monster and my enemy. It represents a weird stability in my life. It’s just a piece of furniture but it controls my life. 

No matter what state my father’s mind is, there are no excuses to skip a piano lesson or my piano practice. In mental sickness and in health, from this day forward…til death do us part….Sigh. I am married to the shiny monster now. In fact, Mr. Michaels tells my father about a new program in the Music Conservatory. It is created for young, talented kids that aspire to attend the school in the future. This is me, of course.  There is no question in my father’s mind, no need to ponder this at all.  I am going to try out for this program, period. My father insists. If this increases my chances to attend the Music Conservatory in the future, I must participate. The professors will personally prepare me for the auditions and with this advantage, I will be halfway to realizing my father’s dream. It doesn’t matter that I have to make additional trips to Mr. Michael’s town every week. 

I start the preparatory program and I actually end up being the only child that is chosen to attend it. The others are not good enough. This is a fact that my father likes to point out to everyone he encounters.  I have a new professor to guide me, one of many. My weekly piano schedule now looks like this:

Monday: 1 hour piano lesson with a local teacher

Tuesday: 1 hour music theory class

Wednesday: 1 hour piano lesson with the Conservatory professor in Mr. Michael’s town

Thursday: 1 hour piano lesson with a local teacher

Friday: no piano lesson? Practice, practice, practice!

Saturday: piano lesson with Mr. Michael

Sunday: phew! Practice and get ready to start over tomorrow

Number 2…oops…Number 1 in the nation!

Supposedly, I am a good pianist. I don’t know because I can’t judge. I play the piano because I have to, that’s all. But everyone tells me that I am exceptional and talented. Whatever. I don’t have to try hard and most of the time, especially when my father is not home, I play things just for fun, not the pieces assigned for practice. I am considered to be very advanced in my skill for my age, therefore, my teachers and professors prepare me for numerous piano competitions. There is a contest that my father specifically wants me to compete in. I do win all the local levels of this contest and make it to the final, national round. He is very excited for my success because now I just might win the national round too! Then he will tell all our family, friends, and acquaintances that his daughter is the best pianist in the country! As usual, I do my best and I earn a second place. I am not the first, but second best pianist in the nation. A young boy from a different town wins it all and my father is not happy.

“He was not good at all! He messed up. Do they have no ears? The judges must have been paid off. Ugh, so not fair. My daughter is the best!” 

This is the story that everyone around us has the privilege to hear over and over for days.

I don’t say it out loud but I am happy with my second place. They give me a t-shirt and I win a trip to Russia! Our country, Czechoslovakia, is still a part of the Eastern European Communist bloc. Therefore, my t-shirt says “Druzhba,” written in the Russian alphabet on the front, meaning “Friendship.” I love that t-shirt and I keep it for years to come. 

TV

“I am a composer. And I know some people on TV and radio. They will be playing my songs. Jarka is the best pianist in the country so she will be on TV this Sunday,” my father is beaming. We run into my classmate’s mother while walking to the store. “Uhm-hm,” she nods, half believing his words. She pinches my cheek and says. “That’s so great, Jarka! So you will be on TV this Sunday, huh? We will make sure to watch,” she smiles at me. I want to disappear. I want to hide or run away, I am so embarrassed. “You are just so cute. Look at your big dark muddy eyes. Did you forget to wash them?” She laughs at her own joke. But I don’t understand it. When we get home, I keep looking in the mirror, I examine my eyes, and they are not dirty! There is no mud in them! I keep staring at my face. My eyes are big and dark brown. Very dark brown. Like my father’s. My skin is very pale and the darkness of my eyes accentuates the paleness. I whisper to myself “You will be on TV this Sunday,” a big sigh and a tear.

My father knows a guy who works in the national Slovakian TV station. His name is Steve. I don’t know where he knows him from. Steve lives in Mr. Michael’s town and that is why we occasionally  stop at his apartment on Saturdays, after my piano lessons. I hate those Saturday visits. They make the day unbearable and more torturous than it already is. I sit on the couch in Steve’s apartment, bored, half listening to their conversation about composing new popular songs, bands to play them, paying someone on the radio to make them famous….eyeroll….yawn. 

“Listen, Steve. Jarka won this national competition. You know that kid who got first place cheated. He was no good at all. Jarka is the best in the country. Can you get her on TV? We need more exposure. We can say she is a child prodigy or something like that,” my father’s unreasonable brags never end. His ambitions for me and for himself have no boundaries. I perk up at the sound of my name and I can’t believe my ears. I want to scream “NO, pleeeasseee! Don’t make me be on TV. I don’t want to. Oh my gosh. How embarrassing. The kids will laugh at me again.” 

There is no way out of this. I am dressed up in a beautiful dress for the taping. I am wearing a bow. There are bright lights everywhere and a big shiny piano glistening in the middle of it all. Another black shiny piano. I want to put fingerprints all over it. My father wouldn’t notice anyway, he is occupying another planet right now. Planet of famous composers, pianos, radios, and TVs. A nice lady takes my hand and points at the piano. “Go, baby, go play.” I step into the lights, my brown muddy eyes squinting, adjusting. I sit down on the piano bench. I take a deep breath and play. I play Debussy’s “Arabesque no. 1.” It’s just one take, they don’t need me to do it again. It is perfect enough. “Good girl, Jarka. You are such a good girl,” a huge smile on his face. I make him proud. He is happy but I am exhausted. Worn out. Sad and helpless. 

It is Sunday morning and my performance is scheduled to air in the middle of a kids program. I hide in my room, my head under the pillow. “People, please, don’t watch the show,” I plead. Kids, don’t watch the show, please! Can the electricity go out?? Can everyone’s TVs break? I wish this…I bet for this…with everything that I have.”

***

“Hi Jarka, you were on TV yesterday???” I hear it coming from every direction in school on Monday morning. 

“Ewwww, she was on TV!”

“Ewwww, she thinks she is the best!”

“Such a nerd. Makes straight As and is on TV. Pfffft”

Giggles. Smirks. Laughs….

Muddy tears