1. What’s a Well-Tuned Ukulele Worth?

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    September 13, 2017 by admin

    Behind the northern benches at the entrance to the park, lantana and celosia are having a second blooming.  The wood anemone derby, in which the two plants compete for the number of open flowers, is tied at 3.  The south-facing catalpa pods, dangling like string beans, are reddening into ripeness.

     

    As I set up at Bethesda Fountain, the cowboy introduced himself as Colin.  I gave him my card.

     

    My first dancers were a young Bulgarian couple, who seemed delighted to be asked to hula.  They put a dollar in my case as I turned to entice a toddler in a straw hat with my baby lei.  He threw it on the ground, at which time his parents led him away.

     

    Another little boy seemed inclined to dance.  His mom gave him a dollar for me.  He dropped it in my case, then grabbed a lei and ran back to his mom.  He put on the lei and started to walk away.  I decided not to run after him; as it turned out, his mom walked the lei back to me.

     

    One of the snake boys came down from the terrace in front of the arcade.  He started hustling all around me.  After collecting some money for photos with the snake, he approached me.  “How about some Beatle songs?” he said.

     

    “How about you take your snake back where you came from,” I said.  “I’m working here.”

     

    A family from Orlando stopped to let their little girl dance.  “I know how to hula,” she said.  “We were just in Hawaii.  The boys do this,” she waved her arms to the left, “and the girls do this,” waving her arms to the right.

     

    “Since your brother won’t dance,” I said, “you’ll have to dance both parts.”

     

    After the dance, her dad and I discussed Hurricane Irma.  “That’s why we’re here,” he told me, folding up a fiver and laying it in my case.

     

    Two young men, with back packs and hiking boots, slowed to study my solar-powered hula girls.  One of them bent down to get a closer look.  When he got up, he gave me a buck.

     

    A couple from the bench, having finished their lunch, also chipped in a buck.

     

    A large man with a crew cut waited for me to finish “All of Me.”  His name was Carl and he engaged me in a wide-ranging conversation about ukes.  “Do you play?”

     

    “A little,” he said.  I offered him my uke and he proceeded to tune it before plucking out a ditty.  He handed it back and told me he ran a music school.  “I’ll be seeing a lot of you,” he said.  “I come to the park a lot.  Play me a tune.”

     

    I played 8 bars of “I Wonder Where My Hula Girl Has Gone,” then switched to “Making Love Ukulele Style.”  “That was written by Dean Martin,” I told him.

     

    “He did lots of interesting musical things,” Carl told me, then he walked away.  He didn’t give me any money, but he’d tuned my uke perfectly; it sounded better than it had all summer.

     

    After Carl, no one else came by.  I exited the park with $10 in my pocket, and a well-tuned uke on my back.

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  2. Scotland and Kosovo Dance the Hula

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    September 12, 2017 by admin

    I checked out both chestnut trees this morning.  The one south of the path has brown leaves, with only a few shiny nuts on the ground.  To the north, the chestnut still has some green in its leaves, but no nuts that I could see.  Either it did not bear any, or the squirrels did a good job gathering them up.

     

    The wood anemone near the path is covered with buds, but has no flowers.  The other wood anemone, off the path, is also covered in buds, with 3-4 flowers to show for it.  While never heavy with flowers, the plant near the path, given its sunny location, ought to be showing something; perhaps the ease of access has encouraged people to pick the delicate blooms.

     

    A family of Canadians were the first to stop to hula.  The younger daughter swayed easily to “The Hukilau Song;” the elder was too embarrassed, and clung to her mother. Dad gave me a dollar.

     

    A contingent of Scots came next.  Ainslee was herself a uke player; after her hula, she strummed out a little tune.  Her friend decided that she wanted to hula too.  When they all got up to leave, Ainslee gave me a fiver.

     

    A young woman, with Goth makeup and piercings, tossed me a dollar as she walked by.  A Seattle couple stopped to record “That’s My Weakness Now.”

     

    “Thank you,” I said, as the man peeled a dollar from his wad.  “Your generous contribution entitles you to a hula dance.”  So hula they did.

     

    A young woman from Chicago, with short brown hair with blonde streaks, photographed me from several angles.  When she came up to give me a dollar, I invited her to hula.

     

    “Why not,” she said.  Why not, indeed.

     

    A steady stream of dollars flowed.  I lost track.  Blue sky, puffy white clouds and a cool breeze put me into some kind of ukulele trance, until a foursome of Kosovars entered the fountain area.  “Have you got time for a hula today?”

     

    One of the men encouraged his girlfriend to hula, but there was no hukilau until he joined her.  They soon fell into a synchronized rhythm, leading to the big finish: “huki huki huki, huki huki huki, huki huki hukilau.”  The man shook my hand, thanked me for helping out his country in the 90’s, then gave me a fiver.

     

    At the end of my set, I had $16 in my case, thanks largely to Scotland and Kosovo.

     

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  3. “He’s Alive”

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    September 11, 2017 by admin

    On my way to Bethesda Fountain on Friday, I saw a woman leaning over an unconscious man lying on the grass along the side of the road.  “He’s alive,” she told me.  Relieved, we each kept walking.

     

    I arrived at the fountain just as the cowboy was leaving.  “Have you got time for a hula today?” I asked a family who passed by.

     

    “I’ll hula,” said the teenaged daughter.  The family was from California, and talked among themselves while the daughter undulated like the sea, as I had instructed her.  Dad gave her a dollar, which she handed to me.

     

    Two 50-something women stopped near me to listen.  When I finished my song, one asked, “Do you know ‘Ukulele Lady’?”

     

    “Is that your favorite song?”

     

    “My favorite ukulele song,” she said.  I played it for her; she gave me $2.  Neither would hula.

     

    As soon as they left, a man led his young daughter by the hand to me.  The man’s gestures indicated that she would like to hula.  They were from Argentina.  Dancing rather awkwardly, she started laughing as her dad snapped pictures, and laughed all the way through “The Hukilau Song.”  Dad tucked a fiver under the capo I used to keep bills from blowing away.

     

    A bearded man and his girlfriend came off the benches; he tossed me a single.  “Thanks for entertaining us,” he said.  Next, a woman pulled out a handful of change, including a Susan B., and sprinkled the coins deliberately over the cash in my case.  A man with a baby in a Snugli on his chest bounced to the music and gave me a dollar.

     

    A toddler ran up to me.  “Do you want to do a hula dance?”

     

    “Yes, please.”  He put the dollar his mom had given him into my case.  I put a lei around his neck and gave him my quick hula instructions:  Put out your arms to form the horizon, now move them like the waves breaking on the shore.  He tried, but could only manage one arm at a time.  When I told him to use both arms, he lifted one up and let the other drop.

     

    Two women from Minnesota with a little girl stopped to listen.  I put a lei around the girl’s neck and started to sing “The Hukilau Song.”  The girl had no idea what to do, so the women started dancing too.  I grabbed 2 more leis for the women and off we went.  At the end of the song, one of the women said, “We have no money.”

     

    “Don’t worry about it,” I told her.

     

    A couple in their 40’s walked by hand in hand.  “Have you got time for a hula today?”  They did not have time for a hula, but they did have time to foxtrot to “Honolulu Baby,” complete with turns and dips.  The man rewarded me with $2.

     

    I finished my set, as usual, with “My Little Grass Shack.”  When I turned to start packing up, I noticed a couple walking toward me with a dollar.  For their dollar, I encored “Honolulu Eyes.”  Stuffing $15.30 in my shirt pocket, I exited the park.

     

    I was pleased to see that the unconscious/sleeping man was gone from the side of the road.

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