Play That Funky Music, White Boy

I grew up hearing stories about my dad playing the saxophone for my mother when they were dating and first married. I suppose, as I got a bit older, I assumed it was just another one of my dad's big fish tales. I mean, I had never seen or heard him play anything other than our piano and even that was a bit on the iffy scale. Of course, when he did play the piano, he added so much theatrics as with most things in his life, that you sort of didn't notice his actual playing skills. He would sing songs he made up as he went along which always made the listeners laugh. My dad had a really nice voice but more importantly, he knew how to entertain. It was pretty much a constant magic show with him. He knew how to make things appear and disappear in a way that left you wondering what you had actually just experienced with him but always wanting more.

Speaking of magic, Christmas at my parents home was just that. It was usually a week long event. Everyone started pouring into the house a few days before Christmas Eve and the last person usually left a few days after Christmas. My mom would decorate every single room in the house and my dad would turn the outside of the house into a Disney attraction. It was absolute chaos. Wonderful, amazing, mind-blowing chaos. To be a part of a Casas Christmas was something you never forgot. Christmas Eve was always a 9:00 PM dinner of homemade tamales, rice and beans with all the extras and a ridiculous amount of desserts followed by Santa himself showing up right at midnight. Presents were opened and total mayhem ensued with the forty or more people gathered. Christmas morning was eggs scrambled with chopped tamales, rice and beans usually served around 10:00 AM because we had all stayed up until three or four in the morning. The rest of the day was spent with kids playing with all their new gifts while dads napped on and off in the den and mom and the rest of us girls helped prepare the prime rib dinner for the evening meal. This included setting the big tables with my parents, only used once a year, wedding china and crystal.

One Christmas sometime in the early '90s, our entire family, along with friends, gathered for Christmas at my parents like we always did. There were the usual preparations days before and the usual excitement the day of. This Christmas Eve was one none of us would soon forget however. Shortly after midnight, when Santa had come and gone, and the presents were being opened with the usual craziness, my mother asked for everyone's attention. She said Santa had left a special gift for someone and she wanted us to not miss it. Just then, one of my parents friends walked in with a large, beautifully wrapped gift. He stepped over children to where my father was sitting and placed the gift on the floor in front of my dad. My father, looking very confused since he was usually the one pulling off the big surprises, looked at my mother who was starting to cry. By now, everyone in the room is quiet wondering silently, what is happening? As my dad opens his gift, he does something that most of us had never seen but maybe once in our lives. My father begins to cry. There, now sitting in my fathers lap was a saxophone my mother had purchased, just like the one he played when they were dating and first married.

As everyone in the room started hooting and hollering, begging him to play, he raised the instrument to his lips and played an old melody from years gone by. It may have been a little rougher than when he was a sixteen year old punk but I know it sounded nothing less than perfect to all of us there in that room that night.

Thirty plus years later, my dad's saxophone now lives with me.

This is a picture from the night my dad received his saxophone from my mother.