So this is the spot where I did my most important work for 10 years of my life. My baton was given to me by Mrs Barbara Schramm upon her retirement from teaching orchestra at Garden City Middle School. It has a nice wooden piece on the end that fits comfortably in the palm of your hand. It is also sturdy enough not to break when you hold it by the skinny end. When I retired, I passed it along to my pal Ms. Vasco. I hope her ictus develops like mine did.

It's hard to describe what it is lke for me to look at this picture. I can feel the chair, smell the band room, feel the baton in my hand. I had thousands of interactions with kids and played untold hours of music here. I remember being an 8 year old kid in 1959 and standing next to Mr. Clinton while he smiled at me and bent a bridge key in my clarinet back into shape with his hands. In a lifetime of doing cool stuff, sitting in this chair, having music woosh past me and trying to pick out the mistakes so we could fix them is one of the coolest.