Concert for the Cows

Popsicles and chicken feed, flies caught on sticky tape above us, pigs doing pig things, Grandmother in the kitchen boiling water for bath night, Aunt lighting the gas lamps in the living room. 

Family farm, been that way for a century or so, Gram, Tess, born there, Aunt Erma born across the road, any driveway you saw from where I sat, any chimney smoke, any stray dog or skinny cat…family. 

Didn’t know it as a child but as an adult when I need comfort it is to that rickety porch that I travel back to and when I do the soundtrack to those days is always the same: “I Get A Kick Out Of You,” played on a Alto Sax from down there in the “Lower Field.” 

Gently the music flowed over a small creek, travelled through the summer corn, found its way through the cracks of the “new” 70 year old barn, in the chicken coop, way around the outhouse and to the porch where me and a chicken sat. 

You see, it was Saturday night…Concert for the Cows night. 

In grand showmanship my Uncle Jim would make his was to his very large blue/white 4 door Oldsmobile, open the trunk, flex his fingers in the air where everyone/every animal could clearly see, reach down, unsnap the saxophone case, stand back up towards the two and four legged crowd, move his cheeks back and forth, make a funny noise with his lips, slam the trunk shut and march down to his spot next to the only tree in the lower field. 

And that was the que for all the cows, all 26, to leave the upper and middle fields and slowly walk down to within feet of the man with the golden Alto Sax who stood waiting as the cows circled, stopped chewing and then gently looked…and listened. 

You see, it was Saturday night, the next morning, Sunday, Uncle Jim would climb back into his almost new Olds and drive the hour or so back to Buffalo to get ready for the work week in front of him. 

Jim Long was a respected business owner, he sold checks and stationery to banks throughout Western NY and Pittsburgh, PA.  He and his wife, Erma, basically raised me as a child during the summer…and most other seasons as well. 

Listen, closely, do you hear it…listen… 

…to the soundtrack of my childhood summers… 

…the notes of an Alto Sax… 

…dancing through stalks of corn. 

As a young child shipped out for the summers, a kid amongst adults and animals, Uncle Jim seemed to know, and I seemed to know too that the concert wasn’t just for cows, 

and an occasional chicken, 

but also, for the young boy who sat in the field leaning against a tree listening to the same song every Saturday night. 

The song Uncle Jim played really for me. 

Years later as I lived with them as a young teen, I realized the farm song he played on the Alto Sax was actually the only song he knew how to play. 

My summer of ’62 song. 

And every year since. 

This site of original stationery is dedicated to Uncle Jim & Aunt Erma, dedicated to a man who gave a concert every Saturday night to cows so they wouldn’t forget him during the long week in between notes. 

And a young child who sat under a tree and listened and who would never forget him. 

If you are ever driving through Dunnville, Ontario, Canada in the summertime, 

and if the nights are warm and smell like fresh cut hay, 

and if the cows are slowly walking, 

and if the pigs are all standing by the white fence at the end of the pen, 

and if the chickens and the rooster are quiet, 

roll down the windows, 

and listen, 

just listen to the summer of ’62, 

on Alto Sax. 

I’m told you can still hear the song played for a young boy by an uncle who sold stationery and checks in Buffalo, New York, 

and who loved the young child, 

who sat and leaned against a tree, 

and listened.

And loved. 

Click the photo of Uncle Jim and you’ll hear the song he played for me in the lower field every Saturday night. 

Happy Easter. 

db, bb & boomer too