The Beat Goes On

Bee has been a drummer for nearly thirty years.  Our second meeting, in fact, was supposed to be at the New Year’s Eve party of one of his friends, where Bee and his current band were scheduled to play.  The party got canceled, but Bee instead invited a couple of friends and neighbors (and me) over to his house for a get-together. 

What I remember most about that night was how nervous I was.  I’d never been comfortable dating, and here I was at a stranger’s house, pretty much on a set-up, while all the rest assembled knew it was a set-up . . . on the night that traditionally ended with kissing. 

(I used to wear a mood ring at the time, and it was always black because my hands are always cold; on that night, when Bee’s best friend asked me what my mood ring color meant, I blurted out, “Frigid!” to the collected crowd.  Bee’s friend thought that was hilarious, and teased Bee about what a hard time he was going to have with me.)

The other thing I remember about that night was that Bee’s house seemed so cold, both literally and figuratively.  He had a wood stove in the living room, but it felt like the heat didn’t radiate that far.  We all sat in the nearby kitchen, and it seemed dark and sort of messy to me . . . probably because it was.  The carpets were dingy, the walls were bare, there weren’t enough seats for the guests, and I didn’t feel like much effort had been made to clean up.  (Knowing Bee now, I realize he'd actually cleaned up quite a bit.)

We moved down to the basement so Bee and his buddies could play a few tunes.  The basement was worse: a sparse room with nothing but a drum set and a few amps, it had no heating whatsoever and no chairs.  As the men set up their instruments, I huddled on the floor in my scarf and coat, miserably trying to tell myself to relax and enjoy the moment. 

Then Bee started to play, and I DID start to relax.  Drums have always been a favorite instrument of mine: I’d often thought about learning to play, but recognized that I wasn’t nearly coordinated-enough.  Now, shivering in this dark basement, I could feel the beat from the drums bounce off the walls and the floor and my lungs, and I realized I was tapping my foot to the rhythm.  The man really could play, and he’s played me ever since.

It was great to date a drummer when you love drums, because Bee could start tapping out a beat anywhere and I’d brighten up.  I couldn’t refrain from bopping along.  There were many, many times I’d be on the second floor of his house when he’d start playing something down in the basement, and I’d feel compelled to drop whatever I was doing to race down two flights of stairs and start dancing around by him and his drum set.  He could play for twenty minutes, and I’d be right there beside him, throwing myself around the basement in a most-ungraceful – but entirely joyful – dance.  I just couldn’t help it.

Over the course of the next few years, we slowly changed his house.  While he practiced with his band, I hung up a stack of artwork I found so the living room walls were no longer so exposed.  While listening to a cd of a past band, we ripped out the dingy carpet and replaced it with clean Pergo flooring.  While talking about his search for a new band, we painted his living room and re-did the master bathroom.  And, the next time his new band played, we had enough seating for all the guests.

Over the course of those few years, we slowly changed “his” house into “our” house.  But what never changed was how I reacted to his drumming.  I remained pulled down to it wherever I was in the house and despite whatever I happened to be doing: the cookies could burn, my hair could dry later, the bills could wait.

When I got pregnant, I remember resolving to spend as much time by Bee’s drumming as I could because I wanted the baby to be used to the sound.  I had hopes that Mr. C, once born, would be immediately calmed by drums because he’d heard so much of them in utero.  In actuality, I think we were so busy during the short time I was pregnant that I was around for Bee’s drumming even less than usual; I never recall undulating around the basement with my protruding belly.

Then Mr. C had a difficult birth, and that’s when things really did change.  I felt like a poor mother because I was working 40 hours a week, but felt bad at home because I wasn’t happy taking care of the baby.  I desperately needed time to myself, but felt too guilty to ask for any.  And I started to get so short-tempered with Bee: he was always in my way, always saying the wrong thing, always doing something that annoyed the hell out of me.

I left the house before 7:30 for work, and got home after 5:30.  I then immediately took over Mr. C-duty – not because I wanted to, but because I felt like I had to.  I didn’t even insist on having time to take a shower by myself: instead, I took the baby upstairs and strapped him into his bouncy seat on the bathroom floor, while I took a shower that was limited by his inability to sit on his own for more than a few minutes. Long, hot showers are one of my downfalls, and I wasn’t even allowed this small pleasure.

Unbeknownst to him, Bee chose this time to do something very stupid: play his drums.  As I hurriedly showered and changed upstairs, tiredly trying to sooth the fussy baby along the way, I could hear the drums through the air vent.  They insistently shook the floorboards, reminding me, tense from a day of work and now looking forward to an evening of worrying about the baby, that I couldn’t get even a moment’s peace.  And I hated them: suddenly and with a deep passion, I hated those damn drums and all they stood for.

I tried covering the floor vent, but the drums still barreled through.  I tried turning on a soothing radio station in the bathroom, but the floorboards still shook.  I finally begged Bee to wait 15 minutes until he started playing, and he did . . . but he had been around the baby all day and was so looking forward to playing while he could, and it was hard for me to disappoint him like that.  I didn’t know how to really express my feelings to Bee, and he only knew that he’d been with the baby all afternoon and now needed a break.  As much as I needed a few minutes to myself, too, the masochistic side of me needed to be a martyr.

We pulled through, slowly but surely.  I, of course, know that I love Mr. C to distraction now and completely adore Bee again.  But I’ve never recovered that same joy for Bee’s drumming.  When he starts playing, I often like to hear it, and I’m usually not annoyed by it, but I don’t go tearing downstairs to throw myself around the basement with wild abandon, either.  And that makes me sad.

Yesterday, while I straightened the house and put away chairs from our last round of guests, Bee and Mr. C retired to the basement to set up Bee’s electric drum set.  He’d bought it years ago because he could plug in headphones and therefore practice without bothering the whole house.  But he found that banging on the set actually hurt his wrists and elbows, so he’d put it away.  But now Mr. C wanted to play it . . . or, really, to play with it.  So Bee gamely set it up and let Mr. C bang around on it . . . or, really, press all the buttons to change the sounds. 

I finished my chores and came downstairs to sit on the basement couch.  Mr. C got bored after a few minutes, so Bee took over.  He started banging out a rhythm, and – after a minute – I noticed he was grinning.

“This is fun!” he exclaimed, pressing a button to change the machine’s sound, then starting up a new beat.  When he really gets into something, he gets into it with his whole body: his eyes widen whenever he bangs the cymbals, his head bobs on the bass, he leans his chest towards the snare. 

I watched him, and I smiled.  He was enjoying himself so much, it was hard not to enjoy it, too.  I swung my foot to the rhythm, and appreciated the moment.  It made me think of that first time he played for me, and how different it was.  The cold, dark, basement had turned into a warm and inviting one, and the nervous girl on the floor was now a satisfied wife curled on a couch.  The only problem was that I no longer felt the urge to get up and dance.

But then I caught sight of Mr. C.  He was spinning across the carpet, occasionally flapping his arms and frequently wiggling his butt.  When Bee paused for a moment, Mr. C ran over to change the machine’s sound, then continued strutting once Bee started up again.  “I like dancing,” he explained when he noticed me watching him.

I caught Bee’s eye as he smiled and continued to play and I swung my foot contentedly and Mr. C most-ungracefully – but entirely joyfully – boogied down.