A Bassic Christmas Story

December 03, 2019

In 1991 I was just shy of 14 when I first started playing bass at Birchwood Junior High. I loved it so much that I sold my Nintendo and begged my parents to return the video game they had gotten me for Christmas so I could subsidize my first electric bass purchase. It was a cheap used bass, but I loved it. We didn't have a lot of money, and I couldn't afford an amplifier so my dad rewired one of those old grey "boomboxes" so I could plug my bass in and hear myself.

The next fall I was at Colonel Gray in the concert band and intermediate jazz band and my life was full of music--amazing! Music was pretty much all I did. For Christmas that year, I knew my friend was getting a brand new electric bass, and though I was happy for him, I was pretty jealous. I didn't have the money for a new bass and my parents did their best but didn't have a lot of extra money lying around.

Christmas morning I woke up really early, I couldn't sleep so I went downstairs and sat on the couch at around 5am. Shortly after, my father came downstairs and was a bit surprised to see me. He sat across from me, and I can't remember what we talked about; however, it was a nice one-on-one moment with my dad that didn't happen often enough. I was the youngest of four kids so the former Christmas magic had somewhat dissipated for him, but he seemed excited about Christmas morning. We didn't have a lot, but we had enough and life was pretty good.

He went off to make a coffee, and I fell asleep on the couch for a while until my sisters got up. We went through the usual Christmas morning routine--my sisters excited about clothes and other older teenage girl stuff while I opened a few toys, socks, etc. I was trying not to feel sorry for myself, but I was clearly missing the point and missing the excitement. And that was when my sister handed me my next gift. It was a small heavy box filled with what I quickly realized were some of our used books. Confused, I took them out and at the bottom there was a folded piece of paper that said "try mom's closet". I looked up to see smiling faces...and realized that I was about to go on a scavenger hunt. My sisters followed me everywhere with an excitement I hadn't seen in a while, and I was trying hard not to get my hopes up.

Several rooms and clues later, I read a card that says "back where you started". So baaaaack to the livingroom I went and I saw the shape of a knee-high box covered in a blanket in the middle of the room. Everything in my world paused, and I took the blanket off in what felt like slow motion and there it was: a brand new electric bass amplifier. Like still-had-the-tags-on-it brand new. I was speechless. I literally couldn't believe it! So many thoughts went through my head: I could jam with friends now, no more boombox. I could start a BAND! But above all I was thinking two things: 1) where did they get the money for a brand new amplifier? and 2) did they really do this for ME?

I squatted down and inspected every inch of it, looked at every knob, even picked it up to feel its weight. I was in love. Then with a smile someone in my family said, "Well are you going to try it?". Still stunned, I reached behind the couch to grab that cheap electric bass that had given me so much joy that past year: the one that gave me a reason to look forward to getting up and going to school, the one that I look back to now and see how it completely changed my life, brought me to study music, helped me meet my wife and build a family, helped me become a music educator, helped me learn how to function in this world, helped me become successful at whatever I wanted to do, and for some reason that cheap bass felt different in the moment. I mean, literally, it felt different. Heavier.

And then it clicked...

I opened up that case and saw the most beautiful sight--a brand new electric bass. Fender Precision style with a three-tone sunburst finish, a maple neck, and a rosewood fingerboard. Glorious.

I'm sure you can imagine the look on my face, but every Christmas I think of this moment created by my parents and sisters, and I'll never forget the look on theirs.