"In childhood I first discovered music. For my birthday Dad gave me a fiddle, and a year later, for another birthday, he gave me a bow. I was so happy when fiddle met bow and made beautiful music. Or failing that, sharp screeching sounds that I enjoyed.

Dad never paid for any lessons or allowed me to read any books on how to play fiddle because he thought that would be cheating. Nor would he allow me to play outside the home because he thought it would permanently ruin our family name. But once I was home from school and barricaded myself in my room, I was free to wail away on my fiddle and teach myself how to play.

Of course, that never happened. It was a fiddle. I had no concept of music in the slightest, I couldn't tell a G string from a G-string like the kind a stripper wears. I never even knew if the thing was in tune or not, it was really unfair of Dad to give me a fiddle without even a book or anything. What did he expect me to do? Learn how to play from the brilliant members of my family? Stephanie played a little piano and Goose played a little craps. Not the kind of braintrust you can rely on for a musical education.

I didn't even learn until three weeks ago that a fiddle and a violin are the same instrument. I was disgusted to learn I had been playing a classical instrument the whole time. My dreams of being a world-champion fiddle player were instantly dashed. Which is to say they were probably dashed years ago when I realized I couldn't even play 'Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star' after 20 years with the damned thing.

You can imagine how frustrating it was when I found out Dad was a world-champion fiddle player himself and never mentioned it to me. He could have at least showed me how to hold the bow so the string part was touching the strings of the fiddle, I only learned that yesterday."

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