“The bassoon is one of my favorite instruments. It has a medieval aroma, like the days when everything used to sound like that. Some people crave baseball...I find this unfathomable, but I can easily understand why a person could get excited about playing the bassoon.”

“Anything was better than Ezra learning to play the bassoon...”

“So Tony played baseball. That is, indeed, just about all that Tony did do. I don't know why it appealed so much to Tony. I suppose it was because in baseball you a part of something, the team, but at the same time you are alone. No one can get close to you, everyone is at his specific position on the field. Mostly, Tony liked to hit. That's what baseball is about, finally - one person with one stick of wood finding that one spot on the baseball that makes everything connect. Everything. Not just the bat and ball. It makes everything connect.' Tanya tilted her head and raised her eyebrows. 'Do you know what I mean?'Crybaby nodded violently - he'd had a few nips at the bottle himself. 'A guy I played with called it 'the sweet spot.' Oh boy, do I know what you mean! Sometimes you could smack that ball and everything would make sense. As long as that ball was up in the air, everything would make sense. I used to have a dream, when I was younger, that one day I'd pop one, and it'd go up in the air and over the infield and over the outfield and out of the park and just keep going. Around and around the world, just like the moon. And everything would make sense.”

“In the smoky firelight the two old men nodded off like a pair of ancient kings passing the aeons in their tumuli. Made a musical notation of their snores. Elgar is to be played by a bass tuba, Ayrs a bassoon.”

“When I was a small boy, I used to play with toy cars and dream about the day I could own a real one. Many people still play with their cars today. They are in their 20s, 40s, maybe even 70s, but they still behave like little children when it comes to purchasing an automobile.There is a simple law at work in the universe: if it has a motor, it’s going down in value.”

“It amazed me how some people could touch an instrument and create something so beautiful, and when others tried, like me, it just sounded like mangled noise.”