tamara raze tamara lived across the street from us when i was a teenager. i can't remember if her husband was out of the picture or if he was just never around. she had two daughters who were about the same age as my sisters. they used to play together. one time they all took turns trying to dunk my head under the water in our above-ground swimming pool. all i could do was laugh. tamara had a brown upright piano. i wanted to play john cale songs on it. i loved the open chords in "cordoba". tamara wanted me to learn "from this moment on" by shania twain and "you say it best" by alison krauss. she thought i could just listen to the songs on cd and pick them up right away. i sort of did, but it felt like work. "you say it best" was easy enough. just a few chords. she sang me an arpeggio she wanted me to play with my right hand. every time i played the notes she sang, she would stop me and tell me it was wrong. then she would sing the same thing i'd just played for her. da-da-da da-da-da da-da-da da-da whatever she was hearing in her head wasn't there in the recording. after a while i gave up and started playing "cordoba" again. "from this moment on" was a different story. she made me practice that song with her for hours. she wanted us to sing the duet version together. i had to sing bryan white's part. the song even had one of those dramatic key changes at the end. i've always hated those things. at fourteen i didn't know anything about warming up my voice. it felt like it was out of my range anyway. when i tried to hit some of the high notes i sounded like bob dylan singing a celine dion song. harmonizing with her was fun, though. i'd never done that with anyone before. she made me an unsolicited salad once. it had mixed greens and nuts and a dressing she made herself. it's still one of the best salads i've ever had. sometimes i wonder if she still sings. 210426 what's it to you? who go blather from