LiesWhen I was growing up, I had a vivid fantasy life. I told my friends that my father was a jazz drummer. He played drums as a hobby, but never professionally. I said he had played with such famous bands as Stan Kenton, Red Norvo and Woody Herman and the Herd. There was little chance of my being found out. My friends had no idea who these musicians were.Where did these lies come from? My father worshipped jazz musicians. The first thing he did when he arrived home from work was turn on his music. I understood that his life, of scrambling to make a living at a finance company, left him unfulfilled. Being an only child, I always felt I was his alter ego . . . or his muse. But it was more than that. We were so tuned into each other that his soul, his dreams became lodged in me, connected by a steady stream of genes and saxophone solos. I don't know if he was aware of the lies I was telling, but I suspect he knew. Once in a while, one of my friends would say to him "Mr. Isaacson, I hear you're a great drummer." I would hold my breath hoping he wouldn't give me away. But he never did. He would just say something like "Oh, I play a little." My friends thought he was being modest. Actually, he was telling the truth. At one time, my father had a drum set in the basement next to the stereo record player. My mother and I would hear him after dinner, hammering away with a Woody Herman or Stan Kenton record. My mother made him get rid of the drums. She said the pounding was giving her migraines. He replaced them with a recorder flute, which he played by ear. He had never taken any music lessons. After dinner I would hear his happy toots, augmenting the most famous jazz charts in the world. I've got to hand it to him, he only played with the best. Maybe I wasn't lying after all. I think I felt it was my job to give him the life I knew he longed for - so I made it up. That could be the reason he never disputed the lies I told about him. I've often thought if he had really wanted to be a musician, he would have learned to read music. But he worked long hours and came home drained, with only enough energy to listen. In a way the fantasy was so delicious, so bittersweet - it became a kind of gift I gave to him. He wasn't the only frustrated person in our family. When I was 12, my parents took me to see "The Sound of Music," at the Schubert theatre. I was barely able to restrain myself from leaping onstage and singing with the Von Trapp Family children. I was completely stage-struck. For the remainder of my childhood, I prepared for my Broadway opening. My father's secret life, compounded by my own, gave off enough delusional vapors to fill a steam table. Every night my father and I listened to Miles Davis, sitting on the L shaped couches in the basement, I imagined the glory of my Broadway debut, while my father's fingers tapped a drum solo on the end table. |