My imagination makes me human
and makes me a fool;
it gives me all the world
and exiles me from it.
--Ursula K. Le Guin

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August 19, 2008

Another warm summer evening downtown, 85% and no breeze, but the flute player on Market Square is happily tooting away, hoping for tips from the Tomato Head crowd or the people coming out of Marble Slab with ice cream cones. I approve of any music on the Square that isn't amped but didn't have cash on hand to drop in his box. Sunday evening, however, while the merchant of Venice was demanding his pound of flesh at the other end of the Square (the Tennessee Stage Company's final outdoor production), I rewarded a very young accordian player on the same bench with a five dollar bill. She was obviously still learning, her performance tentative, but couldn't have been more rigidly intent on her music stand than if she had been on a concert stage. And she was playing what sounded like a French folk song, maybe "Under Paris Skies." Well, French music will sucker me any time. What am I saying? I wouldn't know "Under Paris Skies" from the "Hedgehog Song." But it sounded so . . . so Amelie, so Maigret. If she comes again, I'll give her another five.