In the living room, my baby is playing jazz. Really. The tune is called “Jazzy” and his piano teacher annotated the eighth note pairs to encourage a lilting rhythm.  Lessons are over for the year, but he continues to practice.

This morning I ran wearing his backpack – key chains and strands of beads flying from the zipper pulls. We were headed to camp – Josh riding in the misty rain, me chasing behind with the dog. I looked like a normal jogger on the way home, after dropping off the boy and the backpack. I don’t want to know what impression I made on the way there.

I can’t get “Jazzy” out of my head. Oliver Sacks calls the phenomenon a brain worm, when you can’t let go of a tune.

This jazz thing, it’s a duet. He plays it over and over, one slippery measure at a time. When he finally feels it in his fingers, I know he’ll call me to sit with him. He’ll say, Play the low part, Mommy, as he slides over on the piano bench.  Josh gets the melody every time.