Never too old to learn new things

Gloria flew back to Maryland on Saturday and will soon be back taking summer courses at Dartmouth. My parents are devastated by her absence. Apparently her presence provided elegance to our family home and something else that has been sadly lacking, live music. You see, our family piano is a beauty, a 1927 baby grand, rich in tone, a true work of art. Unfortunately, no one in our family plays. My mother and father never learned and somewhere between the tap lessons and the braces and the other rites of passage of youth, my brother and I dodged the bullet of music lessons (or so we thought at the time).

Since Gloria's departure, and her great success at the mini concert, my mother has been encouraging me to take piano lessons. She says it is a wonderful skill to have and I should seriously consider hiring a piano tutor. I have told her repeatedly I don't have the hands to be a pianist, just like I didn't have the feet to be a ballerina. When I was 3 I wanted to be a ballerina, but I wasn't able to do the splits and I didn't stand properly in first position, so I was shunned from the ballet community. I'm over it now, but it was a sore subject for some time.

My other excuse as to why I should not begin playing the piano is that at 18, I am just too darn old. But, as with all things, my mother has a valid rebuttal as she informed me: Jim, our piano technician, didn't begin playing the piano until he was 21 years old. Now, 15 or so years later, he plays wonderfully. And he doesn't just play. He's also an active member of the Guild of Piano Tuners, which meets monthly in Hayward.

There is a moral to this story, though: you're never too old to start something new. If you have a strong desire to learn, there will always be somebody willing to teach you. The other moral is that mothers think their kids can do anything. While I protest that I don't have the talent to learn how to read music or play, Mom just stares longingly at the piano and hopefully at me.

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I don't know what it is about the month of June, but for whatever reason it always seems to be my Hallmark Card month. Every year at this same time, I spend ridiculous amounts of time in the downtown San Mateo store searching for graduation cards, birthday cards and Father's Day cards. In the process, I read tons of cards (at least a 100 or so), but the thrill of finding the perfect card never ceases. And there's always a perfect card you just have to give it time.

Earlier this month, my best friend Lauren and I were invited to a high school graduation party for our friend Barrett. He was in the class behind us at Aragon High School. We were determined to not give him a typical congratulatory card; Lauren and I have high standards for ourselves and our card-picking abilities. We searched and searched for just the right card. And we found it.

The front of the card is a landscape photograph of a beach covered with bikini clad women and overly-bronzed men. The massive number of people covered every inch of sand. It looked like a good time was being had by all. The inside of the card read: Our condolences on the loss of your spring break.

Hallmark Moment No. 2: The card I gave to my dad on Father's Day was just as perfect. On the front, there is a picture of a man titled back in a recliner, holding a remote control and a bag of chips. Beneath it a caption reads: For whatever reason, Whistler's portrait of his father did not take the art world by storm. When I picked out the card, I also couldn't have planned the situation on Sunday morning when my dad opened the card while he was seated in his recliner. Fate works in funny ways.

Grace Kallis is a graduate of Aragon High School. She is currently attending Barnard College in New York City. Her column, Graceland, appears every other Tuesday. If you have some news you'd like to send Grace's way, e-mail her at gkallis5@hotmail.com.