I am playing a jazz gig with a rock band that I used to be in. The stage is in a covering slightly bigger than a pup tent. A somewhat large crowd, that includes some grade school children, watch us through the mesh flaps and translucent nylon. The gig takes place in the parking lot of a strip mall which I can say is the median of my two childhood neighbourhoods. When the gig ends, I hear one of the kids holler that he wants to meet me. He then hands me a homework assignment of his for me to autograph, which I can barely make out as it is scrawled in pencil on black construction paper. He then says he’s going to buy a book written by a musician that I wish to lionize. This book happens to be on sale at the gig. It is a collection of abstract expressionist paintings made with the materials you’d find at a classroom art centre table. This musician is also in attendance, though keeping a low profile. He walks past me and gives a sideways glance. The musician looks nothing as I remember him, and is younger than when I had first met him. In fact, this person is not the musician at all.