They Meant Well, I guess

Here's another story from my childhood. For some reason my kids love them.

When I was in Grade 5 and 6 I took violin lessons at school, and loved it. I and this other girl were the best in the class. Anyway, my teacher happened to mention to my parents that I had real musical talent. I probably got this from my grandfather who was the leader of the town orchestra before the war. Anyway, when my parents heard this they were delighted. The next year, they stopped my violin lessons and made me take accordion lessons, because they figure that if I was ever short of cash, I could always busk for a living and people would pay to hear an accordion player but not a violinist. The whole premise was dodgy because in Winnipeg there WERE no buskers (maybe it was illegal?). Anyway, I hated it but had to take it for four years, practicing for half an hour every day. My brother who was three years younger than me also took accordion lessons at the same time and he liked it and thus became so much better than I was. It was quite humiliating to have the teacher assign us duets where I got the boring easy parts and he got the more difficult interesting parts.I finally got to quit by telling my parents my homework load was too much. I still do love the sound of violins though.....