I started going to a chiropractor in September. All summer I had this lump in the back of my neck that wouldn't go away. It wasn't sore, really, just irritating. Just this pressure to crack my neck about fifty times a day. The irritation was worse when I was driving back to Connecticut from Montana, so I promised myself I would do something about it when I came home.

In the initial consultation the chiropractor takes an x-ray of your spine- this serves as a reference point for their work. My spine was pretty good- no really obvious problems. My pelvis is a little rotated, but this is actually a fairly normal finding because most people have slight differences in leg length, causing a mild rotation. The most striking finding was that my cervical spine (that's neck to you non-anatomy people) had absolutely no curve to it. The normal spine has a series of curves that flow nicely into each other, but mine curved along until my neck, when it just stopped and jutted straight up. It was really odd to see that. The chiropractor asked me all sorts of questions about what may have caused it, concluding that it might have been a result of being thrown from a horse in my early teens. Both the doctors at the chiropractors office initially thought it was the result of some major car accident.

Of course, I thought it was just a result of poor posture. 29 years of poor posture. I never asked them about this hypothesis because I was afraid they would then laugh at me and try to get me to take yoga classes or something. (not that I have anything against yoga, don't get me wrong.) (I just don't like sweating and farting on a greasy mat with thirty of my nursing school classmates when I could be outside running with the squirrels and the leaves crunching under my toes.) This fear of being laughed at was compounded by both the chiropractors trying to imitate what they interpreted my natural posture must be like- according to them I stand a little like Barney Gumble from the Simpsons. very flattering.

So ever since that xray in September I've been thinking of my odd little spine. and suddenly, this weekend it hit me. Duh- that little no-curve is from my saxophone neck strap.

Did I ever mention that I played saxophone almost daily for 18 years?

Um, yeah. My OTHER life. When I was a musician.

See- that's what I'm talking about. somehow in the past year or two I have gone from being a musician-on-hiatus to being a was-a-musician. This is fairly hard to believe. This is also quite depressing.

I played saxophone from when I was a wee lass in grade school through grad school. I played professionally in San Francisco. I soloed with major ensembles. I lived to play in musical theater. I spent probably tens of thousands of dollars on lessons and more on instruments. When people asked what I was, I would tell them: musician. Most of the choices of my adult life up until the age of 25 were based somehow on music- I went to europe to play saxophone. I lived in berkeley because I didn't feel comfortable practicing in an apartment in san francisco. I almost followed a boyfriend to chicago so I could study with a major saxophonist there.

The last four or so years of my musical career were plagued with pain. First it was the migraines, and then the tendinitis. Eventually, the stress of practicing and trying to survive on no money coupled with the need to pay bills forced me to apply for a full-time job in a fundraising organization. I tapered from still taking weekly lessons to taking bimonthly lessons to no lessons at all. My teacher moved away and I never found another one. I applied to nursing school. I moved to San Francisco, into an apartment where I couldn't practice. And so, three years went by without me touching my saxophone.

I've been thinking a lot about my saxophone lately. About my neck, and my neckstrap and my old little saxophone. It's actually quite valuable, back when my skill was such that I needed a horn of that quality to properly represent my ability.

Last night I was studying for an exam on chemotherapy drugs. at about 10:30, when I couldn't remember any more details, my neighbor downstairs started playing her guitar. She was playing and singing and having a great time. practicing. alone. late at night. Just the way I loved to do when I was in high school and college.

I started to cry. My life seemed pretty bleak already last night with those books open before me and my new husband grumpy and curled up in bed with a pillow over his ears. My life was pretty sad when the neighbor started playing. I was crying, remembering how I used to go to school and convince the janitor to let me stay late so I could practice more. I would play and play until I was sweaty and exhausted and my mouth was raw. Sometimes I would turn out the lights in the practice room so it was pitch black and I would moan music from my fingers and my breath and the only sense was hearing. It was late, I was playing, and that was my job.

Last night my job was to remember the difference between cisplatin and carboplatin. I cried so much. I crawled into bed, inconsolable. Somehow I lost that part of me, and I realized that it was really over. I couldn't breathe for crying and sweets offered me cold medicine to clear my stuffy nose. eventually the neighbor stopped playing her guitar and eventually I fell asleep.

The exam this morning was very difficult. I'm not sure I passed it. There were definite things I just did not know. I've missed lectures because it's been such a horrible couple of months. I didn't study as hard as I might have because I haven't had time. My whole life crumbles around as I write- my academic identity is suffering the same fate as my musical one.

After the exam I came home and got out my saxophone. I opened the case and smelled it- old, sour metal and dust. It looked different than I remembered- a little older and less sparkly. But there was my old neckstrap- and there was my mouthpiece with the marks my teeth have worn into them with years of use. When I opened the case I smiled to see my firstborn child grinning back at me now an adolescent. My music is changing today. It's still there, and I can feel the movements in my bones. That instrument is a little older now, but eager as ever to bend to my will. six hours later my hands still smell of saxophone, the ridge is back in my mouth where I bite down on the reed.

I played saxophone for awhile this morning. I don't feel much better, but at least I don't feel any worse. I can't let go of a lifelong identity as musician that easily. we'll go down fighting, that saxophone and I.