My Uncle Gene was addicted to his pipe. He'd smoke it everywhere, even during his work as a night soil excavation engineer, or maybe especially then. During sleep. While drinking beer (he used a straw for the beer). Duck hunting. Everywhere.

And then, one day, he heard a saxophone being played and fell in love with that deep, sexy sax sound.

Using all of his savings he rushed out and bought himself a custom-made saxophone. Tempered steel, just like my Uncle, and covered with a covering of gilt a quarter of an inch thick that was made from gold bars he'd found on an abandoned train back in Wyoming (that was his story). A reed crafted from the finest, thinnest hornbeam. Mutes (a gift from his mother) of the best cork from Portugal.

But my Uncle still wanted his pipe. He tried everything, but after a day and a half of constant sax he knew that while he loved his sax his love for his pipe (and certain visits by the local police) told him that he couldn't have both. And so, with great sadness and after no little drain on his gold supply, he put sax out of his life.

Oh, it was still there, mounted like a moosehead on the wall. Oft he would look at it and sigh and dream of the Life Left Behind, of his now-quashed dream of being a one-man band with his pipe and his sax, rich and famous.

But as he told me in later years, waving your pipe and bag around while having sax in public is not the best path for a young man to pursue if he wants to stay out of jail.

I don't remember what point I was going to make, but it's a good story and oh! so true. I can even show you the type of sax he used to have.