My new piano is a joy. Most every day I sit on its comfy bench and touch its lustrous keys and think to myself … what did I do to deserve this instrument? Not only have I continued to play old pieces, but I’m even attempting to learn new ones — a sure sign of devotion.

But the piano has developed one interesting habit. It’s thirsty — very, very thirsty. It has a humidifier, you see, with a light that comes on when the water drops below a certain level. When that happens, you fill it through a tube to avoid removing the front of the instrument. Doing this keeps the piano in tune, and is good for it in general. 

When the tuner showed me how this works, I imagined we’d be filling it up once or twice a winter. But it’s been a cold January, and the piano lights up about once a week. So now I water the ferns, I water the spider plants … and I water the piano. 

(*Apologies to the late Eric Carle for riffing on his title)