In my work at school I’m reading about theories of improvisation and I find this an unfair proposition since everything already is an improvisation. If your fingers are always playing the piano how then could you achieve the silence required for teaching A major or Opus 10 #6? Life is just happening, you didn’t choose to be born, you know not when you die, you don’t know if you’ll get Covid, you don’t know what your next thoughts will be. In a courtship you hope she or he will kiss you but you don’t know for sure what they’re thinking. How could you ever be separate from the improvisation in order to study it? There is a scene in Fellini’s film 8 & 1/2 when the kids are pretending to be asleep but after the adults are gone, one girl takes charge of everyone, reminding them tonight’s the night the eyes of the saint in the painting will move and grant their wishes unless they stop looking into her eyes otherwise all will be ruined and cursed. There was a store some years ago on Bathurst near College that sold south shore Nova Scotia art. Awesome store, I bought two woody sculptures, a hen painted white with black spots, red tail and flat back you could rest on like a mug. The other, a tall skinny man about three feet high with wood painted blue long sleeve shirt and black pants. His legs end at the platform that balances him. The end of the legs, which are like giant dowlings, end in the base. No feet. The two arms are attached to the torso by a nail at the shoulder and are swivable. I keep the toilet paper rolls on the man’s arms raised upright to the ceiling. His small head has black hair and little black eyes. Not long ago there was some toilet paper tied around his eyes. My daughter later explained he’s watching her. I reassured her it is not possible, it doesn’t exist, there’s no such thing. She persists. My instincts are to reassure her there is no such thing but then if she sincerely believes it is watching her she solved her problem by covering its eyes, right? Is that not as good as me offering another belief system? I just want for her to be able to improvise as best she can, in her own way and she did, that’s It’s about as close as I can get to a theory of improvisation.