{"id":9645,"date":"2026-07-24T03:02:59","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T03:02:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/?p=9645"},"modified":"2026-07-28T03:24:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T03:24:13","slug":"thatcher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/?p=9645","title":{"rendered":"thatcher"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

They sat in silence in the patient lounge of the same optometrist. Then over the little speakers the Steely Dan song Reelin’ in the Years<\/em> played and after the famous guitar solo arrived, Margaret Thatcher broke the silence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie:<\/strong> Remarkably efficient.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen:<\/strong> Efficient?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie:<\/strong> Every note appears to have employment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen McIlwaine laughed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen:<\/strong> That’s one way to hear it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie:<\/strong> No wasted movement. No self-indulgence. It accomplishes precisely what it sets out to accomplish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen:<\/strong> You think it’s a tax policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie<\/strong>:<\/strong> Good craftsmanship is good craftsmanship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen picked up an imaginary guitar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen<\/strong>:<\/strong> Listen again. Not to the speed. To the leaning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie frowned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie<\/strong>:<\/strong> Leaning?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen<\/strong>:<\/strong> Every good guitarist leans into certain notes. They’re persuaded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie considered this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie<\/strong>:<\/strong> Yet the solo sounds highly disciplined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen<\/strong>:<\/strong> Yepper. Freedom without discipline is just noise. The trick is disguising one as the other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie<\/strong>:<\/strong> That sounds conservative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen<\/strong>:<\/strong> Blues is conservative. Every player learns the same twelve bars. Then spends a lifetime escaping.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie folded her hands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie<\/strong>:<\/strong> I admire competence. This guitarist possesses it very much.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen<\/strong>:<\/strong> Competence gets you invited. Personality gets you remembered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie<\/strong>:<\/strong> So why this solo? People keep talking about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen closed her eyes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen<\/strong>:<\/strong> Because he sounds delighted. You can hear him smiling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie<\/strong>:<\/strong> Interesting. The notes arrive with unusual confidence. As though each one believes it belongs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen<\/strong>:<\/strong> Exactly. A frightened guitarist plays scales. A great guitarist makes you forget strings are involved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie<\/strong>:<\/strong> Tell me something, if someone else had played exactly those same notes…would history remember the solo?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen<\/strong>:<\/strong> The notes aren’t the performance. They’re the evidence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie nodded slowly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I understand.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen looked toward the speakers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“You know what my favourite thing is?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“What?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Halfway through, he stops trying to impress anyone.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maggie raised an eyebrow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“He was impressing me all along.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“That’s because you’re not a musician and you’re listening for achievement.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“And you?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I’m listening for surrender.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“So greatness,” she said, “is discipline perfected?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellen smiled and picked up her guitar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“No.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She struck a single bent note and let it hang in the air.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It’s discipline forgotten at exactly the right moment.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

They sat in silence in the patient lounge of the same optometrist. Then over the little speakers the Steely Dan song Reelin’ in the Years played and after the famous […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"Layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["entry","author-rockbob","post-9645","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9645"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9645\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bobwiseman.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}