Read This Song Is (Not) for You for Free Online

and bus stops and overhead passes—why can’t they be beautiful and unique, or at least interesting to look at? We have people who want do it for us for free, people who don’t think art should only be locked up in galleries.
    It’s at least something worth thinking about, right?
    So anyway, I was proud of my fire hydrant.
    The city of St. Louis didn’t exactly feel the same way.
    The cop showed up during dinner, good timing on his part.
    Mom and I were still at the table when Dad called my name. By his voice, I knew something was up.
    The cop’s badge said “Smith.”
    His face said “grave concern.”
    Smith asked me, “Son, is this your car?” and he handed me a still shot from a security camera. It showed my car in the alley next to the fire hydrant.
    “Yes, sir,” I said. I had imagined a moment like this, and I was determined to go out with dignity.
    “Mr. Cogsworthy,” Officer Smith said. (I hate, hate, hate it when adults call me Mr., as if they were treating me with respect when actually they mean the opposite by it.) “Is it a coincidence that your car, which is covered in glitter, was seen on camera near a piece of city property that was vandalized by glitter?”
    And I couldn’t help it.
    I laughed.
    I laughed in front of Officer Smith and my parents, because “vandalized by glitter” was the funniest phrase I had ever heard spoken aloud in such a serious voice.
    I’m gonna make a long story short and say that in the end I was really lucky. I was technically arrested, though I never actually left my parents’ home, and I went before a judge and read the statement of apology that my mom wrote, instead of the artistic manifesto that I’d prepared. The judge was lenient because he said that he had a grandson who was “like me” (I’m not even gonna comment on that one), and I did sixteen hours of community service cleaning up gang tags in bad neighborhoods.
    I was also grounded for two months, and Mom and Dad have definitely kept the leash tighter since then.
    The worst part was that Sara didn’t want me to do GOP anymore. And that was when we started fighting.

Ramona
    “Here’s the thing about Neil Peart,” I explain to the guys. “He knows that acoustic drums will always be the soul of percussion, but he embraces the innovations allowed by electronic drums.”
    It’s a normal afternoon in Sam’s garage. We’re taking a quick break before we try to record our new song. Today Tom brought his touch-pad chaos thing, usual collection of pedals, and a didgeridoo he made out of PVC pipe. We just messed around for a little while, and it didn’t take long for a song to emerge. The music we make with Tom is strange and exciting. It isn’t always technically difficult, but it’s always new.
    The song we wrote today opens with the lone, low tones of the didgeridoo, then Sam comes in with this crazy riff on the authentic sitar his dad brought back from India. Just as I come in with the polyrhythmic beat, Tom switches from the real didgeridoo to a premade recording he runs effects through, and Sam begins lead melody on the electric guitar.
    The setup for all of this is ridiculous. Instruments, pedals, and cables are all over the floor, and Sam had to get another extension cord. Because of the clutter, we’re all standing or sitting behind our instruments.
    “Electronic drums were invented by the guy from Moody Blues,” Tom says. “They deserve a place in any true percussionist’s heart. And a band without a true percussionist brain cannot transcend this realm.”
    “We don’t have that problem,” Sam says.
    “Thanks,” I say, “but I don’t think I deserve the compliment. I’m a good drummer, yeah, but I’m not that innovative.”
    “Remember just the other day when you were saying how much you liked the sound when you drummed on the garage floor?” Tom says. “Why haven’t you ever recorded it for a song?”
    Something inside me clicks into place.
    “You already treat the