A Tuning on Cedar

I slipped back out under the screen door to stretch my legs along the yard. Near the damp moss beneath the cedar fence, someone had leaned a discarded strip of heavy galvanized wire against an old grey cinder block. I climbed up onto the rough concrete and tested the wire with both hands. It was stiff, springy, and coiled tight. I pulled my pine wedge from my belt, jammed it into one of the block's hollow cavities to pin the lower end, then took out my tortoiseshell pick. One slow, firm pluck sent a low, resonant twang through the hollow concrete. It rang clean against the open yard.