murakami, haruki - Norwegian wood

those who are good at teaching things to people, and those who are not
- I pretty much belong to the first group," said Reiko. "I never thought
so when I was young, and I suppose I didn't want to think of myself
that way, but once
I reached a certain age and had attained a degree of selfknowledge I
realized it was true after all: I'm good at teaching people things. Really
good."
"I bet you are."
"I have a lot more patience for others than I have for myself, and I'm
much better at bringing out the best in others than in myself. That's
just the kind of person I am. I'm the scratchy stuff on the side of the
matchbox. But that's fine with me. I don't mind at all. Better to be a
first-class matchbox than a second-class match. I got this clear in my
own mind, I'd say, after I started teaching this girl. I had taught a few
others when I was younger, strictly as a sideline, without realizing this
about myself. It was only after I started teaching her that I began to
think of myself that way. Hey - I'm good at teaching people. That's
how well the lessons went.
As I said yesterday, the girl was nothing special when it came to
technique, and there was no question of her becoming a professional
musician, so I could take it easy. Plus she was going to the kind of
girls' school where anybody with halfdecent marks automatically got
into university, which meant she didn't have to kill herself studying,
and her mother was all for going easy with the lessons, too. So I didn't
push her to do anything. I knew the first time I met her that she was
the kind of girl you couldn't push to do anything, that she was the kind
of child who would be all sweetness and say "Yes, yes,' and absolutely
refuse to do anything she didn't want to do. So the first thing I did was
let her play a piece the way she wanted to - 100 per cent her own way.
Then I would play the same piece several different ways for her, and
the two of us would discuss which was best or which way she liked
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