From Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com

‘One of my innumerable regrets is not learning how to play a musical instrument. When I was growing up, many kids  in our town took outside lessons, or were taught by their parents, to play the piano. Both my parents played, though my father was better. With a little more practice, perhaps  in a crunch he could have played in a cocktail lounge.  We had a borrowed baby grand for years. My father also had a ukulele, which he’d play on the weekends, often with a cigarette in his mouth.  It’s a strong memory I have of that kindly but rather cryptic man.

 We even had an old pump organ, bought in a sort of junk and antiques store in Marshfield, Mass., called Reed’s Ark. My father would play songs from the turn of the 20th Century on it.

Marshfield’s Wickedlocal noted of Reed’s Ark, a dusty firetrap in which you entered the 19th Century:

“Some 50 years ago, there was a fascinating store near the middle of Marshfield. You could prowl among antique junk or books or tools and occasionally find something worth actually buying.’’

Playing musical instruments and reading were primary middle-class home attractions, and, unlike with much of our electronic life now, active, not passive activities. (My God, we got a lot of magazines! Maybe eight a week, all jammed with ads.)

 I’m thinking of this these days because we’re all spending a lot more time at home, whether we want to or not.