We were working our way through the World’s Longest Yard Sale when we ran across a guy with a collection of wooden organ pipes. No organ, just the pipes.

The big ones were spread out on the ground on a blanket. Some were as big around as a tube of bologna and maybe six to eight feet long. The rest were spread out across the table. The smaller ones were square and anywhere from 36 inches to 6 inches long.

“These are over a hundred years old,” says the guy selling his wares.

“How much?” Marion is intrigued.

“Five bucks a piece for anything on the table.”

I had been keeping an eye out for another set of piano keys, but I certainly never expected to find organ pipes.

An organ pipe is basically like a wooden whistle, only more sophisticated. It was impossible not to pick one up and try it out.

Marion got three of them in her hands and proceeded to see what kind of sound she could make. I could tell she was trying to play a tune. It sounded more like a sick bird call.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to find the right ones to play Yankee Doodle. It’s the only song I ever learned on the piano.”

I helped her sort through the pile until we got the right four notes. It was a process of elimination. Blow two of them. Put the wrong one down. Blow three of them. Put one back and search for the next one.

When we finally got the right four together, she held them like one of those Indian Pan Flutes. Excuse me, Native American Pan Flute. Anyway, she held them up like a sandwich, put the wind behind each note and Yankee Doodle came to life.

She seemed pleased with herself.

Man has been making flute-like instruments since the first time he put a hollowed-out animal horn up to his mouth. He’s carved instruments out of bones. He’s poked holes in bamboo. Anything he could blow through to make a sound has been shaped, cut, bored out, and put to his lips.

This brings me to the owl call I bought last week. Sort of like a wind instrument, but not. Not designed for making music but designed for making owl talk.

Anyone who has ever blown through a wooden instrument knows that lip control matters. You can’t just throw this thing up to your lips willy-nilly. There is a particular lip shape and surface tension that needs to be achieved in order to make an effective call.

You can’t think of it like blowing up a balloon. For one thing, you don’t wrap your lips around the barrel of the call. That would be silly. And besides, you’d look like Winston Churchill sucking on a cigar.

The lips must be pursed against the outer rim of the barrel. Press tight enough against the smooth opening so as not to allow air to escape around the edge but not closed too tightly so as to allow air to flow through the lips and into the chamber of the call.

This is called the pucker factor. And…I’m guessing you just tried to pucker.

You would think that a man of my age and experience would know how to pucker correctly. Evidently, the proper owl pucker is more difficult than I first thought.

You know what I’m talking about. Some of you heard the recording of my first practice runs with this owl call. There were many things wrong with my technique, but if you get the pucker wrong, nothing else matters. I was failing miserably.

The next most important factor is the manner in which you deliver air through the pucker and into the chamber.

In the early going, I looked like a bullfrog with my cheeks all puffed out. Think Dizzy Gillespe holding his trumpet, cheeks swollen like two overstretched balloons about to explode, and you get a pretty good idea of what I looked like with an owl call up to my lips.

This is largely responsible for why my owl calls sounded more like a dying moose. The air flow was all wrong.

The proper owl call does not require a continuous flow of air. Instead, owls talk in short bursts of acoustic vocalizations. Spurts of air. Not like a tire leaking. More like a goose honking.

This is achieved by filling your lungs with air and then using your diaphragm to push short bursts of wind out through your properly puckered lips.

I go back to the balloon image. I have blown up a million balloons. Expanded cheeks and the long continuous use of my lungs in the effort is something to which I am accustomed. Using my diaphragm is almost an alien behavior.

I have to concentrate on using my diaphragm in this way. I fill my lungs, and then I have to think about what to do next. I have been practicing without the call to my lips. Tighten my core. Push from down deep somewhere. Lips pursed.

I’m thinking, “Don’t fill your cheeks.” “Push up from inside.” “Short bursts of air.”

After about five minutes of practice, I’m feeling light-headed, and I start sounding more like a cat trying to heave up a hairball. I’m just glad that Marion has not recorded all my attempts.

This is more work than I counted on.

Part of my training is listening to the Barred Owl calls on YouTube. Evidently, I’ve scared all the real ones away with my practice sessions. I’ve been paying attention to the rhythm and timbre of their vocalizations.

I understand the Who-cooks-for-you, Who-cooks-for-you-all approach to the basic call. But there are really only four notes to both sequences, not four in the first and five in the second. So, I’ve decided to southernize the owl call for the sake of clarification.

The truest version of the Barred Owl call is Who-cooks-for-you, Who-cooks-for-y’all. That last note is a gurgle that trails off and fades away. And that gurgle must come from the back of your throat, not your lips like blowing bubbles in the pool.

So, get this picture. A white-haired old guy with a wooden whistle-looking thing up to his lips. He’s puckered. He’s heaving in the mid-section like he’s about to barf. His hands are cupped over the sound hole in the call.

I forgot to mention that cupping your hands over the sound hole is important. It’s called “giving a little back pressure” to the air traveling out the far end. Without the back pressure, it definitely sounds more like a duck.

With that picture in mind, you now have a pretty good idea of what it takes to become a professional owl caller. I’m getting better. I haven’t had an owl talk back to me yet, but I figure they’re on vacation. When the weather cools off, they’ll be back, and I’ll be ready.

In the meantime, Marion and I will be sitting on the back porch. Her Yankee Doodle  pipes and my owl call.

We really know how to live it up.