October 17th, 2008

Hold Your Applause

Dad, Kevin, and I played a wedding reception this past weekend. The bride requested that we prepare a set of more subdued stuff for the dinner portion of the event, and seeing as how there is nothing subtle or innocuous about the banjo (something you’ve no doubt learned from Steve Martin, if you’ve ever spent 30 seconds with him), we decided I’d switch to the guitar for this section of our performance.

I haven’t played guitar before an audience in almost 10 years. My skills have improved a lot since then, just by virtue of the fact that I still spend a lot of my downtime around the house picking and strumming songs I know and/or learning new ones. My old guitar however, hasn’t gotten any better with age. This is unfortunate, given that it was not a very nice guitar when I bought it, brand new, 12 years ago. Its main flaw, I believe, is that it is comprised almost entirely of plastic. Armed with that fact, my fellow guitar players have wagered a guess as to what kind of guitar I have, and they are cringing. They are assuming that I own an Ovation — the strange, bowl-backed instruments that appeared on the scene in the mid-70s, were embraced by a few singer-songwriters, were subsequently discovered to be not-so-great and sort of disappeared, and then, somehow, experienced a short-lived resurgence in the mid-90s at the precise moment when I was in the market for my first ax.

My fellow guitar players would be half-right. I couldn’t afford a real Ovation, so I ended up with an Applause. And now my fellow guitar players are double-cringing, because they know that an Applause is a product built to Ovation’s already undesirable specs, but in Mexico or Japan, with parts similar to, but not as nice as, those Ovation puts in their line of terrible guitars.

So, we start with that, then add me lugging it to every different place I’ve lived from 1996 ’til now, being an irresponsible youth and accidentally banging it on every waist-high surface in each of these places along the way, and never taking the time to clean it, have any adjustments made to it, or change the strings on it more than once every four years, and, well, for how much I still like to play, a new guitar has been on my list of purchases to make for a while now.

Things fell into place this month when Kevin discovered Taylor’s “Big Baby” at a guitar shop in Raleigh. Taylors are beautiful feeling, beautiful sounding acoustic guitars and they simply don’t make a full-size model that retails for under $800. Money I don’t have. The “Big Baby” is a 15/16 scale (a size difference I didn’t even notice) and, thanks to Taylor skimping on some of their typical frills like elaborate inlays and super-glossy finish, they sell it for $450. (Kevin decided this was the “Toyota of Taylors”: no fancy bells or whistles, but reliable, high-performing, and reasonably affordable.) Since I needed a better guitar I could play at this wedding, and we were paid generously for the gig, I went for it.

And I am one proud papa. Now that I own a Big Baby, I don’t see myself buying another guitar in my lifetime.

My Taylor — which Kevin explained to me is a “real” guitar made out of various “woods” — must be put back in its case every time I am done playing it to protect it from changes in humidity and temperature and my tendency to send beverages cascading onto surfaces they shouldn’t be on. And with my banjo and uke cases already taking up valuable real estate in our incredible shrinking house, there’s just no place for my old guitar and its case in our floor plan.

For a split second, I considered putting my Applause on Craigslist. Perhaps there’s someone out there who doesn’t care about tone or resonation, and would shell out $50 for an old beater they could learn on? I quickly realized I’d feel bad sticking a beginning player with this thing though, even if it is what I started on. (Actually 12 years with this guitar is probably why I’m not better than I am today.)

Also, awful or not, I once practiced sets of songs for hours and hours on this thing. I took it up onstage at open mic nights in college. My roommate was the singer in our act, and we enjoyed some moderate popularity at the bar we played at. A year later, when that roommate and I had a falling out of divorce-like proportions, that saw us dividing up friends and un-mingling our stuff from every shelf and container so I could move out, that guitar was one of the first things I took out of the room. And in the aftermath, when my grades were suffering and I didn’t feel like anyone was there for me anymore, I’d go back to my one-person dorm room and play it and somehow start to feel like maybe all wasn’t lost. And as I continued to go through good times and bad ones, that guitar was always there.

I believe, as a society, we are are too obsessed with material things and that we should all embrace Buddhist philosophy and discover the freedom of limiting our possessions, but when you’re a sentimental fool, this is quite difficult to put into practice.

Recently, the REI messenger bag that was handed down (or technically, up) to me by my sister my junior year of college, that I carried around for the remaining two-and-a-half years there, into all the jobs I’ve had since, and on almost every trip I’ve taken over that entire time, suffered it’s third zipper-malfunction and received a large tear in its main pocket. REI stands behind their products for all eternity and this was stuff that could be fixed. I’ve sent it back for similar repairs before though, and found that the mending never returns the bag to its original integrity and that being bagless for six weeks while it gets shipped around is pretty inconvenient. Thus I took the store’s offer to pick out a new bag and get the full cost of my old bag credited towards the new one. What I didn’t realize, as we finished the transaction, was that they needed to tag, re-enter into their system, and, ultimately, keep my old bag. I guess as hard evidence for the store manager when he has to appear in front of the REI tribunal for letting me buy an $80 messenger bag for $20?

Just after I realized what was happening, the cashier turned to take my worn, ratty old satchel that no one else would ever want away forever and the weight of all the places I’d ever gone with that thing on my back and all the different projects and love notes and life-altering documents I’ve ever hauled around in it hit me all at once. “Can you just give me a moment alone with the bag?” I blurted out. Ok, I didn’t say that, but that was what I meant when I said “Let me make sure I’ve gotten everything out of there!” I had carefully emptied it out at home before I ran my errands; there was no need to check it again.

I’m glad I didn’t have to trade in my old guitar to get the new one. It could have gotten ugly. Instead I packed it up yet again and, this time, moved it into the attic. After everything I’ve put it through, it’s probably thankful for the chance to rest.

Tags: Music, Recollections - No Comments »

October 3rd, 2008

What the Buzz Is About

It seems the list of things that virtually every other person in America has done and I never will is one item longer today. That brings it to three.

I never went to a summer camp. During summer vacation, Kate, Kevin, and I were pretty good about getting up, eating breakfast, and immediately vacating the house for the backyard or the neighborhood pool, giving my mom with some peace and quiet for at least a few hours a day. There was probably no real motivation for my parents to send us.

I never played little league baseball. I had no interest and my parents had no interest in forcing me to develop an interest. Growing up, neither myself nor my siblings were particularly athletic. There was a good chance we’d get hurt out there! No, we were much better off spending our time under a car being held up by jackstands braced at their tallest setting, helping Dad lower a 500-lb. transmission on a hydraulic jack with a home-made holder fashioned out of 2x4s attached to the top of it.

And…I never got a proper haircut. In other words I never ventured into a place whose business model is based around cutting hair and remitted currency to have this stuff growing out of my head trimmed, shaped, or (God forbid) styled.

Until recently, every haircut I’ve ever received was given at home by my mother. By her own admission, Mom only knows how to do your run-of-the-mill, basic haircuts. But she’s good at your run-of-the-mill, basic haircuts and I’ve never felt I needed anything other than your run-of-the-mill, basic haircuts. Therefore, I’m sure this seems ridiculous to you, dear reader, but, I have no idea how one conducts oneself in a barbershop or salon. I’ve never been inside one. Is it advisable to bring in a photo-montage of the look you want for the person doing the scissoring? Should you bring alternates, in case what you want won’t work with your hair? How many? As the scissoree, do you make conversation with the scissorer, or is it understood that they need to fully concentrate on the task at hand? There’s tipping involved, right? How much? When?

I thought these mysteries would be revealed to me when I went away to college, but, once there, I found that an unruly mop was something of an art school badge of honor. It showed that you preferred to spend the time when you should have been grooming working on your art, and that you were committed to being countercultural and unemployable. There was no need for me to get a haircut any more than once a semester. And I went home at least once a semester.

Thus for my four years at ECU, I looked like this:

These days I cut my own hair with an electric trimmer set just above the notch marked “First Day of Boot Camp.” The reason I do this is the same reason the “S.S. Setting Foot in a Supercuts” has set sail: things are looking pretty sparse on my frontal and crownal regions.

“What!?! Nah, man! I mean, I can’t even tell! It looks fine! Coulda fooled me!”

Folks are quick to reassure when I mention this fact in casual conversation. I’m fairly certain the thinning is noticeable and they’re just trying to comfort me ’cause they assume I’m bummed out about the whole descent into baldness. Or perhaps they really are unaware of my problem areas, as my relative height keeps them out of view for many. Wait, shorter people, ’til you see me crouched down changing an electrical outlet. There is significantly less coverage up there than there should be. No denying it.

I have the luxury of saying this now I suppose, because there is still something holding on, but I’m not that distressed about this development. Honestly I’m just thankful that my follicles waited — stuck around until I got a full-time job and a house and moved to grown-up-land where everyone’s physical appearance is taking some kind of abuse. If they want to wither and die at this point, can I really complain?

And there is a silver lining here. The last time I had my hair as tightly-cropped as I do now it was sprouting out of my head for the very first time (which, according to my mom, was when I was about six), so I’m just now discovering the world of the zero-maintenence-’do. It is awesome. I have not had to bother with finding the comb or wetting my hands for months now. And with my curbed shampoo use and shorter showers, we’re saving valuable cents per day.

And what am I giving up? My hair’s coloring is not dark and mysterious, but also not light and fun-loving. It’s just medium-brown. Nondescript. Middle-of-the-road. The longer it gets, the more I feel like it’s drawing attention to the fact that I have a really large forehead, and texture-wise, it’s an unfortunate blend of frizzy and poofy on the top, wavy in the back, and extremely curly on the sides. It’s always been impossible to corral into a non-doofy-looking, even-remotely-fashionable hairdo, as can be seen in every school picture of me from kindergarten through my senior year.

Yeah, I don’t think my hair has ever been much of an asset for me, anyway. Possibly because I never got a proper haircut.

Tags: Happenings, Recollections - No Comments »

August 30th, 2008

Past Mistakes

I didn’t notice it at the time, but now I realize that the first half of 2008 came and went without a word about it. I assumed that’s when they’d try to contact me: either well before or right around the exact day, 10 years later.

Of course I honestly believed that they wouldn’t get to me, as I haven’t kept up with anyone, least of all the “right people” for this sort of thing.

Only I knew that they’d get to me, because of Facebook and MySpace — tools that I just know allowed the reunion committee to locate (based on the relatively small number of “MIA” alumni listed) 90% of my graduating class. This was no small feat considering the high school I went to was massive. Not only was it impossible to be acquainted with everyone in the senior class, but there were people in caps and gowns at my graduation that I didn’t recognize at all from the previous four years. It was the perfect place if you wanted to be as close to nonexistent as possible. Which I basically did.

Nonetheless I received a very enthusiastic, nostalgia-envoking invitation to my 10-year high school reunion from two people I’ve never met who were, apparently, classmates of mine. Thus, I was forced to think about who I was back then.

The “jock?” Far from it, as I didn’t play a single sport. The “nerd?” Nope. I did well enough in my classes not catch hell from any teachers, but didn’t do well enough to stand out. The “criminal?” Again, no way did I want the sheer level of recognition one gets as a “problem kid.” The “basketcase?” Within the confines of my own brain: pretty much. But not on the surface. The “queen?” (Hold on, The Breakfast Club! Allow me to amend your stereotypes for my own purposes.) The “king?” Not a chance. I did not appear in any school plays, do anything with student government, or, despite a burgeoning interest in music, play in the marching, concert, or jazz bands. I wasn’t in the “public eye” nearly enough for that role. I was as friendly as I needed to be to not have to eat lunch by myself, and that was it. I stayed away from everything because I felt like I didn’t fit in…and I felt like I didn’t fit in because I stayed away from everything. This dilemma was not beyond my grasp, but I could barely absorb the random ridicule I received as a wallflower. And all I could see was that being recognized for something only meant a potential increase in the amount I was picked on.

If I could travel back in time and tell myself the things that would have made the high school experience more fulfilling for me, just before I started, this is what I’d tell shy, scrawny ninth-grade me:

“Don’t be afraid to give things a try, even if you think you won’t be good at them. You’ll probably do better than you thought. Even if you do just ended up looking stupid: every time you make yourself jump into something that’s scary and unknown, you gain a little courage and it gets easier to try the next new thing that comes along. People admire those that ‘put themselves out there.’ Even the people that will make fun of you will probably respect you more than you think.”

Except that’s not what I’d tell shy, scrawny ninth-grade me at all. Everyone tries to impart this conventional wisdom on you as you start high school, but it’s impossible to understand until you discover it yourself. Instead I’d probably just say:

“Look, this going to suck. Keep your head down. Get through it. Before you know it this place will be a speck in the rear view mirror. And you won’t ever have to go back. Oh, and go to ECU to study fine art, even though everyone will tell you there’s no way to benefit from it financially. Four-and-a-half years from now, things are going to start looking up.”

Were there a reunion for the “Class of ‘02” from ECU’s School of Art, I’d be the one organizing the raffle and collecting and enlarging the pictures of the really popular kids and placing them at the main entrance. It turns out, in art school, socially-awkward outcasts can develop the ability to form, indeed cherish, relationships with other human beings (who were most likely socially-awkward outcasts themselves). They might even become keystones in a social arch or two. I did. Between my wife and I there are the photographs of groups of jovial young people — with yours truly, front-and-center — to prove it! Yes, those were the days.

Only maybe they weren’t. I recently read somewhere¹ that every time we remember something our brain actually reconstructs that place or event as if it is taking it in for the first time. And with each reconstruction the chance that our brain is jumbling or deleting information is exponentially increased. Combine that with the mind-bending circumstances that serve as the setting for most college memories in the first place, and, well, I think I may be recalling “those days” through some seriously Vaseline-smeared lenses.

There is no more damning evidence for this than the candid video footage we own of “those days.” On a whim, Steph and I recently decided to watch the home movie, which was shot by our friend Ashley and features a 12–15 person cast, most of whom were major players on the set of “those days.” It was the first time Steph and I had viewed this since shortly after it was made. It was early fall and the beginning of my last semester of college, and we are having a cookout at my roommate Kymia and I’s apartment. And starting at about 00:00:30, long-forgotten and highly unsavory layers to every person and combination of persons documented — layers our still cameras did not detected, much less preserve — practically leap out of the QuickTime window. Someone is clearly jealous of someone else. Or desperately attracted to them. Or completely disinterested in them. Or really angry at them. We all seem tired. Malnourished. Tense. It was difficult for Steph and I to watch.

So, looking at the inverse, maybe high school wasn’t as bad as I describe? Maybe I wasn’t such a pathetic nobody? Now I almost feel that I need to find out. Imagine what I could learn about my memory, about how I’ll look back on what I’m experiencing now and what I’ll experience in years to come! Imagine what I could learn about myself!! Yep, I think I’m actually going to go to my 10-year high school reunion!!!

Except there’s no way I am going to my 10-year high school reunion. I kept my head down. I got through it. I don’t ever have to go back.

–

¹ Issue of Women’s Health that was accidentally delivered to us and I ended up reading from cover-to-cover.

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