Awareness recently seems to be a matter of listening to the Universe. When people I know get an idea they're supposed to do something, they credit the Universe for sending messages. So I guess the Universe is sending me messages about playing my horn. I play it in my head sometimes. I'm seeing more and more musical acts come along that have trumpets. Sunya posted from the beach at Santa Cruz about the soft sound of a trumpet playing nearby. Messages! Universe! Play!
I don't know about some over-arching Universal intelligence sending me messages. Just as likely I know I want to play but wrestle with making the time and meanwhile I'm sensitive and/or attuned to noticing the damn things. Similar to when thinking of buying a Cooper MINI I'd suddenly start seeing them all over the place. I went through that last year. I don't know what the Universe had in mind but I'm glad I didn't buy one.
Thing about trumpet is it's very physical. When I was sixteen, seventeen my teacher was lead trumpet for the San Francisco Symphony and he was very keen, as you might expect, on tone and intonation. Consequently, whenever I blow a horn now and it sounds like I'm spitting into a bucket I have a hard time tolerating it and sticking with it for the year or two it would take to get into shape. I guess I have to let that go and just make a habit of it somehow. turn it into preparation for a marathon. I don't know how. Pretty much every day something comes up that needs my immediate and significant attention. There have actually been many days when I thought about playing and looked back on the day and realized I simply couldn't have.
But it would be so cool to have my chops back and sit with a band and get one of those underpaid gigs at a bar such as our friend A was complaining about. A is brilliant and talented and beautiful and driven and just quit her band because let's face it, those gigs don't pay enough to justify. But what the hell. Gotta play awhile before you can decide it ain't worth it.
Yes. I am very aware, very aware indeed, that I've been talking about this for far more than two years.
I also actually did it for awhile last year -- or the year before, I forget, but I played for a month or two, somewhat sporadically, with ever-improving sound. But I got bored with it and didn't come up with an alteration to address that, and something interrupted what passed for a routine, and that effectively ended that. For the time being.
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So I have this to say about that.
First of all, everyone who is actually in the know, if you know what I mean, understands perfectly well that it isn't the *Universe* (and here I am using very sarcastic fingery air quotes) that is speaking to you or to anyone else for that matter.
It's the frickin' wee tiny demons that live 'twixt crust and mantle, is what's speaking to you when you start seeing and hearing all these messages.
Furthermore, the frickin' wee tiny demons that live 'twixt crust and mantle are very much NOT telling you to start playing your trumpet again. They're telling you to play your *strumpet*, which is another thing entirely. They just can't figure out how to attach the "s" to the front of the word, see. Think of it as a sort of wee-tiny demon game of Pictionary.
mmkay?
And, yes. I've had a glass of wine and am therefore quite adorable.
My acoustics are always in the stand, so if I just walk by and notice one of them, I stop and pick it up and play, even if just for a few minutes. Oh hell. Blog post . . .
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