A few weeks back I turned 28. Like most birthdays—especially those after my 18th—the occasion felt mostly anticlimactic. Still, some part of me felt like Samwise Gamgee standing in the field in The Fellowship of the Ring; if I grow up one more day, it'll be the furthest from young I've ever been. Most of the legendary figures of pop-culture I've looked up to had already made and shared at least one masterpiece by this point in their lives. Many of them I've already outlived with nary a quarter-masterpiece to my name (although if I'm being fair, one or two of my lyrics have shown promise).
Sure, many of you reading this may roll your eyes at the idea of anyone my age feeling old, though my back at the moment could plead a good case for at least aged. Whenever I'm out and hear teenagers talking with the kind of frantic, almost chaotic verve which seems to transcend generations for a specific age range, I can't help but remember how old and mature I used to feel. I was so sure of what I believed and believed in. Stupidly, this kind of reminiscence is often twisted to speak to or treat adolescents with condescension and derision. Please don't do that. As we get older, we so easily forget how intensely we once felt, how passionately we once ran from moment to moment, swept up in the uncertain wonder and panic of becoming.
And then we became...what?
Or perhaps we never stop riding the current of time. And it's never the same river twice.
Finally got around to meeting with a new therapist. If there was a punch card for seeing different psychiatric professionals, I'd soon be due for a free fro-yo. The first meeting is often the weirdest, but the odd twist is that meeting with this detached stranger I've no reason to trust can sometimes make it easier to open up. Sharing the reasons and tales behind my trauma has always been exhausting, but after a certain number of tellings, it sands down to this sanitized, mechanical madlib of psychological buzzwords. I strain to recall the timeline while finding it all too easy to recall the key images of pain, terror, and abuse. Still, they seem nice. At least there are no glaring, immediate signs of troubled water ahead.
Once again, I've been attempting to participate in National Novel Writing Month. If you happen to be keeping track, this is—I think—the sixth year in which I've thought to give NaNoWriMo a go. I only ever reached the 50,000 word goal once, on my first time through. Every other try since has found me writing an evolving variation on the same story and usually giving up less than halfway through. Throughout the following year, I'll occasionally get the urge to pick up that old manuscript and rework into a plot full of characters and situations inspiring enough to keep me motivated. By the time the next November cycles back around, I've second-guessed/reworked everything but a few of the proper nouns and the genre. Thanks to the online writing course I took over the summer, I finally had the beginnings of a workable outline and have started in on something that could perhaps hold merit. Trying to remind myself that the goal of a first draft is simply to get the idea out of my head and into a document, it's not only lack of motivation or self-doubt but a scarcity of energy in general.
Heading into the dark of winter, I languish.
I wish I could say I've still been playing music. Though I have been writing bits and pieces of new material, there's a strength quite lacking in my desire to finish any one song or practice any finished piece to performance level. My favorite open mic has shut down. There are others, but it's just one more excuse to keep my feeble mind from reconnecting with one of the few activities that ever made me truly happy.
I will push through. I must.
Further on the topic of feeling old is that my younger cousin got married last month, the first wedding of a younger family member and only the second wedding of anyone younger than me I've attended. My older sister's wedding is coming up at the end of this year.
Know that old music video or film cliche of the subject/singer standing still while a crowd rushes past in fast-forward around them? It's the egotism of anyone who creates art that our most abundant emotional resource is our own neuroses. A bit of solipsism is bound to leak through the cracks in the ceiling of a cell whose walls are all plastered with self-portraits.
Speaking of, there's only one more track left of the four I recorded with Joe Casey two years back. I'm wicked grateful to him for the opportunity of working with someone so talented and receptive to my style and ideas while also bringing a passionate, skilled, creative force that makes every note, every beat, every concept all the clearer and fuller. The best music is collaborative at least on some level. Even if I write, record, and mix everything on my own, I can't create without channeling something of those who've inspired me. Thus, why not embrace that and bring a mix of influences to the fore? Why not work with others whose tastes jive with but also differ from your own, creating a blend out of both the tension and the unexpected cohesion?
I'll let you know when that new stuff comes out. For now, I've got more writing to do.
Thanks for reading,
Odist
p.s. - check out my latest track and lyric video:
