The Day After 49

It's amazing how incapacitated I feel after I get a cut on my finger. I WAS SO BUMMED because I had been getting really close to figuring out the chords I wanted to use for the latest song I'd been trying to learn but now I'm gonna have to lay off playing for a few days while this finger heals. This isn't even the first time this has happened. It's always in the kitchen... just not with a knife this time. Sorry, Clue. You're gonna have to add scissors to the choices. Now how does one manage to get a cut on their finger with scissors? Oh, that's easy. Simply attempt to cut open a very large pump dispenser of Lubriderm lotion to get every last bit of moisturizing goodness, and save money! But wait, there's more! Use an industrial-sized pair of scissors and then attempt to clean off all the lotion from it afterwards. That's the tricky part, and how I ended up with a laceration. Or it could just be sheer stupidity. I mean, who does these things? Me. I do these things.

It's the day after my birthday. Turned 49 yesterday. I don't feel any different. What's different is, I once again have to learn to separate my identity from the job I have chosen to take. There is no job, right now. There is just... time. That's really kind of an irony because I'm busier than ever. There's never really been idle time, ever. When people ask me, what's your birthday wish, I often think about how desperately I just want to sleep in. A friend of mine told me how she fantasized about locking herself in a hotel room for 48 hours, just getting room service, and sleeping. I like this fantasy. Really, I just want 8 hours of sleep, every night. But apparently, that's too much to ask. So, I go back to the default health and happiness wish, and if I were to join a beauty pageant, I would add world peace. Yes, I loved Miss Congeniality.

I need to get some of this...

The more important question here is, what am I planning to do with this entirely new year that lies before me? I'd been unknowingly prepping for that over the last year. I'm going to record an album. That's the goal for 50. I'm going to finish recording an album of acoustic covers. Play guitar, sing, produce. I'm going to be the talent that is no longer at the mercy of my sound engineer. I'm going to do it all myself. I'm going to get over the need for perfection and instead be ok with something that sounds good and genuine. And I'm going to get this done by the time I'm 50. <Insert deep breath here>

It's kind of nuts how I see former co-workers, people I went to college with and other friends that post videos of their kids doing amazing musical things. Not themselves but their kids. There's one who has her daughter actually in a performing arts school and they have all these stories posted. Videos of that sultry song number, filled with all the runs. She's a pro, that one. There's another who filmed her daughter at what looks like a club, on stage, performing a song that she wrote while playing electric guitar. There is yet another who posts video after video of more than one child in a musical production of something or other. Finally, a mother-daughter team who joined a theatre group and performed in a musical, then posted a video of them promoting said theatre group while performing a musical number. <sigh> 

There are so many talented people in the world, who is going to want to hear 49 year old me trying to cover Sarah McLachlan? I don't think my family even wants to hear me sing. Not my husband and certainly not my kids. I don't know if they just think it's funny when I ask, oh do you want me to sing that? They all say NOOOOOO. AM I really that bad? But I don't want my confidence to take a hit because honestly, I feel like this year, I finally found my voice. The singer in me that I actually liked. The producer in me who had the ideas, who could come up with a concept and vision for how a song can sound and I could hear it all... in my head.

Now, I'm used to the sound of my voice when speaking. I was a voice talent for years. Radio announcer (I say DJ but people seem to think I spin records. No, I'm the person talking on the radio. I play the music too but my main job is really the talking), newscaster, traffic reporter... I did all the jobs. I did a morning show for years. I basically produced the show too, conceptualized the bits, booked the guests, wrote copy... everything! The side hustle was always voice overs, I did continuity for several networks, but the majority of income eventually came from commercials. The singing, I am not sure how confident I was about that. There were a good number of bad performances. I hang out at post-production studios and occasionally get asked to sing for a study here and there, which was actually fun. But performing in public? Ohhh there was that jingle (cringe) and the mall shows where I had to sing said jingle live, over and over. I was 18. I think about those days and realize, wow, that was traumatizing for me. But it's amazing what all the young people are doing now and the fact that they are doing it so young. Do I wish my children would go into the performing arts? I would appreciate and love it but I don't make them do anything. I want them to choose their own path, the same way I chose mine.

What was the path I chose? It's this weird combo of me drifting along and trying everything that comes my way, building relationships as I go and filling holes and roles that need to be filled. I believe that I am capable of much, if I put my mind to it and I suppose that made me a master of none but I enjoy the journey, all the things I pick up along the way and all the people I meet. I wouldn't have walked this life differently, even if I had the choice. When I got married, I gave up the career that I had precariously built since my teens and after having my first child, I stayed home. I did bits of work, here and there, a brief stint at a bank, a call center, a mystery shopper and when the pandemic hit, I had this overwhelming urge to offer my services to my child's elementary school. I worked as an aide for a few months and eventually became a substitute teacher. This isn't a stretch for me because I did lecture at a couple of colleges before I got married but as I would discover immediately, the 10 and under set is vastly different from students in their late teens. It helped that I had children but I still learned a lot about dealing with children everyday that I showed up at school to work. 

Last school year, I realized that I no longer enjoyed being in the elementary school building as much as I did the years before. There was one spot that I couldn't get enough of though. I loved filling in for the music teacher. It wasn't the job, really. It was the fact that in the music room, there were instruments that I could play with. It reignited that forgotten love of being around the music. I would say I loved performing but I was still horribly afraid of singing when other people were there to listen. I still got the old jitters that made my voice waver and I constantly offered excuses for the less than perfect guitar playing. But I didn't feel judgment. Nobody was laughing at my attempt to entertain. I still hid behind the mask of self-deprecating humor but I think I figured out the key to performing. Practice, practice, practice, that's how you prepare and when performing, be in the moment. Enjoy it! When you do, others around you can enjoy it too. 

So that's the goal. I already found several songs I like and can play (I'm just being honest about my limited guitar skills). I have a concept that I feel good about and I'm still in the process of learning a few more songs. It's just a matter of working with new to me recording equipment and figuring out how my vision can be achieved. On to 50! Let's do this!

Playlist Recommendation: Building a Mystery (E), Sarah McLachlan