Bionic Teutonic

When I was a kid, my parents put me into piano lessons, which I took pretty much up until I went off to college. When I was really little, I remember thinking that each note was somehow good or evil. Their moral standing was not a static thing either. It varied from song to song. While a B-flat may have been a force for evil in one song, in the next, it was imbued with a righteous glow. Each notes respective goodness or badness was intuitively understood by my childhood self. I did not have any power to influence its standing no matter how hard I tried. It simply was what it was. I assume that this was part of the tension that certain songs play with, but I really don’t know.

I was remembering this outlook towards musical notes the other day when I was playing around with my keyboard and I realized that I no longer have the same moral compass. A note is simply a note, and does not have any inherent goodness or badness. I don’t have any memory of this changing at any given point in time, but I find myself wondering if a) I’ve gained some perspective and can thus see each note as simply a tool to be used for a purpose, or if b) I’ve lost some innate childhood insight into music that is really the deeper understanding. Maybe it’s a bit of both. I don’t know.

So, I was in a bike accident a little over a month ago, for which I spent a little time in the hospital. Yesterday, I got a bunch of my bills. Jesus. Even with health insurance, this is the 3rd most expensive thing I’ve ever had to pay for (behind my house and my bad-ass Macintosh). The strange thing is that they send you each bill separately, so you get one for the CT scan, one for the stitches, etc. This is sort of panic inducing because you don’t really have an idea of what the total is. It just keeps going up and up the more of the bills you look at and you don’t know where it will stop. This is cruel. With all the money they will be getting from me, I think the least they could do is add it all up and send me one bill.

Besides giving me a financial heart attack, yesterday was also the birthday of two old friends of mine, so Ariel and I did a little party hopping. Seeing a bunch of friends and meeting some new people managed to erase the earlier panic nicely (or was that the booze?). The most interesting small world encounter of last night goes to a Russian woman we met, who’s name I sadly can’t remember. In the course of conversation, it came out that she went to the University of Tuebingen in Germany. Tuebingen, besides being an absolutely beautiful city, is the home town of an old family friend named Birgit and is relatively close to Heidelberg, where I used to live. - (Aside: It’s fun to speak German with somebody who has a similar dialect as you. Normally, Germans make fun of me unless I make the effort to speak in “high” German. I imagine it’s sort of like hearing a french exchange student speaking English with Australian accent. Which I’m sure is very funny.) - Anyway, it also turns out she is from Siberia, so I mentioned that Ariel’s cousin had gone to a camp there last year on an exchange program. Totally coincidentally, this camp happens in the same tiny little town she grew up in. The woman that runs the camp was her neighbor. “That tiny town in SIBERIA that your cousin spent last summer in? I was born there.” Crazy.

I tend to put up barriers to talking to people on the bus. I avoid most eye contact so I don’t get trapped in conversations with people, and I’m generally reading a book so people know that I’m not available for talking to. I forget that those barriers trap me in as much as they keep the crazies out.

Yesterday on the bus, this kid sat down next to me, and about 30 seconds later turned to me and said “So…what’s your name?”. He then went on to ask me “What’s your main thing to do?”, which I think is an awesome question to ask a total stranger. I told him music, he said he was looking for a band. I asked him how old he was. “Eight” he says. We talked about drums, work (he wanted to know), and his little brother. He was so fearless asking questions. This was one of the coolest conversations I’ve had with a random person on the bus. I think his name was Jimarcus.

Unjaded kids rock.

So we are re-modeling our bathroom and I’ve been going around assembling all the items that we need (drywall, 2×4s, etc.). This morning I went and dropped over $400 on slate for the floor and a big piece that will either go underneath the window, or be used as a sink counter top eventually. As I was driving from the quarry warehouse to work, I got to thinking that I had just spent an obscene amount of money for a bunch of rock that somebody had made flat and square. This strikes me as sort of ridiculous.

Near our house there is a business that consists of a huge pile of dirt and a little office where (presumably) the owner sits and sells said dirt. I’ve always made fun of this place (Dirt! Get your dirt right here! Lowest prices! Dirt cheap!), but now I find myself buying flattened rock. I seem to have lost my high horse somewhere. If anybody sees it, would you please let me know where I can find it again?

Damn, that weekend went fast. I had two wedding events to go to this weekend, and while I love the people who got married, receptions can be exhausting and sort of stressful. The end result is that I spent the entire weekend either at a reception, or running errands. I had hoped to spend most of the weekend writing and playing music, but in reality I only spent maybe 2 hours in my studio, which made me a little short tempered, I’m afraid. I got some nice pictures of Jane’s wedding though.
So, I’m going to be starting beginning aerial classes at the School of Acrobatics and New Circus Arts on Sept 11th, which I’m very excited about. I’m not entirely sure what the class will be like, or what kinds of aerial apparatuses we will be learning on, but no matter. I’ll get the thumb my nose at gravity for a while, which is always fun.

OK,

So, I’ve been working on getting this up and running all day. There are still a few things left to tweek, but I’m close. This is my second attempt at publishing a blog. Let’s hope this time around I stick with it a little longer. I’ve been wanting a place to publish thoughts, comments, etc. for a while and I’ve actually been somewhat keeping a travel journal, which I’ve been enjoying. Publishing it on the web seems like a logical step. So I figure I’ll start with some goals for the site and see where it goes from there.

I intend:

1. To gain honest insight into facets of my life through the act of writing it all down

2. To share with others and build community

3. To use the site as a motivational tool to inspire me to pursue those things which I’m interested in

4. To overcome my perfectionist tendencies while writing. i.e. become more comfortable with having words and thoughts in a public arena that are less than brilliant/ not a masterpiece of literature

5. To use this blog as a tool to keep in better touch with family and friends.

I’m sure there are many other reasons I could go into, but in the spirit of keeping entries managable and undaunting, I’ll leave it at that.