How it all started

As I got into my 40's, it happened that my friends and acquaintances began dying of cancer and other natural causes, instead of the adventures gone awry which had claimed lives when we were all much younger. This made me question what I wanted to do or experience before my own death, and I was surprised by the answer that came to me -- I wished to be able to express myself through a musical instrument. I had expected something more traditional, like exotic travel, or perhaps late childbearing, but playing music the unequivocal answer that came echoing back to me.

This was unexpected, given that I'd never shown the least glimmer of musical talent. I had inherited my father's infamously dire singing voice, and I was fired from childhood piano lessons "for lack of aptitude or application." Adolescent attempts at teaching myself guitar and recorder petered out into sore fingers and menopausal maternal complaints about infernal noise. Eventually I concluded that I was simply lacking in musical talent, and should contend with my writer's block instead.

Someday I want to write a deep and thoughtful entry about the wrestling matches with personal demons that I, as one of those persons repeatedly labeled as musically untalented, had to go through in order to feel justified in spending my time struggling against my own non-aptitude (not to mention justifying my antisocial acts of generating noise pollution along the way). But that will have to wait until my next deep and thoughtful mood.