Brain Shower

This entry was delayed by the death and burial of my grandmother, a very special woman to whom I was very close.

The last three days’ focus was to work on a poem.

Result: I enjoyed the brainstorming stage of writing the poem. I’m technically still in the brainstorming stage. When I began with my three-days’-focus series, I promised myself that I would not be too hard on myself for an unfinished project. And to that I hold.

The trouble, for me, in any creative work, is that, sometimes, I just have to make a choice, and I cannot expect every choice to be perfect. I pursue perfection, yet I know that I won’t achieve it.

The question for me will become, when I make it past the brainstorming stage, can I come up with something coherent that says what I want to say.

The next three days’ focus project: work on exercises that are in my piano book. I took four years of lessons at KWU, and, I’ll admit, I never really practiced. I think that I passed because my instructor was more interested that I understand the concepts of playing… that, and, at least during my lessons, I was able to do what she wanted me to do. At the time that I was a music major at KWU, the program was still building and solidifying. Does this excuse my lack of proficiency? No, certainly not. I was more concerned with my class attendance (the skill of commitment-keeping) and my emotional growth, social growth, and involvedness than I was with actually building skills. College, it seems, for me was a 3.75-year foray into learning how to think… I recount with embarrassment how it always seems like I know a fair amount of things, but I can do hardly anything.

There is a difference between intelligence and smartness. To illustrate this, I go back to a conversation with one of my college instructors. This conversation took place about six months ago. The professor said to me, in a tone of comfort (necessary because I was coping with mistreatment at the time), that I was “pretty smart,” and at, at the time, this didn’t make sense to me. “Pretty smart? I’ve had people complimenting my intelligence all my life! You’re just downplaying it because I’m not good at what you do, because I don’t have the skills and didn’t succeed all that much.” It was moronic to think this… Perhaps, if I’d had guts and said this thought out loud, I might’ve learned faster the difference that I now understand. This particular instructor is also a coach, and the activity that he coaches requires not that people be intelligent, but that they be smart. Smartness, then, is intelligence in action. By this definition, I’m not very smart. I have the intelligence to learn smarts, but I need to focus and practice in order to obtain these smarts.

As far as being a musician goes, it’s quite embarrassing to sit down at a piano and not be able to do what my brain wants done. I have many of the piano concepts in my head, but that only makes me intelligent. It doesn’t make me piano-smart. I’m going to spend the next three days, starting tomorrow because tonight I’m covering a high school football game on the radio, working rather hard to build some piano smarts. They say that it takes about 10,000 hours of commitment to master something… I’m going to see if I can make it at least 15 hours closer to piano mastery.

Clutter Confrontation

Talk abou’chr floor space! Check this action out!

A moderate success in the second three days' focus project

My second three days’ focus project was to focus on arranging my room.

Report: I made considerable progress on the first day, and then didn’t accomplish anything the next two days. I did show off my progress to my housemate and his girlfriend, though. *sticks tongue out to the side obnoxiously*

How I progressed: This box of random j-u-n-q-u-e sat behind the door to my bedroom. Having sorted through it, I was able to play a game of rearrange-the-squares-to-make-the-picture in my room. I don’t have much shelf space, but I changed what I kept on the shelf and put storage containers closer together, near my closet. The end result is that I can now walk freely into my room. I can see my desk completely, there are probably 24 square feet of free floor space now, and I have easy access to my piano keyboard.

Looking forward, now, to the next three days: I will be celebrating my nephew’s first birthday tomorrow (Eight hours of driving are involved.), and I’m directing my church choir in the morning, so I’ll lose an entire day of progress (for a good reason.)

Unless…

I work on a poem.

I’ve realized that the beauty of poetry is, in part, that every word is carefully chosen. And, even though one can sit there, putting his/her thoughts in lines and rhyme words at the ends of those lines, there isn’t any depth, any gravity, to the work other than simple conversational idea communication. So, I think that my thoughts, pensamientos, need to be more carefully considered when I write poetry. My next three days’ focus project is to work on a poem dealing with the concept of how some things will never be. I will search for ways to express the profundities of what “neverness” means. The choosing of the right words should involve lots of brainstorming, structuring, and careful consideration. I don’t expect to “finish” the poem, but, perhaps, I’ll make a good start.

Crunch Time

The first three days’ focus ends, the new one pondered.

The first three days’ focus didn't turn out as well as it should've, but it is also wasn’t as bad as it could’ve been. The reality is that I managed to do core exercises each of the three days. I’m putting that one in the win column.

Predictably, or, to be honest, what I should’ve hypothesized would be a result, was that, in focusing on one thing for several days, I found myself more motivated to do other things. For example, I was thinking about making sure that I worked on my core muscles, yet I also started thinking about a yard project, read another 60 or so pages of a book, kept the kitchen clean, and wrote some more brainstormed ideas for a book that I’d like to write. So, if nothing else, these three days’ focus projects may set me up for continued success in doing all of the little things right. Heck, I even did some more thinking about a barbershop arrangement that I hope to write.

The question now becomes “What do I focus on for these next three days?” I think that I have my answer, and the answer comes from noticing inconveniences in my work-out time. I tend to not work out when I feel confined by space. Scratch that. I tend not to do ANY work when I’m confined or when there is the slightest hindrance to working on a project. My room, you see, is not very open because I have too much clutter. Clutter, though, is a problem not easily dealt with… For me, at least. I have found that I don’t like to start a project unless I can stay with it and get it completed. And, I don’t like to take things out of containers (I should have noted earlier that these containers contain all of the stuff that I describe as clutter; I’ve gotten better at not leaving clutter out in the open.

So, my conclusion is that the three days’ focus for Wednesday through Friday is going to be working on that stack of storage buckets so that I have more openness in my bedroom. Heck, maybe I’ll even do a few core exercises along the way if the principle of being more motivated to do other things while I work on a principle project continues to hold true. Turn on the music, Self, you’ve got three days of hard work ahead of you. Rock on.

Three Days’ Focus

Nothing like Orwell’s "Two Minutes Hate"

I called a friend of mine last night. He’s a visual artist. He’s got a sweet set-up in Lawrence, a little one bedroom apartment where he can produce, enjoy, and discover creative works. I wanted to ask him how he manages to focus on projects, get things done.

Somehow, though, it seems that the simple fact of calling him and thinking it out loud gave me an idea… well, that, and I went for a slow country drive. I took some Oreos with me. In any case, I called him because he seemed to be a person who could relate to my intentions. You see, there’re all sorts of projects that I want to do, poems that I want to write, songs, arrangements, physical conditioning, audio recordings, blogging, language learning. I feel like my problem is motivational and focus-related.

It’s like, once I get into a project, I can while away the hours and get a lot done, having a lot of fun and feeling in the zone. Yet, I tend to waste time just staring around the house trying to make up my mind what I’m going to do.

So, here’s what I came up with. I’m going to focus on one project at a time. It’s going to be an intense 3-day focus of each project. If I get it done, great; if I don’t, that’s ok, too.

I’ve arrived at this idea because I’ve noticed that I got a lot more done when I have something demanding on which to focus. When I was reading a book recently, I felt that all that I wanted to do was to finish the book. It seemed that I could focus super hardcore for a couple of days. I’d like to build up my focus ability, though. So, I think that three days of focus presents a good challenge. Here goes. First project: physical conditioning. Working on the core muscles for the next three days. Game on. 365 days in a year, so 121 projects to complete. If I do 121 projects, it should be a helluva year.

Do we grieve as we should? Two stories that make me wonder...

Riding on a bus headed for Niagara Falls, having only dozed for maybe two hours from Junction City to Kansas City (MO), and having just enjoyed a delicious breakfast sandwich made by two men speaking that sonorous KCMO Black accent, I decided to listen to some music. But, the bus's Wi-Fi wasn't keeping up with Pandora, so I picked Tracy Lawrence and soon realized that I was in the mood for country ballads. What has followed so far was the rest of Tracy's ballads from his Greatest Hits, then "Straight Tequila Nights" by John Anderson, and now I'm on Blackhawk. When I got to Tracy's "Texas Tornado," I started to tear up... I began thinking of something that I had in the past, something that wasn't really right for me (which I had known for most of the duration) but that I still missed parts of. I remember that, when that relationship ended, or, more specifically, morphed (how often does a relationship truly "end?"), I was upset and hurt, and had some moisture in my eyes... ********************************** In the early 1980s, years before I was born, the maternal side of my family endured a catastrophic series of losses. In around two years, FOURTEEN of them died. Three of the four generations lost at least one member. My grandmother lost her husband to Parkinson's disease. My aunt and uncle lost two sons, one to drowning, one who had complications as an infant and died before his fourth month began. Around 20 years later, Grandma was driving her white Plymouth Breeze (she prefers red) to my cousin's basic training graduation. She doesn't remember how, but she must have fallen asleep. The crash broke a bone in almost every apendage. She survived, living to defy death again on her 80th birthday, four years later... but, she wasn't the same. She sat around all day, drugged up on varying degrees of pain killers, gaining so much weight that my mother began to insist that she pull herself up when someone proposed the taking of a picture... She, my mother, didn't want my youngest brother to remember his Grandma as an amorphous blob in an easy chair. In the Spring of 2009, my sister made up her mind to bring Grandma to live with her in Salina... To paraphrase, my sister said to my grandma, "You can go to free shows all the time, have your own house, and we'll even get you a cat!" Due to a combined effort from sister (40%), grandma (35%), and myself (25%), grandma has lost over 60 lbs. which on a woman of 5'1" is spectacular. We're hoping that she wins her war with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and hangs around for another 5-10 years. Her distinctive mannerisms have all returned, she does chores, and sure loves to chat. Once, I asked Grandma what in the world she was doing, what she was thinking about, all those years, 8 or 9, that she was just sitting in a chair... Of course, part of what she was doing was coping with pain, but she took me aback when she said, "I never really had a chance to grieve." "For Aunt Mary?" I asked, referring to her younger sister who died of a diabetes-related heart attack over 15 years ago. "Well, yes, but also for Daddy." (Grandma always forgets to which generation she's talking. She meant my grandfather.) She had struck me. "For GRANDPA?" I asked incredulously. "But that was in 1982!" "Well, I never really had a chance to mourn. Someone always needed me." "You held in all that pain for over 25 years?" Thirty years after the death of a grandfather he'll never know in this world, the grandson who bears his grandfather's first name as his middle, accented in a way that leads most people to pronounce it inappropriately upon first reading, a grandson who still signs everything with that big, loopy, capital "B.," rides on a bus to support his mother in the completion of her two-year certificate program in Spiritual Guidance. Perhaps, his reasons for holding in the sadness are steeped in latent bitterness, pride, and incredulousness, yet, still, he's been unable to completely move on. This sadness needs an outlet. I wonder... How often do we grieve as we should, mourning the losses in our life? How often do we let the sadness and hurt lie buried in our subconscious mind, hindering our emotional maturity? *************************** Dialogue from an episode of the TV show "Scrubs"... The surgeon's brother's wife left him, and the surgeon risks making his fiancè angry by taking his brother out for drinks. The brother asks what he's supposed to do, and Dr. Turk takes over: "Barkeep, I'm gonna need these two glasses, and that bottle of whisky. 'Scuse me, yes, my brother definitely needs to borrow your hat. And for the love of all that is holy! Will somebody please put on some country!"

How I Became a Man, Part 2: A Complimentary Coach

In part 2 of my series on men who taught me to be a man, I profile a coach who kept me on his teams for a good number of years.

As an athlete, there were physical reasons for my lagging-behindedness. To be honest, I never told my teammates about my eyes or my asthma unless they asked. I always fought to be the best that I could be. Athletically, though, there were just some things that I could not overcome.

When it came to baseball, I think that I loved practice more than I loved games. Shoot, at games, I knew that I wasn't a good hitter, but I sure didn't swing at pitches that weren't strikes! Looking back, it makes me smile to think that maybe I always batted 14th because of my high on-base percentage, the coach knowing that I would be a smart baserunner and would come in to score thanks to the hitters at the top of the order. But, digression aside, practice was action. It was playing catch, reps at the plate. When I got older, it meant batting cages, too. I've held back tears at times, thinking of how much I loved baseball, wishing that I were better at it, but practice was pure immersion in the sport(s) that I loved. There was a boy a year ahead of me in school whose dad always got me on his team. Here are the values that I learned from that:

My coach, one year, after giving awards to the great athletic performers of the team from the previous season, gave me special recognition. Perhaps, he doesn't recall saying it, but he said that I was the player with the most heart. He loved having me on his teams.

As a side note, it's weird to think back on how, in school, I was "the smart kid," but, somehow, my teammates in sports never teased me... and I was, in all honesty, one of the least-talented players on my team, regardless of sport. I don't know whether it was the coaches looking out for me or my teammates respecting my hustle, but it's an aspect of my childhood for which I am very grateful to my teammates, and it's worth mentioning.

This was one of those things that seemed small to me at the time: the awards show ended, my mom emphasized that he'd said that about me, and that was it. But, it stuck with me.

So, there was the compliment, but I remember him pitching to me at practice. I remember his smile and the way that he always seemed glad to see me. Here was this father of two, a man whose familial and financial lifestyle was nothing like the one that this little boy knew (he had wonderful grass in his back yard; one year we had our end-of-year picnic and played whiffle ball), a man with very strong shoulders and I a little boy with virtually no physical strength: we were different. But, he reached out to me in ceaseless, tireless acceptance and support.

Aren't the comments of those who rarely give us any time the ones that we hold so closely to our heart? I remember three such occasions in the case of my sire, baseball-wise. Once, I was throwing at a fence, and he said that I should use the strength in my legs. One season, when I was not on the team of the coach about whom I write today, I got to pitch, and he, my father, actually attended a game, and afterwards told me that I threw faster than he had; the third time was when he played catch with me and showed me the basics of throwing a curve. How much I cherished those brief moments! ... Yet, they were almost as nothing when compared to the body of work of my coach.

I love to think about the butterfly effect, how one seemingly small act begets so many others... The buttefly effect has always served an amazingly positive influence in my life. In the example of this coach, his simple act to always include me on his wonderful teams led to me meeting another couple who coached our team. Despite the fact that I couldn't hit a damn beach ball, the lady coach said that I had a beautiful, level swing, something that I worked very hard to develop: when I make mistakes, often it's from trying to follow directions too much to the letter. I had learned, from an early age, the value of swinging through the ball. Here, years later, was validation of my efforts!

Finally, a very important aspect of character to mention (in the realm of example-setting lessons that I learned) about this coach: he and his wife attended, literally, every athletic activity in which their boys took part; the missus kept score at all the games. That kind of support has really stuck with me, and it served as a strong counter-attack to my father's dismissal of my endeavors as less important than his own desires. This couple's children grew up genuine, stable, and respectful; even as a child, the older boy and I sat having a conversation where we discovered common ground - by our peers, we were held to ridiculously high standards, he, as an athlete, and I, as a scholar; this supportive boy never showed me anything but friendship. I cannot help but make the assumption that this quality of character came to him largely from his marvelously supportive father.

How I Became a Man, Part 1: A Man with an Open-door, Open-Heart Policy

I recently tweeted (@MapNMusicMan) that I did not become a bad-ass all on my own. This series I'm beginning now profiles the powerful and/or subtly helpful influences of the men in my life who taught me how to be a man.

...One of the keys to a person being successful at her job of single-mothering is to understand her weaknesses and find ways to overcome them. My mother chose to overcome what she, deep down, probably knew was a flaw on her part - her insistence that I my father try to act like a dad – by annoyingly insisting that I get out of the house and do stuff… With some of these things, I think that it was harder to force me than others. She had a tough time getting me to go to school, a somewhat difficult time to get me to go to Boy Scout meetings (I don’t recall being difficult about camping trip departures, at least from a motivational standpoint), a little difficulty with church youth group. On the other hand, I think that I made it pretty easy for her to motivate me to go to soccer-baseball-basketball practice, but, in any case, I'm glad that she did. All of the men whom I met set some sort of good example for me or gave me some good idea of how I could find the path to success.

So, further ado to be left in the dust, here we go, starting off with the man through whose influence I am writing this blog in the first place.

Note: In order to protect privacy, I'm not going to use names.

My college communications instructor

Sometimes in life, I think that we run across people who, for some reason or other, we just want to sit and listen to them talk to us. I've been blessed to meet several such people. This gentleman's kindness has been so powerful for me. I say kindness because he gives me lots of advice; as I grow older, I believe more and more that advice freely given by others is a precious gift. When people take the time to give you advice, they often are people who deeply, truly care about you. How many people sit by and watch us fail, enjoying our pain?

A couple of the gems of sage-ness that he's shared (not direct quotes):

Make your job what you would do anyway; then, your work is just you being you, and it's not a job

What's your band going to offer that no one else has really done? Lyle Lovett uses Western swing to tell stories that have nothing to do with cowboy life. Living Colour is a band from Harlem that plays metal.

Sometimes, the best advice comes from a person not telling you what to do, but helping you to avoid making mistakes:

On my idea to make textbook audio books:
I think that you'll find that creative path fraught with difficulties for which you're not yet ready. Your time would be better spent focusing on something more basic.(Paraphrased)

I have stopped by his office numerous times just to talk, or to vent, or to throw out some random creative idea that I have. He always listens to me, encourages me. Every time that I apply for a job, I call him up and read him my cover letter, and he always finds something to make my cover letter slightly better and more professional-sounding.

He never tells me what I want to hear unless he thinks that I will have a chance to succeed. Sometimes, he's talking to me, and I just sit there, trying to be cool and hold back a smile, but I just love listening to him.

If he reads this, I hope that he knows that I don't know how stable I'd be, or if I'd have even been able to choose the few mildly-committal directions that I've chosen.