Must Be the Season of the Witch, again

I mean that in the most positive possible sense.

It is just that so many changes are in the air, some I can identify, and some I only sense. When things change with my friends, they influence my life. That is new, and I'm all for it. Often that leaves a space for me to fill which somehow serves a good purpose for them. When the status quo gets shaken, it is always accompanied by a tinge of fear of the unknown, even if excitement over leaving a negative aspect behind is there too.

I'm soon to become an official card carrying Californian, which is no real big deal, but it has connotations. West is where I am now, and with both feet. No more keeping one toe in TN, just in case. At my age many people think nothing is new and they are able to glide on, resting on the fruits of there continual efforts and such of the past. My life did not work out that way.

I'm beginning to wonder if it really was possible for it to have been secure and solid and filled with an abundance of offspring as I had hoped. Turning point after turning point keeps appearing in the path. The relief is that more and more I can worry about things in other people's lives instead of just hanging in my own vacuum. One thing I have plenty of is "me time". Some people crave that. Be careful what you wish for. At least set some conditions or you might find yourself in solitary confinement.

If I were to try to tell my own future, I guess I would have to be vague and say there may be a bit of travel involved, and government work is unlikely.

How It Feels to Play

Now I remember the only reason I ever started playing with bands, or at all. It was purely an effort to release something that I have never been able to release, or express. It comes and goes, that unquantifiable thing. I guess it is some sort of inner scream wanting to affirm existence. Crazy.

Most likely that is one scream that will never be heard.

When it doesn't matter, it seems to go away rather than burn.

I used to feel like I'd just explode into bloody bits if I couldn't let that scream out.

Playing was usually a physical thing, tied more to how it felt than how it sounded, although if I am not in the right key or those I'm playing with are out of tune, even one string, I can't do it.

Given that I was never able to spontaneously combust, there were moments when it was almost like an out of body experience in which I was hearing what I played as if I was standing or floating outside of myself. The playing would just happen as I rode some wave completely independent of the mechanics of making the sounds. That hasn't happened in awhile. I know the missing ingredient which seems to enable floating through the air on the melody but it is not something you can buy.

Either it comes to you or not.

That state of being I described is always what is being chased, and the hope of experiencing it, and hopefully with an audience of millions, is the main reason I bother. I honestly do not understand it, but that's how it feels.

I think I'll shut up for awhile.