Finding Fruit

To fill the hour, that is happiness; to fill the hour, and leave no crevice for a repentance or an approval.” –Experience, Ralph Waldo Emerson

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No-Key Suare

I really do not mean to beat this subject to death, but it is on my mind. In the absence of both my guru and my most trusted confidante (mind you, neither of these people suspect the real way I feel about their opinions), I have nobody but everybody with access to the internet to confess those things I feel the most need to confess. Here I am going to take the opportunity to mention that the bad taste from adding yet more poor-to-mediocre writing to the already bloated world wide web has gotten worse in my own mouth lately, but here I am adding more by the moment and feeling little to no guilt. For shame.

There we have Bradley filling his hour by strumming a twelve string guitar. I ought to record it straight into the mac-top and put it here for you, but you’ll have to imagine something like Sandy Bull crossed with Roy Montgomery on a snowy evening in our living room (you understand that it isn’t snowing in our living room, right?).

And here you have me, still wondering what I have to lose.

See, when making music, there really isn’t anything to lose. I do what I want and what I feel because the act of making music is for nothing other than to fill my hour with something that brings me joy and peace and sometimes relief and other times pride, among other pleasant emotions. If I end up with a well recorded track that stirs pleasant emotions in others, too, well that’s even more pleasant, isn’t it? It isn’t going to hurt anybody else, surely it can’t.

But I’ve got this idea in my head, and it is such a big idea and there is so much to lose, I feel. And I don’t like to feel as though there is something to lose that isn’t worth risking, except my life, except my life, except my life. I just mean that there isn’t any real risk in writing a song, or making a meal, or writing a blog entry, or keeping a journal, or drawing a picture, or spending a weekend crocheting little hexagons that I will probably never turn into an afghan (yes, I did this recently). A few hours, a few dollars, all worth it for the privilege of filling an Emersonian hour or two.

I’m trying to convince myself that there really isn’t much difference between a few dollars and a few hundred thousand dollars, a few hours and a few years. If I go into this thing, I’ve got to make myself believe that it is worth trying even if I fail miserably.

“Go out on a limb; it’s where all the fruit is,” said Aunt Sophia with a smile. I want to believe she’s right, as frightened as I am of heights.