Fine, Thanks.

Tags

expression, happy enough, MMEA, small talk

I have a confession to make: I can’t stand small talk. It makes me profoundly uncomfortable.

I engaged in a lot of it today, as it was the first day of the annual conference of the Massachusetts Music Educators Association. I’ve been attending this conference for longer than most of my students have been alive – a fact that has recently demanded my acknowledgement although I know I shouldn’t be dwelling on such things. It is a three-day event packed with interesting workshops, vendors, and the best scholastic music groups in the state.

It is also second only to homecoming as an opportunity to see a great number of my college classmates, which I love. It’s really nice that, even as we scattered after graduation, we can always come back to All State to touch base each year.

But sometimes I’m just not up for the small talk. Today I was asked the same question dozens of times and never did come up with a satisfactory response:

“How are you?”

Well, that’s a rather complicated question.

I have a steady job making music with really great teens who make me laugh. I’ve been working there for my entire adult life and have built something that I’m really proud of. Big changes are starting to take root in my job, and I worry about them a lot.

I’m still living in the same place I was living the last time we saw each other, and while I don’t really love it there, my circumstances are unlikely to change in our current real estate market. It’s cozy, and it’s mine. There’s a dog there who makes me really happy.

No, I’m not seeing anyone right now. Actually, since the last time I saw you I fell deeply in love, got my heart broken, wallowed in it for a while, and gradually made my way back to something resembling normalcy.

I’m currently in good physical health, and I now have the perspective to appreciate it. I’m in good financial health too, although I probably worry about that more than I should.

I just got back from my latest trip to Europe. It was amazing – my trips usually are – and I have mixed feelings about being back.

I don’t have enough time in the day to pursue all the things that I want to pursue. There is an open book of Scarlatti sonatas gathering dust on my keyboard and a pile of books that I haven’t read. I’ve pretty much kicked the TV habit, and I’m really proud of that. I barely even watch shows on Hulu anymore. And I’m doing pretty well with the writing. Oh, yeah. I write now. It’s something I’ve always enjoyed but neglected for a long time, and it feels good to commit to some small degree of daily creative expression.

I have some really amazing friends, and I’ve made a commitment to seeing them regularly, which I am coming to recognize as a major component of a happy life. I have one friend who has been silently drifting away for a year now, and I miss her terribly. It’s really been bothering me lately, and I don’t know how to tell her.

Compared to when you met me, I am a lot less certain about … well … everything. I miss that absolute clarity of purpose that is typical of the young and naïve. It’s nice, though, to feel my perspective expanding – however uncomfortable that expansion may sometimes be.

Oh, and my socks keep slipping down around my heels, and I can’t wait to go home and take them off because they are driving me insane.

The thing is, when you run into a college classmate at a professional conference and they ask how you’re doing, you don’t launch into a narrative like this.  So my standard response is a peppy “Not too bad! Yourself?” We launch into a brief, cheerfully cursory discussion, occasionally peppered with a gripe or two about the weather. Once in a while, if time permits, we grab a meal together and let the conversation take its course. Truth does not reveal itself in small talk, but it often accompanies a meal.

I much prefer meal talk over small talk.

Writer’s Block #1

Tags

blog, expression, writing

This whole daily writing thing is sometimes really difficult.

I am a planner. A saver. I think a lot about preparation for an unknown future. I freeze casseroles and can summer vegetables. I have three retirement accounts.  In fact, the day I started this blog, my mind was racing with all sorts of great ideas for things to write about. It took considerable restraint to stop myself from sitting at my computer, typing away late into the night. It couldn’t hurt to have a stockpile of blog entries ready for posting. And as long as they were all original, there would be no harm in planning ahead, right?

Except doing so would actually be a huge violation of the (self-imposed) rules of Creative Exfoliation. Just as silky smooth heels will not appear after one extra-vigorous pumicing session, good writing needs to be practiced regularly. The whole idea was to discover how my life would change if I committed myself to a daily creative outlet.

Surprisingly, this daily habit has already been a catalyst for change in my life.

I have not slept especially well in the last thirty-six days. This is partly due to the fact that I find it difficult to carve out time for writing in the middle of my day. Even if my schedule were to permit it – which it almost never does – my brain does not switch over easily from productivity to creativity. Thus, my writing tends to happen at the end of a long day, when all of my other projects are done (or at least done for now.)

The interesting countereffect is that I feel more energized. More often than not, the act of writing activates a part of my brain that otherwise lies dormant. Like falling in love or drinking Red Bull, writing leaves me utterly disinterested in sleep.

The act of articulating, editing, and publishing my ideas and opinions has certainly been an eye-opening experience. I have to admit that I quite enjoy my little digital soapbox. I’ve noticed that when I write honestly and with conviction, people pay attention.

Sometimes a lot of people pay attention.

It’s a nice little reminder that my opinions matter.

It’s also a reminder that some of my opinions are best kept to myself.

I quite enjoy the writer’s lens on the world. I pay more attention to, well, everything, because inspiration can be found in a news report or the quiet thump of a dog’s tail. I’ve gained a greater appreciation for good writing and rediscovered a hunger for books that I haven’t felt for nearly twenty years. (I also find that I have even less patience for mediocre writing and have now lectured several of my classes on the importance of using words that mean something. So whether they’re aware of it or not, I’m not so sure my students are enjoying the effects of my blogging endeavor.)

Perhaps most of all, I take great satisfaction from the knowledge that I am regularly setting aside time for an enjoyable activity combined with a generous dose of self improvement. With all of the responsibilities that compete for my time and attention, I’m really glad that I have made the choice to prioritize this.

So on balance, the Creative Exfoliation experiment has been a force for good in my life.

But it’s kind of a pain in the ass on days like today, when I don’t know what to write about.

Boundaries

Tags

blog, boundaries, expression, Facebook, mindfulness, Twitter, writing

You’ve probably noticed a major subscription push from me in recent days.  Since Friday I have concluded every post with instructions on how to become a blog subscriber or how to follow me on Twitter. I’ve also been posting daily subscription reminders on Facebook.

Let me be perfectly up front about one thing: I love my subscribers. I get really excited when I receive a subscription notification. I’m really flattered when someone likes my writing enough to request an email notification when I write something. Any pretense otherwise would be disingenuous.

But that’s really not why I’m encouraging you to become a follower – although I thank you, followers, most sincerely for the validation. No, the subscription drive (which will end tomorrow, I promise) is part of a larger effort to compartmentalize my life.

Last week I looked at my Facebook wall and thought it looked … cluttered. My daily blog announcements dominated the page. Which means that, for some of my Facebook friends, my blog posts are cluttering up their news feeds.

I have a few Facebook friends who blog regularly. I have some others who use social media to promote their businesses. And I have a few who neither blog nor run businesses but who simply seem to enjoy beating the same drum over and over again. The end result is always the same: after seeing too much of the same thing on my news feed, I start to mentally tune them out. In extreme cases, I hover my cursor over their post and select “unsubscribe” from the dropdown menu that appears. That’s the kinder, gentler alternative to unfriending. (And it’s also a fascinating commentary on social interaction in the digital age. What does our friendship amount to if I elect to tune out every word you say?)

Well, I mean, not you.  Of course I wouldn’t unsubscribe from your updates.

So it’s important to me that I not bombard my Facebook friends, relatives, acquaintances, colleagues, and people I pretend to like with READ MY BLOG! READ IT AGAIN! READ IT NOW!  Far more polite, I think, to provide the option of notification to those who want it and just stop hassling the ones who don’t. So tomorrow will be the last day that I post my blog entries on Facebook. Unless I occasionally write a post that I believe to be particularly worthy of sharing.

But again, that’s not my only motivation.

A major area of focus for me is the achievement of balance. I am attempting to more clearly define the boundaries of my various identities. This is a struggle that almost anyone can relate to, but I believe it has become vastly more difficult in the digital age. Computers, tablets, and smart phones (all of which I adore, btw) facilitate the blurring of these boundaries. I can check my work email at home. I can tweet at the dinner table. I can answer student queries on Facebook. And I don’t feel that any of these capabilities are inherently bad.

But I do think it’s important that one know how to move gracefully between the many identities that define a person, and I find the only way to do that successfully is to keep them separate.

I’m still figuring out where the blog fits in. It’s something that I work at, but it’s at best indirectly related to my work. It is read by many of my friends, but it is not inherently social. It is a practice that, first and foremost, is meant to stimulate my creativity and build habits of mind that have been languishing. That’s too complex for Facebook.

So if you’re curious, here’s my working list of life boundaries (current as of 7:43 pm on January 25, 2012)

• Facebook is for socializing.
• Hotmail is for junk mail.
• Gmail is for personal matters.
• Phone calls are fair game, but there is a 60% chance on any given day that I will ignore your call. Sorry. That’s just how I roll.
• Professional conversations happen on my work email, which I may or may not check at home at 10:00 pm.
• No social media, personal phone calls, or mindless web surfing at work.
•  Twitter is for promoting my blog.
• Google+ is for … I don’t know.
• No TV in the bedroom. No electronics of any kind, when possible.
• No prayer or politics at school.
• Wine does not pair with artichokes. Ever.
• No dogs on the couch. Bed is okay.

Don’t worry, I’m not asking you to memorize any of this. It’s my life to balance, not yours. But I’m curious to know what you do to ensure that your various identities remain strong and vibrant.

By the way, I still sometimes mix up my darks with my whites. It’s all a work in progress, you see.

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iListen

Tags

expression, listening, music, teaching

I had the pleasure of attending a terrific concert today: the culminating performance of the 2012 Northeastern District Senior Festival. Our district festivals are a collaboration between the brightest musical talents of more than fifty high schools in our region.

While the entire concert was thoroughly enjoyable, the highlight for me was the orchestra’s performance of Berceuse and Finale from Igor Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. It is one of my favorite orchestral works. I know of no piece that more aptly illustrates terror, abject despair, and the eventual triumph of the human spirit.

By the way, I love to play this piece for my music history class. We listen to it in its entirety as the students sketch out a story to go along with what they hear. Then we compare their stories to look for common elements and talk about why certain sounds and timbres evoke specific emotions or images. Then I tell them the story of the Firebird Suite. Finally, we watch this scene from Fantasia 2000.

If you’re not familiar with the piece, go listen to it. I’ll wait here.

…

…

…

I know, right?!?

Imagine having the opportunity to listen to a technically brilliant, achingly expressive live performance. Imagine that you are in a beautiful theater with acoustics that perfectly highlight the work of the musicians on stage. Imagine that one of the performers that afternoon is your son or daughter.

Imagine that in the middle of the piece, your iPhone vibrates with a text message. What do you do?

If you are the man who sat three seats down from me, you take out your iPhone, read the text, put the phone away, take it out again, read the text again, check your iCal, read the text again, respond to the text, browse the web, show a page to your adolescent son sitting next to you, and fire off a few more text messages.

Throughout the slow building intensity of the finale his fingers flicked across the touch screen. When the bass drum let out a boom so intense it pounded in my chest, he did not so much as raise his eyes from his phone.

And when the piece was over he beamed and applauded enthusiastically. That’s when it hit me: he had absolutely no idea what he had just missed. If you were to ask him what he did today, he would most likely tell you that he listened to a great concert by his kid, of whom he is most likely very proud.

The thing is, he didn’t listen to this incredible performance. He heard it. There is a difference.

If our screaming advertisers, sound bites, and increasingly vitriolic circular political debates are any indication, we are a culture that is losing its ability to listen. This has ramifications far beyond our capacity to appreciate music. It affects our interpersonal relationships and our short term memory. With the whole world in our back pockets at all times, we are literally rewiring our brains.

Look, folks, I’m no luddite. I can barely keep my hands off my iPod Touch. Nor am I naïve enough to believe that everyone shares my appreciation for a good classical concert. Hell, even I will admit that it’s not necessarily at the top of my list of ways to spend a Saturday afternoon.

But I believe it’s important to be able to recognize when you are in the presence of once-in-a-lifetime profound beauty. The one hundred students who made up the festival orchestra will never play together again. But they spent three days peeling back the layers on a piece of music that challenged and illuminated them, and then they gave us the gift of listening to it.

I’d argue that moments like these define our humanity more so than do our gadgets.

1/8/12 Edit: My friend Joy just shared this blog post on Facebook … looks like the author and I are on the same wavelength this weekend!

Sail On, Silver Girl

Tags

creative efforts, expression, music, sadness, teaching

“I like living. I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, racked with sorrow, but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing.” ~ Agatha Christie

We as a culture are uncomfortable with sadness and uncertainty. Most of us lack the vocabulary to talk about these inconvenient feelings. We suspect that no one wants to hear about them, and that we are alone in our experience. When we can’t put a name to our inner turmoil we lash out senselessly.

I didn’t expect for this to be the recurring theme of my day, but it was. It began with my first period music history class as we started our cursory lesson on post-World War II serialism. Fresh from winter break my students, who had probably not seen 8:00 am in a week and a half, looked at me as if I had assaulted their tender ears. Once they were over their initial shock they began a conversation about how we turn to music to express the feelings we don’t know how to verbalize.

A few hours later my a cappella students ran into a proverbial brick wall when they couldn’t figure out how to take their performance of “Bridge Over Troubled Water” from accurate to artistic. When I asked them how the emotion changed at the outset of the final verse they fidgeted, avoided eye contact, and changed the subject. With some prodding they came to the conclusion that the song offers encouragement to someone who is sad.

I asked them to consider the power of bearing witness to human suffering and of the redemptive power of empathy. I asked them to consider the possibility that they could lift the spirits of their listeners even as they sing about sadness. I told them how the song touched the hearts of an entire generation. I wondered aloud of there is a song that touches the hearts of theirs. I await their answer still.

“This class makes me feel really depressed about the music of my generation,” said a student in my American Popular Music class recently. “Older generations had music to express what they were feeling. Music today is just about drinking and partying.”

I find this statement deeply troubling. What does it say about our culture when our exalted artistic heroes have nothing to say about our twenty first century human spirits?

Music is not just entertainment. It is the job of the artist to give voice to the stifled and silenced parts of ourselves.

Thank God there are a few artists out there who carry the torch quite masterfully. (By the way, here’s one from Hayley Reardon, a talented young artist who is wise beyond her years.) It’s a shame that they so rarely enjoy the perks of fame, because we need them now more than ever.

https://player.soundcloud.com/player.swf?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F32331810 NEW SONG – SCRIBBLES (rough home recording..) by Hayley Reardon