Susan
The Amazing Adventures
of Sara Corel
A novel by Toomey
Telling Stories
Maybe
Maybe I'm coming to terms with
what's burning inside of me right now. Something I've been
approaching for a while but hesitating to accept. I realize I've
been afraid to confront the full ramifications of this thing that
gnaws at me. It's time to face up to it, though.
Here I am, past fifty,
supposedly sliding into some sort of inevitable decline, the major
issues of my life having been decided a long time ago. Yet in just
the past year or so, I've had to start my life over again in so
many ways perhaps the least of which involves my recent
divorce.
There's the matter of a whole
new musical instrument, the doublebass one that's not so easy,
physically, mentally or musically. It's made a profound difference
in how I interact with my life-long career, going in another
direction, changing my outlook and perceptions and (incidentally)
causing a great deal of pain my left arm is so swollen by the
sudden unaccustomed strain from the beast that it won't even fit
in my tux anymore, and my fingertips are numb most of the time.
I'm suddenly playing it so much that I don't have time to recover
or adjust, and that's causing me some concern. I know a doctor
would tell me to stop playing for a few weeks advice that
might be an option for doctors, but not musicians.
Then there's the website
assembly a diversion, then a hobby, now almost a full-time job
in itself. I used to enjoy this sort of thing once. Imagine a
decidedly non-technoid geezer at my advanced years having to learn
all this geek stuff. It's almost like waking up one day on an
alien world. It's become something of a nightmare, with deadlines,
strident customers, new challenges to overcome daily, constant
pressure. Hey, I'm a musician irresponsibility is a job
qualification. Budgeting time resources is Hell, especially when
there's just not enough of them.
The recording studio is at
least related to my original career. Like a lot of musicians, it
can seem to a casual observer that the only reason I went pro is
so that I can justify buying a lot of neat gear. But the things
I'm dealing with now are so cutting edge that they don't even work
yet. Someday soon, I've got to assemble a new computer that is so
powerful and advanced that it won't be obsolete for months. Then,
I have to use all this crap to make recordings that last year
were only possible in a major studio. There's a lot more to it
than punching a button and counting off, "And a-one and a-two
"
Just to make sure I have
enough to do, I'm working out every day (gotta shed those 75
pounds I gained married to a cook for eight years) and have a
twenty-something-year-old girlfriend (well, we're 'just friends',
though that seems to involve a lot of time doing things on
those rare occasions when we both happen to not be working). Oh,
and email. Lots of email. Didn't I complain once about not getting
enough email? Huh
But
There's something else. And
right now, it's the only thing that really matters to me. It's
come to matter so much that I resent having to do all the other
stuff, as interesting and challenging as it might be. I'd chuck
the whole lot and wall myself in my little room and devote all of
my waking hours to its pursuit, if I could figure out a way to get
away with it.
It has to do with telling
stories.
Not necessarily any particular
story, though I'm involved with a certain one these days that I
want to see to completion. To some extent, it's the process of the
craftsmanship involved the technique, the elements, the
language. More importantly, though, it's the act of telling a
story itself.
This is what I feel. It's
something I've known for a very long time but have been unable to
articulate. There's a lot of fear in having a dream, you know,
involving the apprehension that it may be unattainable that
there's no way to beat the odds, that I'll never be good enough.
And I know I haven't been good enough through many years of trying
and failing to get what I've wanted to tell out of me.
I realize that I might still
not be good enough, by the traditional ways of measuring whatever
success is as a storyteller. I do think that I'm approaching being
as good as I can be, though, and that's going to have to be good
enough to make the usual validation that comes with commercial
acceptance irrelevant. I have no illusions about my chances of
being able to ever support myself as an author penning the obscure
weirdness with which I seem to be smitten.
There I've said it.
Author. Yes that's what it amounts to. I want to be known and
accepted as an author. Maybe an obscure one, forever condemned to
marginal acceptance in a miniscule niche, maybe always having to
haul my equipment from gig to gig, singing for my supper so that I
can scurry back to my little room somewhere and pound out another
chapter of frustration and visions.
There have certainly been
plenty of starving artists in the world. I guess I don't mind
becoming another one. You never know how the sweeping changes
we're facing will affect marketability, or how public whim can
catch some obscurity unawares and magnify its significance far out
of proportion for a brief moment. I could get lucky but that
would be a first for me
It doesn't matter. I know that
I must be a storyteller. Nothing else will do. I've denied it with
all my consciousness for all of my life knowing that I was
only putting off the inevitable. So I've got a lot of catching up
to do. Somehow, I need to get a lifetime of dreams into other
peoples' heads, dreams that need to be shared because that is
what I was always meant to do
Dream dreams and tell
stories.
God help me.
© Patrick Hill, 2000 |