Beatbox Brilliance

Beatbox brilliance: Tom Thum at TEDxSydney

I'd never heard of a beat box until a week or so ago and now, after watching several videos featuring them, I'm putting it on my wish list.  As well as that other device he used near the end where he recorded snatches of notes and beats and single words individually and then, using something like a keyboard, made a song out of them.

The beatbox, as Tom Thum plays, it sounds like a whole orchestra held in the hand.  Of course, I'm most interested in making it sound like a drum symphony.

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Sunday Serenity #394: Drums for Worship

Stikyard Percussion

Well this settles it.

If what my mother said when I was eleven and choosing my band instrument was ever true, it's not now.

'You can't play hymns with drums.' was her reason for nixing my first (second, third, forth, fifth...) choice for a band instrument to spend the next six years with.

I only made it three years with the clarinet I settled on that day.

I have never lost my love of drums tho I've never actually played a real one.  But I've always tapped or thumped on everything in sight with my hands, fingers, feet or items I was holding.

Playing a real drum set was the second item on the Bucket List series I began last October.

Watching videos like this one intensifies my desire to hit big covered bowls and tubes with sticks.  But I never quite imagined playing drums like this:

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Sam Burns: The Little Drummer Boy with the Big Happy

Sam Burns a 17 year old with Progeria, a snare drummer for his highschool marching band gave this TED talk last fall on the theme of his life philosophy and the huge premium he put on happiness.

I watched this over and over.  Can't get enough of it.  One of his big aspirations was to contribute in such a way as to change the world.  As I watched I was holding that hope for him as well.  Then while preparing this post, I happened to glance down at the comments on the YouTube page and saw that he'd passed away in January.

Well I expect that between all the lives that he touched during the exemplary life that he lived, this video that's gone viral and the HBO documentary about his life that aired last October he has triggered change in enough people that the cumulative ripple effect can't help but change the world.

I know I was changed by my encounter with him in this video.

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Sunday Serenity #392

This is not only relaxing and trance inducing, it feels like it's reorganizing my brain.

While listening to trance drums, something ineffable is happening to the emotional charge of my memories.  I'm able to experience the memory along with the emotion while not getting sucked in.  Owning it instead of being owned by it.

Also I'm switching back and forth between the sadness charged memories and the happiness charged ones at will so that the joyful memories of Merlin's life with us now carry equal weight with the grief of his loss--if not more.

This is remarkable as I've always experienced the 'negatively' charged emotions like sadness, anger, despair and fear as having more substance than the 'positively' charged ones like love, joy and peace.  My sense (belief?) while in the grip of the 'negative' emotions has been that they were the true reality while the 'positive' ones were illusions, flukes--something that was going to pop like a soap bubble at any second.

Thus just by being conscious of happiness or peace I'd automatically be probing for the feelings of anxiety and sadness, knowing they had to be nipping at my heels.  And while suffering through the anxiety, bitterness and despair, they'd feel endless and the chance of happiness or contentment returning felt random and unlikely.

Now I know, from my reading on the neurology of emotion, that both of those stances are illusions.  Whether the positive or negative emotions get the upperhand has to do with how you tended to focus on them when the neurological pathways were being laid down in infancy and toddlerhood and whether or not you learned how to manage those connections, with appropriate coping skills, as you got older.  If one was emphasized over the other there are more connections and cross connections for them and thus more triggers--memories, odors, sounds, touch sensations, thoughts--that just take you there instantly and seemingly against your will.

But that too is illusion.  This is essentially a habit (an autopilot algorithm of neurological, physiological, and behavioral activities) and habits can be changed.  Not easily but it is doable.

Thus, I had it right about the positive emotions being temporary.  But wrong to think them less real.  And I had it wrong about the negative emotions being unending.  Truth is all emotion is fickle and fleeting.  So the true stance to take with all of them is:

This too will pass.

But that doesn't mean we have to deny ourselves the enjoyment of the positive emotions when they are in the ascendancy.  In fact the enjoyment of them is a form of gratitude which is also a positively charged emotion.  By enjoying them we also focus on them which increases the neurological connections, making it easier for them to keep or retake the upperhand.  Reinforcement is aggregate.

We can also increase those connections by probing for the memories charged by them, choosing to look for things to appreciate, choosing to willingly give of your time, effort, talent or money for the good of another, choosing to focus on the love that exists in our relationships with family, friends, partners, self and Divinty,  choosing to look for the potential for good in even the moments, past and present, charged by the negative emotions, and seeking out experiences guaranteed to produce positively charged emotions.

Experiences like fellowship (aka hanging out) with friends and family, listening to uplifting music, watching funny videos or comedic or uplifting movies/TV, reading uplifting stories or spiritual writings, meditate, walk in nature, sports activities or creative activities you enjoy, give and receive hugs, hold a sleeping baby, play with a kitten or puppy...

Do not mistake the use of the words 'positive' and 'negative' for the emotion categories as synonyms for 'good' and 'evil'.  All emotions are neutral in that regard.  It isn't the emotion that has moral or ethical weight it is the behavior of the individual while under the influence of the emotion.

Nor should one think that by calling them 'negative' the emotions of anger, sadness, and fear should be eliminated, disallowed, repressed or otherwise denied.  These emotions, like physical pain, have a valuable role as signals that something needs focused attention and action right now.  Too often we focus on the emotion itself  and not on what triggered it or what needs to be done about it.

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Rhythm and Muse

Drumming on a Bubble

I just discovered the power of rhythm as a problem solving muse.  Pardon the lengthy preamble but the context is important to this story.

Monday I had to hastily move stuff around on the desks to make room for something unexpected and I've been working around the mess I made ever since because I was behind on so many tasks including posts, email, and sleep.

All that is still true but I couldn't stand it one moment longer. So when I was having trouble staying awake when sitting still, I decided to get active and get that mess cleaned up.  Besides there were a few tweaks I had been planning to do on my workstation for several weeks and now would be a good time to do them too.

Nothing major.  No furniture or big box shifting. Items ranged in size from nail clippers and crochet hooks to inboxes and all sizes of books and notebooks. The biggest was the printer.  The idea is to get more of the items I use regularly (or should) within arms reach while sitting in the chair which includes the maybe 3x4 foot floor space I can roll around in.

Soon after beginning I uncovered my drumsticks which are one of my favorite desk toys.  They had been outta sight outta mind for at least a couple weeks after rolling under the edge of a book crate on my desk.

When I hit a conundrum in a complex series of moves--moving A out of its space to make room for B and C into B's vacated space to get them out from behind blocking P and switch around F, G and H which were accessible to the wrong hand where they were but that move made the intended spot for A too small...conundrum.

My usual thing when this happens is to sit down and scan the area playing a 3D game of Sokaban in my head.  But I didn't dare sit for fear I'd doze off and be late getting Mom's lunch.

I spotted my drumsticks and picked them up and started tapping them on every surface that looked to make an interesting sound.  I favor the baritone and bass sounds and was having little luck in finding any until I started tapping on the exercise ball and the mini-tramp surface under it.

And then I was lost in Rhythm World for over fifteen minutes.  Seriously lost.  Zoned.  Merlin snapped me out of it by pricking my calf with a single claw.  Reminding me it was past time for lunch.

I was about to lecture myself for getting off track when my eyes lit on the A object and I immediately saw it would fit in the crate holding D which could be moved 'upstairs' to the crate recently vacated by the returned library books.

I don't think it was simple coincidence that I'd found the solution while lost in Rhythm World.  Reinforcing that belief is the fact that while I was drumming on the bubble my inner vision was producing image after image--still and moving--suffused with emotion.  Some were attached to childhood memories and others to the three decades of adult memories but mixed in with them were images and scenes from my various storyworlds.

All of these images were carried on the surface of bubbles and they all started playing their own riff on Sokuban tho much less rigid.  Imagine Sokuban played with bubbles by the bubbles in a volume of mutable space where they bounce off all surfaces including each other and merge and break apart and cluster...

Yeah.  My favorite screen saver is Bubbles and I spend a lot of time each day watching it so that metaphor was easy tho no less true.

The conundrum solving did not stop with the desktop Sokuban game.  Several of my story world conundrums were also finding solutions or hints at solutions. And possibly a few of my personal world problems. There is something magical about the way rhythm seems to organize the usual chaos of thought and emotion.

I think I will be doing a lot of bubble drumming going forward.

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Sunday Serenity #360

Kanade Sato age 9

Last Sunday I began a My Bucket List series for Sunday Serenity.   Today and going forward I will keep the linked list of the preceding ones at the bottom of the post.

My Bucket List

#2 Play on a real drum set

It took me awhile to figure out exactly how to define the item for the list.  I finally settled on what  you see heading this.  But a one time event would not be enough.  I actually dream of owning my own drum set.  But I won't be living anywhere with room to set one up and a soundproof room or enough space between me and neighbors that wouldn't matter so initially it would be awesome just to get to play on someone else's under whatever circumstance.

Playing on an electronic set with headphones would be an acceptable substitute for playing until we do have room for a set.  But it would not be the fulfillment of this bucket list item.  I use the term 'play' loosely as I'm self 'taught' with a pair of drumsticks on practice pad and whatever surface or object that looks like it'll make an interesting sound.

I think I would also like to take lessons.  Preferably with someone who can talk about what it is like to play on stage and travel with a band.  Because my WIP, Orbiting Jupiter, is stalled until I can figure out how to fill in those gaps in my knowledge.  Watching YouTube vids and reading text can take me only so far.

I've wanted to play drums ever since I was the age of Kanade Sato in the vid above or even longer.  When it came time to choose my band instrument at age 11 just before entering 6th grade my first choice was drums.  but the band teacher said, 'Girls don't play drums.'  and my Mom said, 'You can't play hymns on drums.'  And so my choice was nixed.

My desire for the drums was so strong it was as tho it filled the top ten slots of my choice list and I only selected another one under pressure.  The one I liked most was the flute but while experimenting with the instruments lined up on the stage under the teacher's and my parent's supervision, I could  not get the flute to make a musical sound.  The best I could get out of it was the sound you get blowing across a bottle top--wind with a slight whistle.  So they suggested I try something else.  I finally settled on the clarinet but the three years I was stuck with it were torturous.  I absolutely detested the sensation of the vibrating reed on my lips.

Ah well.  I digress.  This was supposed to be all about the happy created by contemplating the long desired To Do Someday item.

My Bucket List

#1 Hot Air Balloon Ride

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Sunday Serenity #250 Drums & Read-a-Thons

Nothing like drums to keep you awake and turning the pages to the beat. Oh and these drums! Sublime.

Drats but I had this draft prepped and meant to add a line or two regarding the thons and post it in the final hours of Dewey's thon as a wake up and hang in there offering.  ah well

Dewey's has been over for an hour and a half already and i'm still awake.  Maybe i should pick up the next book and keep reading for Wonderfully Wicked until the next nap attack hits.  when it does I won't fight it and will probably sleep 12hrs so I may not get the sleep out of my eyes in time this evening to do anymore reading for WW.

UPDATE 9PM That's a wrap for WW.  I managed another thirty minutes this morning after Dewey thon and another hour or so this evening.  All those minutes scattered across more titles than I care to list here.  Part of it was in prepping library books to go back and browsing in the unfinished ones with no little regret..  My main accomplishment for both thons was to finish Breaking Dawn begun as WW started and finished as Dewey ended.

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Sunday Serenity #175

Drums, mesmerizing color in motion. Watch in full screen!!

I finished Stephen King's Under the Dome this evening. Plan to spend the night watching episodes of Bones Season 1. Can't get them all watched before 9am unless i were to speed them up but who wants to listen to listen to David Boreanaz and Emily Deschanel sounding like the Chipmonks.

So I guess I do the best I can and get back in the double digit queue for another turn in about four months.

So what is the best I can expect without speeding up the videos?

I'm 8 episodes in out of 22. I've got 12 to go and 9 hrs. They are probably 43 or so minutes per episode. So that's 43x12 divided by 60 = 8.72 or 8 hours 40 some minutes. Hmm so there is a chance if I don't take more than a cumulative 20 minutes to switch discs and get snacks etc.

So possibly it's doable. Unless of course Ed has to leave here before 9am which he won't know until morning.

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Why Do I Go To Extremes

I thought to put up another quick Billy Joel vid for today so I could get back to work on my River Why project for Book Drum and when I saw the title for this one I thought 'perfect' to go with the comment/plaint 'why do I always push a deadline over the cliff?'

Then I watched the video and noticed the drum action and thought 'cool, I can mention that and say I'll have to look into who drummed for Billy Joel. But not now. Next week after my Book Drum and bookmark deadlines are past.'

Then I noticed this video in the related:



So now I know who Billy Joel's drummer was. And that he gives lessons and that there is one lesson related to the drum action in 'I Go To Extremes' that can be downloaded. A 43 minute lesson. Sure, and i bet it's $50 right? But no. It's only $4.99. That I might be able to swing in the near future.

Meanwhile a whole slew of Liberty Divitto vids showed up in Related. I started to add them to a quicklist so I could send them to my Drums playlist for later perusal but I reminded myself that this was something that could wait, that I had all the info I needed to return and harvest them later. But I couldn't resist watching a couple more:









See what I mean about going to extremes? Two vids would have been plenty and I might have been back to work on River Why half an hour ago. Sigh. This next week is going to fly by with me feeling like I'm falling out of the sky the whole time.

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Drumming Books

You must have noticed I seem to be stuck on the drum theme this past week. I'm not appologizing and I may not be backing off anytime soon. It's fun. It's feeding my muse. And it's research for my WIP.

My focus on drumming must be drawing drum related stuff my way because even when I'm not looking I'm finding things on and off line to do with drums or peripherally thematic. Like the email waiting for me this morning from the editor of Book Drum.

I confess I rubbed my eyes a few times and did a few 'am I dreaming?' checks that was so weird. I'd been thinking of putting out a request via my blog and/or twitter and/or facebook for suggestions on where to look for good info on all things drums--history, genres, how-to, jargon, who's who, ethnic practices around the world, but I hadn't yet. I thought briefly that someone stumbling onto my blog saw my interest and was offering info or maybe spamming me. But when I opened the email what I found was even better than unsolicited (except through the urgent exuberance of my psyche's obsession) info about drumming.

It was an invite to participate in a new book site based on a concept I've been interested in ever since I read Gordon R. Dickson's The Final Encyclopedia in the eighties. Of course this isn't anywhere near that ultimate in hyperlinked, multi-media info repository featured in that novel but it's pretty cool none-the-less.

The concept is to create a book profile, a multi-media companion to a book. There are six sections: Bookmarks - Review - Setting - Glossary - Author - Summary. Summary is a complete though brief overview and needs to be objective while Review can have a personal bias. Author contains bio info and interviews and such. Setting is for maps and photos of landscapes and cityscapes and info on the places and time where the story takes place. Glossary is a simple list of words and terms necessary for understanding the author's intent--this is the only section that is not multi-media. Bookmarks is a bit related to the concept of footnoting. This is where you can include materials that expands on anything (item, person, historical or cultural reference) in the story, including audio and visiual aids.

See what they did for The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.


So when I do the Bookmarks section for the book I signed up to do--The River Why by David James Duncan--I can include such things as: a video of someone fly fishing (hopefully on an Oregon river) photos of items likely to be used by a fly fisherman--tackle and waders and vests and hats festooned with hooks; photos of the scenic rivers in the story; info about author's quoted or alluded to within the story or in the chapter epigraphs and their possible relevance; info on Seventh Day Adventism, the religion the main character was raised in; photos and info on the flora and fauna encountered by the protagonist; audio of a song mentioned in the text. That's just a few examples.

I waffled back and forth as to whether I was going to sign up to participate. There is a deadline (January 31, 2010) and I have so much on my agenda between now and then what with the holidays and the visit to my Mom's in January. But this project is the ultimate in portable. I needed to re-read and thoroughly notate The River Why for my WIP (for a character whose encounter with the novel was transforming) and this was the perfect kick-in-the-pants. There is possible financial reward if my offering is awesome enough--as their debut onto the web they are having a tournament with a grand prize of 1000 British pounds. But even more intriguing to me is the possibility of a job interview which will be in the offing for anyone whose book profile during the tournament totally impresses them.

Besides, how could I turn away from anything with the words book and drum combined? Seriously? That would be a total snub to the Synchronicity involved in this email dropping into my inbox this morning.

What is really weird and almost unnerving in light of this is that this wasn't the first time this week that I've encountered the pairing of books and drums in a concept. Check out this video that came up in my drum searches. Be patient as the books don't appear until the last scene but it is so worth the wait. It's funny as well as intriguing and it stretches the concept of just what is music to an eye-popping wonderment.

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Music As Story

OK gotta stop goofing around on YouTube watching percussion vids. I need to put together some kind of post and get busy with the other things on my agenda for this session--the reading and writing I discussed in yesterday's post. I don't have all night this time as I'm not going to stay up until I'm a Popsicle again. I estimate it will get unbearable by 2AM and I intend to be snuggled in under covers by then--maybe by 1AM. I may still be able to read but can't count on it.

I went on YouTube looking for something related to the CD featuring the Wurzburger Percussions Ensemble with Siegfried Fink that I checked out of the library today. I'd especially hoped to find something about the first track on it which had been composed by a Rolf Liebermann originally for 156 office machines and then scored by Fink for percussion instruments. I find the concept of composing a percussion piece for 'instruments' not traditionally thought of as musical instruments facinating.

Sadly I failed to find anything directly related to this CD or that track. But my search terms led me to a whole new realm of drumming delight.

And while I was watching/listening I began to notice how the music seemed to be telling a story. I'm not sure if that's because the two pieces I embedded here that initiated that concept sound like they could be from movie or TV sound tracks (and the name John Cage, composer of the piece below, is associated in my mind for no conscious reason with sound tracks) or because there really is something to it. Are well composed musical pieces based on the same form that well composed stories are? The rise and fall of drama towards a cathartic climax?

It would make a certain sense, if so, that there would be structures used by the mind around which concepts accumulate and develop or enhance meaning. I already believe that story is primal and integral to our humanity and if so it must predate language itself and what better communicator (presuming a lack of lanuguage) than music?

I wonder if anyone has done any research, writing or musing on this concept anywhere.

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Sunday Serenity #156

moar funny pictures


moar funny pictures
Been goofing with my drum sticks. Tapping on everything in sight. Learning to hold them right and trying to learn to hold a beat for longer than ten seconds. It's not as easy done as said. The manual that came with my kit suggests a metronome so Ed found a freeware one online and downloaded it for me. Check it out here.

Have also been goofing on icanhascheezeburger.com. Captioned a bunch in the last few days. Check em out here.

Did some goofing around with Ed today too. We went out to eat at Carl Jr and then shopping for snack foods to munch while watching three more episodes of Gilmore Girls season six. I crocheted three more bookmarks during and just after that. Tonight he had to crash early as he as to be at work by 5AM but because of that he's expecting to get home early enough to take me to the library where more drumming books, DVD and CDs are waiting and to the post office to mail the five bookmarks to my read-a-thon mini-challenge winners (after taking me to store for the proper envelopes.)

I've been goofing away most of an entire week and goofing time is about over. Tomorrow work on my fiction WIP goes back on the daily agenda and along with it fiction reading, which I've been neglecting to the detriment of my writing. As a writer of fiction I must stop thinking of reading fiction as something I 'get' to do only after my 'work' is done and treat it as one of the duties in my 'job' description.

[ooops. i goofed when typing the title and didn't catch it before publishing. this is only my 156th Sunday Serenity]

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Sunday Serenity #154

Still got drumming on my mind. See last weeks post. Got a kick out of this vid of Jerry Lewis in a drum duel with Buddy Rich. Loved the huge eclectic collection of drums in Jerry's 'set'. It made me feel like:



But then the nasty harpies started messing with my head. "Whahahahaha. What female drummers besides babies banging pots and pans have you ever heard of?"

Well...



Harpies: "Oh yeah? but what about blind drummers? Bwararharharharhar."

What do ya know...



Harpies: But that's a kid. Who ever heard of an over fifty woman learning the drums? *Kackle*

Ummm...



Harpies: She wasn't over 50 when she started!!

Oh stuff it you ol shrews!!! I've got as much right to make noise as you do. Get outta my space less I start practicin' on your face!

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Sunday Serenity #153

What does joy, O Mag, B & N, Shakespeare, Dreams, Books, Drums and Gilmore Girls have to do with one another let alone with Sunday or Serenity?

Well Friday was my birthday and Ed was planning to take me out to dinner but got home late and wiped. Instead he brought home Subway sandwiches and the latest O Magazine to hit the stands. I'd mentioned the O Mag earlier that week when the Oprah show was about the making of the cover and the story behind it--the shenanigans Ellen pulled on her show last winter that inspired Oprah to invite her to share a cover with her and the photo shoot and the reveal of the cover. Ed had walked in while I was watching, shortly after the reveal and I was like 'Whoa, look, my name is on O!!! I want! I want!'

I was half being silly but only half. I collect things with my name on them. Not because--or at least not just because--it is my name. But because of the meaning of the word that is my name. I didn't start doing that until the mid nineties tho. Before that, for most of my life and especially through my whole school years, I hated my name exactly because of the association with the word and its meaning. It didn't help that I was constantly reminded by my parents that they'd named me Joy because my arrival had brought them such joy and I was supposed to be a joyful child and I'd been such a happy baby so what happened? Because from about age 4.5 on I was a moody and often morose child.

Ed was aware of all of this so his bringing home the O mag was a meaningful gesture to go with his apology and promise to do something special on Sunday instead. So today he took me out to Hometown Buffet for dinner but first we made a stop at Barnes & Noble so I could spend over an hour browsing and deciding how to spend the $40 gift card my niece (who was my secret Santa last year) had given me for Christmas just before I left town for six months to help out with my Mom's post-surgery care in Longview.



So today was both a belated birthday and belated Xmas celebration in a sense. And after nearly two hours of browsing and finding and considering over a dozen items on my serious wish list, I selected two books and--something else--but first the books:


Thinking Shakespeare byBarry Edelstein wasn't on my wish list by title but by topic--I needed something to give me insight and hard facts about what it means to act in and/or direct a Shakespeare play because of that story I'm planning to write that has Faye, Julia, Wilma, and Inny producing Macbeth with high school kids. Before I picked this one up, I'd looked at several of the Shakespeare books I keep checking out of the library and looked for several more that weren't there. Every one of them would have eaten at least 90% of the card and a couple would have gone over. I still seriously considered at least three of them but couldn't decide between them. Then Ed handed this one to me and I read the subtitle: A how-to guide for student actors, directors and anyone else who wants to feel more comfortable with the Bard.

That hooked me into opening at random where I read this advice: Shakespeare's characters thought in ten syllables. After I read the explanation surrounding that line, I knew I needed this book and I knew the library didn't have it because I've had out every Shakespeare book they have at least once and had never seen this one. Only then did I look at the price and see that I could have it and at least one other of the items I'd considered--one of the $30 something which meant either the Crochet Stitch Bible or the book with 200 braid patterns.

But on second thought, I still have the Crochet Stitch Bible checked out of the library and besides I knew I could get them both on Amazon cheaper if I waited so my thoughts went back to the first book I'd pointed at on our way into the store--the new Stephen King. I knew it would be months before we could get our turn at the library and I knew Ed was as eager as I for it. But on the other hand, I wouldn't get to read it until after Christmas anyway as I couldn't start it during NaNo and I really didn't want to carry 1000 page tome with me to Longview since I'd not likely be able to read much while there anyway.

While all this was going through my head, I was making my way back to the front section where we'd started. Alone because Ed had wandered off as soon as he handed that Shakespeare book to me. I had started to head back to the sewing and craft section but had just made a turn back towards the display tables where the bestsellers where and was about to make another sharp turn toward the bargain section where I'd spotted that encyclopedia of symbols and signs in dreams which I'd spent a good ten minutes looking at earlier, intrigued by its discussion of the language of image and musing about its relevance for a writer who might like to know the potential impact of certain images they're thinking of using in stories or poems. That was only $10 and Thinking Shakespeare was only $8 so I could have both and still have something else in the $20 something range.

But before I could get back to that spot I ran into Ed. Almost literally. I stopped short by about half an inch. He was looking for me and he had the something else plus a book. And he was telling me that if these three items went over the card limit he would cover the excess. The book was the latest Oprah Book Club selection, Say You're One of Them.

So tempting. It was on the list I had rattled off in the car on the way. I'd been wanting it since Oprah announced it a couple months ago and he had looked at all the places he had been shopping--Wal-Mart, Target, grocery stores--but it was never in stock when he happened to be looking. B&N is quite out of the way of his usual routes and he wouldn't have gone there without me. He had been promising me a visit 'soon' ever since I got back from Longview in June but it never worked out for both of us on the same day. So tempting.

But the Oprah Book Club web event had met over that book last week and my turn is coming any day for the library book. So I held my finger up, saying 'Maybe, but just a sec.' and darted (as best I could with a white cane in a semi-crowded store aisle) toward that dream symbol book to take another look at it. Ed followed and when he saw what I had returned to, he laid the novel in some random place and reached for the two books in my hands and said 'Let's go.' as he laid them on top of the box he was carrying:



It's a beginner's drum kit with the sticks and a practice pad, a book with lessons that start with how to hold the stick and include over 100 exercises that take you into advanced technique and a DVD with over 70 minutes of instruction. I'd pointed this out to him in the first ten minutes we were in the store. I hadn't really thought to include it in today's choices but for him to consider for Christmas maybe or just to be pointing it out because my long standing interest in learning the drums had just heated up again this past week as he and I reached the Gilmore Girls episode late in season two in which Rory's best friend Lane Kim finds her true passion and calling--drumming.

I'd first told Ed of my thwarted interest in learning the drums our Senior year in high school when we noticed we both had the annoying habit of tapping--he with his fingers and me with pencils and pens. I told him that my first choice for a band instrument as I entered sixth grade had been drums but it had been nixed by both the band teacher and my parents. The teacher said it wasn't a girl's instrument. My parents said it wasn't for hymn accompaniment. I ended up with the clarinet which I hated and dropped after two years.

I had been talking a lot in the last two years--ever since NaNo 2007 when I gave two of my major characters drumming as a skill and passion--that I really needed to learn how to play drums now if I were to make these character's ability on the drums believable. I don't know the jargon, or the feel of holding the sticks or how it feels when the sticks hit the drums surface. I don't even know the correct way of holding the sticks.

By bringing the box to me and offering to pay the extra so I could still have two books, Ed was essentially telling me it was time, that finding that kit at that price on this day was a sign and I'd be a fool to walk out of that store without that box because who knew if either of us could get back here before Christmas and it was so obviously a Christmas special they would not likely continue to stock beyond it.



He was right and I came home with them. As thrilled as I am that I'm about to embark on learning a skill I've dreamed about for forty years there is that part of me wondering what the world were you thinking? Your poor wrists are not going to thank you. In fact they just may curse you.




But then again, nobody is saying I have to get good at it. This is about playing with a couple of sticks and letting the rhythms penned up in my brain loose once in a while. And its about learning just enough that I can create a believable character who can be as expert, as genius at the drums as her story requires. And its about saying 'Yes!' to something that my intuition has been trying to tell me for most of my life is needed by my psyche and for some unfathomable reason is connected in my psyche with the concept of joy--and Joy.

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Sunday Serenity #132

Today is the day I've been waiting for. I should be home before dark today. After six long months it seems almost unreal to think that the next time I post will be from there.

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Drumming Dreams

Blue Man Group at the Grammys

The other day I was trying to describe The Blue Man Group and their unique music-making to my sister. I didn't have the words and found my own memories confused anyway. So that night, after she had gone to bed, I went to YouTube to look for videos to refresh my memory. And I got lost there for hours. And hours.

My memory had included their blue faces, their mime act, and intricate instruments made out of PVC pipes some of which stood solid on the stage and others wrapped around their bodies. I remembered all of that but I had forgotten that they were drummers!

No wonder I remembered them fondly though. Drumming is something that has always called to me.

I collected dozens of links to the videos I encountered. After the first half-dozen I realized that I had more than plenty for a demonstration for my sister--more than she would be willing to sit still for--but I couldn't stop.

Later the drumming, the pipes, the paint hijacked my dreams.

I was looking for a topic for tonight's post and remembered that night of Blue Man Group Dreaming. I thought I could put together a quick post from memory. Maybe I could have but I couldn't resist watching one first. And one led to another. And another. And next thing I knew three hours were gone.

I had also hoped to choose just one video for this post. Ha.

During that three hours, I realized that I could chock all these hours and the dozens of links up to research for the Maia character in my Spring Fever WIP--my NaNo novel from 2007. I don't know if I would necessarily make any mention of the Blue Man Group in the story. It is enough that watching these videos gives me a better sense of what goes into stage producing a sensational act. That is one of Maia's passions.

After hours of watching these guys, I have an incredible itch to pick up a pair of drumsticks and start drumming on every surface in sight.

Blue Man Group on Jay Leno

Blue Man Group wearing their PVC instruments on stage with Tiesto.

Blue Man Group demonstrating the workings of the eye.

Blue Man Group clowning

You might be most familiar with Blue Man Group from the Intel commercials:

The Keys
The Treadmill
The Paint

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