Of Life and Bad Metaphors

Last night when I was walking home from assisting a beginning taiko class, I felt something wet dripping down the side of my body. Lo and behold when I looked down, I realized that my water bottle had somehow opened up in my taiko bag, soaking everything inside, including bachi (which are somewhat water resistant if you catch it in time) and my cell phone and my metronome. Now, 24 hours later, the cell phone is barely turning on and not picking up any kind of signal. The metronome sounds awful when you turn it on--it sounds like what a metronome would sound like if you tortured it. I'm just glad because I was this close to bringing my new ipod along, which would have been in the bachi bag. Then I really would have been sad.

But really, when I got home, I just felt defeated. I felt like life was making a really bad metaphor at me by giving me a soaking. I mean, my metronome is broken, and my heart is broken. And my cell phone is all funky and can't talk to the rest of the world any more and neither do I. I feel like one of those cartoon characters who have their own personal rain cloud following them around. Everything just goes bad. I was even watching the football playoffs and choosing (at random, basically) teams to root for, and they all lost.

Anyhow. A couple of years ago, my office underwent a leadership change and things were all shifting around and people were getting cranky and upset because all the normal things were changing. Some people quit, and some people went a little crazy and then quit. I was kind of cranky too, because I like things to stay the way they are, but then I realized (for the first time in my life, really) that no matter what you do, you really can't stop things from changing, and that you sometimes just have to go with it. I also realized that when things change, you can totally use it as an opportunity to get new cool stuff. Ok, so yes, I had more work to do, but I was one of the first people in the office to get thier computer upgraded, and I ordered a bunch of cool pens and post-its and a chair that went up and down. And so do you know what I did today? I went and got myself this:


This baby not only keeps time, it plays different rhythms and allows you to create your own rhythms and it has a stopwatch and a backlight and a headphone jack and a bunch of other features I don't understand yet. I decided this morning that I will spend some time just trying to work on basics and rudiments and just developing technique. These are things that I would like to have in my arsenal, but don't necessarily have time to work on under the pressure of getting ready for a performance or whatnot. Don't tell anyone, but I'm actually thinking of composing a song--but that's just a nasty rumor and you didn't hear it from me. Uh-uh. I just need to work on getting me back in shape.

Pushing Through

Every day is hard. Let me tell you that much. Every day is hard, but the reason why we keep going on is because we have to. Or I have to anyway. A friend emailed me, a friend who lost her father, and she said that I had to just keep going on, or in her words, "keep taking my vitamins" and try to stay healthy, even if I had to force myself. So every morning, I eat my healthy breakfast and take my multivitamin and chew my 2 calcium caramel pills and eat my fiber-rich cereal and I run my 30 minutes a couple times a week because I have to. Another friend said that I didn't have to do anything. That there weren't any have-to's. Ok, she said this before I talked to my other friend about the vitamins. But I think they were both right (even though the anti-have-to friend is actually a doctor, a PhD in psycho-something-or-other). But really--they were both right.

I had a dream the other night that my teacher said, or exclaimed rather--even in dreams people can speak to me in exclamation points--she said "come back to class already!" And by class she meant taiko of course. But anyway, she said come back to class already(!) and I think I ought to. I mean, I did go back to class once, but it was downright painful. It wasn't an Aiko class, just regular class, and my exclaiming teacher wasn't the one teaching, and we were kind of struggling our way through one of the Aiko songs we played for the concert, but it just wasn't the same. I was kiaing in an effort to get my other classmates to kiai, because a kiai is such an essential part of a song. I wanted to create a kiai-contagion, but it wasn't catching on, and the spirit of the class just wasn't the same as with the Aiko group. It's depressing because there really isn't Aiko anymore. Not that there's anything wrong with the regular class, but it's just not the same.

But really, that's not why I'm depressed. Or maybe that's part of it.

I googled "taiko" and "grieving" and the hits that came back were either kind of campy in the touchy-feely way "writing" and "grief" will get you on google, or just not applicable. I don't know--you know sometimes people who are writers will try to make a few bucks by holding workshops in writing that will help you get through your grief or whatever it is that's holding you back by basically getting you to journal your way through the process. Oh my god--yawn! (Rolling of the eyes).

I guess why I didn't get any good hits was because maybe taiko and grief just don't go hand in hand like that. I mean my whole thing is that you don't play taiko without a kind of joy in you. You always have those gigs where you play taiko at weddings, but never at funerals. I was actually wondering about when I died, and I would want taiko at my funeral, but what song in the whole reparatoir (sp?) of all the taiko that I know in the whole world would I want played?

What happens when all the joy in you has left you and the only good thing you remember from that other life you had--the life before grief--was taiko. That's my happy thought--you know, like when Peter Pan (or Robin Williams in Hook, anyway) needed the happy thought to get his ass off the ground and soaring again--taiko is my happy thought, but it's not there anymore. Not in the same way. Aiko was always an experiment, an experiment with no guarantees going on beyond that one concert in November. I need to find a way to get beyond that.

Ugh. What would you do? If you're out there reading this, which I don't know that many people, or even just a few, are, then please tell me. What would you do? What keeps you going? How do you push through?

Starting Over

Happy 2006 all. I don't know where to begin. I guess I can begin by saying that I filled up my Moleskine notebook. I started it at the beginning of 2005 and I used up all the pages by the end of 2005. That's quite a feat if you ask me. I am the world's biggest sucker for notebooks, and have started way more notebooks than I have ever actually finished. Stationery stores are horrible places for me to go to because I know that I can't just walk out of there empty-handed. No. There will always be some sort of notebook I find that I think I can absolutlely not function without. I love paper and notebooks are like beautiful little paper museums.

I hadn't really meant for this notebook to document a particular year. I originally had started using it to make little sketches for future art projects. Then I decided I needed a notebook for Taiko Conference, and I grabbed it as I headed out the door for L.A. And then I figured since I had some taiko notes in there already that I would use it for making notes for the Aiko Taiko pieces we were learning. Then I started carrying it everywhere I went so I could practice the taiko pieces. Then when I felt the urge to write stuff down in a journal, this notebook was there, so what the heck, it's a journal too. And then it was a good place to stuff papers I didn't want to lose. The only problem now is that I'm really attached to this notebook, but it's full. I've never had this problem before.

But you know what? I've got to let it go. I'm going to start a new notebook. This is just like the other one, but it has more pages. And my new notebook was given to me by my mother. We lost Mom in early December, and that's why I haven't really blogged for a long time. And my heart is all broken, and I haven't really touched my bachi since the concert, and my shime is sitting in the same place I left it, no tension on it, silent. Like me. 2005 was the best and worst year all wrapped up into one.

Now it is time to start over. Have you heard Baaba Maal's album, Missing You? If not, go out and buy it. It is heartache and hope, and it is beautiful. Words fail me. Listen to that album. That is what I feel like. I miss her.

Today I saw my writing teacher. Did you know that I am a writer? Only, I am a writer who does not write, which means I am not a writer at all. If you're a writer, or you know writers, then you must know that they are very strict people, most notably, strict on themselves. And so self critical. Like if you don't write everyday, then you're not a writer at all. For writers, serious writers, writing is life, and you continually flog yourself into writing until you can produce a paragraph or a page or a chapter. That turns me off about writing. There is always the threat of failure. Maybe that's why I'm a writer that does not write. Anyhow, my teacher asked me if I was writing, and I told her no, not really, and that it had been a while, but that I was thinking of writing again. She was taken aback a little. She asked, have you regressed so far back that you are only thinking about writing? I told her that even thinking about writing was a feat in itself. I think she was disappointed. I think there is a book in me still; I told her this. We parted ways.

You know, the thing that I love about taiko is that there is no guilt in it for me. No self-inflicted flogging. When you write, it is always a struggle. You can't be satisfied until you produce pages of text, and even when you do, every word choice and character is something that should be critiqued and doubted. When and where is the joy? I'm sure there are writers out there who can argue with me. I don't care. I love the immediacy of taiko. You hit the drum and it responds to you. You feel its don. You rejoice in the ka's. And when you play with other people, it doesn't matter what language you speak or how old you are or where you come from, the thing is is that you're playing together and you're connected and the taiko community is so kind and supportive to one another. My approach to taiko is that don't bother playing at all unless you bring your joy to it. Don't play taiko unless it brings joy to you.

If there really is that book in me, it will come. I won't force it. Maybe I'll even scribble some notes for it in my new moleskine. On Monday, I think I'll go back to taiko. I've been away for a long time, but my hands remember. They play the desk and my lap without me telling them to. They remember ratamacues and pieces of all those solos I worked so hard on. My soul could use a big ol' don to rattle the bones. There is still joy in me somewhere.