New Year’s Eve reflection tweet thread:

1/ I think a lot of people (notably ME) fall prey to the “I will try ‘x’ but will ONLY do it once if I’m not immediately good at it,” syndrome.

2/ This has been discussed a lot before as an ailment that affects kids who are gifted on one axis or another — they get so much encouragement for the thing they’re good at they’re like, “Why the hell would I bother to learn this thing that’s hard and is kicking my butt.”

3/ I was semi-decent at the saxophone in grade school (obviously not a prodigy by any means) but didn’t put in practice time and mid-year I lost first-chair. I gave up the sax and it was lost; I actively missed it for 36 years after.

4/ It was a defining moment. I actively avoided all sports because I was younger and littler than the kids in my grade & they all practiced with their dads or friends. I avoided dancing because I wasn’t good at it, I didn’t learn because I didn’t want to look stupid learning.

5/ This cycle went on for years and years. Finally six years ago some friends of mine started rock climbing, and dragged me along. No teams. No mean kids. Nobody particularly watching me fail. I loved it.

6/ This got me to thinking, way back to that beautiful silver-on-gold saxophone I had in the sixth grade. I missed it so much. But, wait...wasn’t I an adult? Couldn’t I...buy a saxophone, with human dollars? The thought was honestly shocking.

7/ So I went to Union Music and got a decent sax. And that day I hired a teacher who is a real honest-to-gosh professional jazz saxophonist. Every week since, barring just a few hiccups (cough *covid*), he’s taught me how to make music.

8/ Am I any good? No, not particularly. Do I practice? Some, not enough to ever be a pro. Is it ok that I’ll never be that great at it?

Yes. Yes, it is ok. I can just do it for the fun of learning. And hopefully I’ll keep adding things to the list of “you’ll never be the anywhere near the best at this, but that’s fine."

-fin-