You're a lot more creative than...

Lots of notable and quotable things here on creativity.  I want to re-watch it myself to write things down but here it is for you all.

Keith Richards Part 2

I've just finished reading Keith Richards' "Life".  It's like saying goodbye to a friend I've never met.  Here are some more quotes.

Pg. 468 On songwriting with Mick  "We always come up with something when we're together.  There's an electric spark between us.  There always has been.  That's what we look forward to and that's what helps turn folks on."

Pg. 491  "The grind is never the stage performance.  Once we're up there doing it, it's sheer fun and joy."

Pg. 491   "The only way I can sustain the impetus over the long tours we do is by feeding off the energy that we get back from an audience. That's my fuel."

Pg. 491, 491    "All I've got is this burning energy, especially when I've got a guitar in my hands.  I get an incredible raging glee when they get out their seats.  Yeah, come on, let it go.  Give me some energy and I'll give back double.  It's almost like some enormous dynamo or generator.  It's indescribable....If the place was empty I wouldn't be able to do it...It's like sitting on top of a rocket."

Pg. 522  "Aside from poaching, which I haven't done since then, I lead a gentleman's life.  Listen to Mozart, read many, many books....I've always got some historical work on the go."

Pg. 546  "But I'm not here just to make records and money.  I'm here to say something and to touch other people, sometimes in a cry of desperation. "Do you know this feeling?" "

Pinocchio

This is a quick entry.  I've just finished a 9 month twelve step program that pretty much leaves no stone un-turned as far as forms of denial go, how I've been hurt, whom I've hurt, how to fix what I can, and how to live and think in more healthy ways.  In many senses I don't know yet what, if anything, has changed in me.  One thing that seems to have, is me being more open and honest (or are those the same?).  It's come out unintentionally in some large artworks I've done for my church this year. Really uncanny for me how many people in the last months have been magnetically drawn to these over-sized pictures I've poured my soul into and have come to tell me so.  I even got a card in the mail yesterday thanking me for the current display.   I don't know what it is.  It's as if the art now has a soul.  Like Pinocchio becoming a real boy.

An unexpected reward for willingly trudging through this 12 step program though it seemed to almost kill me at times. (It's called Freedom Sessions, by the way) Still not sure how to deal with all the responses but I'm starting with thank you's.

Keith Richards

As part of my rock star reading I'm plowing through a 500 plus word autobiography of Keith Richards called "Life" which has no boring parts.  Happy to discover another famous British musician who knows how to write.  Lots of interesting stuff in there but I'll focus on some quotes for this post.

About songwriting:

    pg. 240 "These crucial wonderful riffs that just came, I don't know where from.  I'm blessed with them and I can never get to the bottom of them."
    pg. 277   "So what makes you want to write songs? In a way you want to stretch yourself into other people's heads.  You want to plant yourself there, or at least get a resonance, where other people become a bigger instrument than the one you're playing.  It becomes almost an obsession to touch other people..."
    pg. 309  "Great songs write themselves...you're just the conveyor."
    pg. 310  "When I first knew I could do it, I wondered if I could do another one.  Then I found they were rolling off my fingers like pearls.  I never had any difficulty writing songs.  It was a sheer pleasure.  And a wonderful gift that I didn't know I had.  It amazes me."

About playing and recording:

   pg. 243  "It's what you leave out that counts."
   pg. 244   "Rhythm really only has to be suggested."
   pg. 306   "With a great band you only really need a little sparkle of an idea, and before the evening's over it will be a beautiful thing,"
   pg. 241   "The big discovery late in 1968 or early 1969 was when I started playing the open five-string tuning.  It transformed my life."
   pg. 244    "Five strings cleared out the clutter."
   pg. 315    "For me there is no such thing as time when I'm into recording.  Time changes."

Nordic

Recently I've developed a craving for things Nordic and Viking. Odd after so many years.  I was born on the coast of a Scandinavian country, lived there for a few years and went back often in summers into my teens. Didn't much appeal to me at the time.  So many hours driving through trees or seemingly passing the same scene over and over of yellow flowered fields and blue lakes with little else in between.  I think I was tainted too by the isolation my transplanted mother felt in those early years.  Apparently, though, my little kid self at least outwardly fit in pretty well back then. I was even tri-lingual for a while.

Lately I've been looking up a lot of old Scandinavian craftsmanship on the internet.  Especially silver jewelry and wood carvings.  And a friend got me listening to Icelandic minimalist composer Olafur Arnald and the group Sigor Ros.  I'm hooked.  Something has changed in my brain and associations and it's appealing now. Beautiful.  A part of my history that I'm ok with and more now.

It's expanding my creativity.  These weeks I'm working on a textured wall art project with a bit of a house theme and the details are all emerging with a Nordic twist.  I hope to take some photos of that for another blog entry.

By the way, the sweater above was handmade for my dad 50 years ago. It lives in my closet now.  Nothing like scratchy wool and pewter to bring back Scandinavia.  

Sir Ken Robinson - Escape Death Valley

The delightfully British, witty and inspiring teacher of education with a 2013 Ted Talks talk.  I especially liked his comment about the arts reaching a part of children's being that other disciplines can't.  

Our Father

My 3 D rendering of The Lord's Prayer.  I decided to confine myself to materials I had on hand instead of buying things and I used string instead of glue to attach pieces.  Felt more tangible, honest and gentle this way.  Rice crackers for Daily Bread, which became unintentionally more like communion than dinner.  Things like this hint strongly that art has a mind of its own and just humors me with my participation.  

Jack Turpin

Attended another workshop at an art supply store.  Featured was JACK TURPIN, retired teacher of high school English, P.E. and art, whose workshop subject was art journals.  I was open-mouthed from beginning to end of two lightening quick hours.

He brought in 10 or so journals, talked and showed us pages.  Mesmerizingly detailed pen and ink drawings, some in blue or brown.  Some he'd added just one, at most two watercolors to.  Often he'd written threads of stories in exquisite calligraphy that wrapped around his drawings.  Interspersed were glued in paper mementos at catchy angles: brochures, labels, programs etc.  He said that for the past 12 years or so he'd had two "characters" floating through these journals, cut out as stencils and appearing in various creative forms. Some of his writings were about these characters' interactions with whatever artistic inspirations he was illustrating and the travels he was documenting. The one character's name I remember was Nat O'graphy, taken from an old National Geography cover he'd found and cut out.

I looked up Jack's webpage, JackTurpin.ca.  Very professional and appealing. A lot of his paintings are featured and a number of the drawings from his journals.  What I really liked was reading on his blog about how he paints 3 hours a week with a fellow painter and friend.  For my current season of mostly artistic aloneness this sounds vastly appealing.  Brings up my same old theme and pipe dream of wanting to live in a musicians/artists community where all sorts of creativity synergizes and interesting conversations flow freely and extensively.  

Tillers Folly

    Recently a certain young fiddler I know took part in a summer concert and I, the driver, came along. We headed to a peaceful, tree lined field that sloped down to a fold out stage-in-a-truck. People trickled in leisurely with camp chairs and blankets.  The fiddlers did their thing under the diffused orange glow of a late setting sun.  Surprisingly varied tunes and fiddle styles, even for the youngest students.

    All this to say that the fiddlers were the opening act for a three piece group called Tillers Folly.  New to me.  Blue grassish/folk/country style which doesn't cross my path a whole lot.  In general I don't get to attend a lot of concerts.  Even fewer outdoor ones.  This one, thankfully, turned out to be a winner.  The lead singer's voice reminded me of Christopher Cross for some reason and I didn't expect such pretty melodies and intricate instrumentals.  The mandolin player was also fiddler.

    Soon the lounging crowd relaxed into a soothed, timeless trance.  It was soul medicine.  Soul salve.  I let the songs wash over me, carrying off the day and whatever had muddied up my spirit lately.  Another part of my consciousness said to myself, "This is what I want to do as long as I'm on the planet and beyond if I may." Let music flow into a collective stream and over whoever will receive it.  A solace and echo of sacrament in our fragile days.

 

Color Blind

As I ponder whether to register and actually pay for art courses I'm sampling free demos at the local art supply store this month. Two days ago I attended one by a recently retired tax accountant who has been an established painter since the 70's.  Not only did I appreciate hearing that many of his accounting clients had been artists but was also intrigued when this painter said he was red green color blind.  Apparently this has made him mix unusual greens which many buyers said made his art more interesting.  Even if his wife has to tell him occasionally that his colors have gone very off, he says for him painting is mainly about form and color values, ie. light, medium, and dark. In his opinion the specific colors themselves are almost irrelevant and completely interchangeable.  Wow!  Revolutionary thought for me who is so color sensitive. Have to ponder this for a while.

Boredom

One of my kids had to write a paper entitled:  "China - Friend or Foe?"  Talk about vague, if not unspecific.  Apart from relief that I didn't have to write this paper, I am inspired by the concept and will call this post "Boredom - Friend or Foe?".

Growing up I was told that "The (my family name) children are never bored". Truly untrue if it had to be said.  As ammunition again this vice, my mother often referred to the fictitious "boy in the hospital".  He and he alone was allowed to be bored.  Actually we never heard what became of him, even fictitiously. I still wonder.

Anyway, boredom, growing up, was equated with ingratitude and overall lack of character.  There was a strong implication that bored kids were shameful, spoiled brats. Sigh.  Doomed from the start.

In truth, I have often been bored.  Yes.  Not even just mildly. Yawningly, cavernously, soul-gnawingly, voraciously and so on.  Bored with tired vocabulary, bored with lecturers on auto pilot, bored with people who never try anything new.  Bored with bland food,  bored with song arrangements, bored with routines, bored even with...gasp...reading instructions and spending so much of my life being responsible, reliable and practical.  Not that I am considering a criminal lifestyle, in case my mother is reading this.

Boredom, for the most part, has been a powerful and even useful force in my life.  It has motivated me to take courses, read books, and jump headlong into new social groups.  Boredom has driven me to learn instruments, take things apart to make new things (sometimes successfully), talk to strangers, ask questions and squeeze the last drop of humor out of or into situations that would otherwise be, well, boring.  A tremendous asset, I'd say...again for the most part.  Maybe sometime I'll write another post on the cons of boredom. If I'm still interested.

Piano Practice

I just thought I'd write a bit about how I practice the piano, in case this is useful to anyone.
Just for context, most of my performance playing is without written out music, just with chords in a particular key and improvised along with a band. To keep myself in musical shape between performances and when I'm not getting ready for particular songs, here's what I do:

I sit at the piano about 5 times a week and play even if it's just for 5 minutes.  Frequency is important.  I start with just one exercise from the Hanon exercise book which most piano students meet in their first couple years of lessons. It's like eating your greens.  Might as well get it over with since it's good for you even if it's not very interesting.  I do this with a metronome.  The metronome keeps my ears and fingers used to following a certain tempo and being steady, just like when I'm playing with other musicians.

Next I pick one key for the day to do scales. (Over several weeks I make sure I get through every key or at least the harder ones so I'm ok playing in any key if I have to.)  I play the major scale in that key with a metronome but pick a different tempo or speed from what I used for the Hanon exercise for variety and more ear/finger training.  If I have more time I play it as a minor scale and/or as a blues scale, which I've started adding to my practice in the last couple years.  Sometimes I'll play solid, then broken chords in that key or do arpeggios in the same key.  Now and then I'll do a chromatic scale starting and ending on the first note of the key I'm in.

Finally, and again if I have the time, I'll set the metronome to yet another tempo and do some piano doodling or improvising in the key of my scale for the day.  I don't try to be very fancy or tricky. I just relax and fool around in that key.  Sometimes I'll come up with some interesting things, mostly because I'm not trying to.

And that's it for my routine.  Not very complicated but so far it has served me well and has been manageable.

Illustrator Irina Vinnik

Check out this illustrator's work online. Fascinating drawings that I believe are digitally done but look like inked art.  I really like how she does some of them in earth tones like a Da Vinci drawing. The details and patterns are mesmerizing to me.  Below is one of her works.

Fiddling

Attended a fiddle concert at the music school where my youngest is finishing her 1st year of fiddle class, though it's her 5th all together of violin.  Amazing to me how much variety and "cross pollinating" there is within this genre, if that's even the correct term. There were pieces with South American rhythms, Ukrainian, Irish and early 20th century American styles.  Professional musicians/instructors from the school accompanied the students on double bass, drums and guitar.

I think the most inspirational to me was the adult fiddle class of four people. Two women, two men.  The youngest was probably in his fifties.  It was also their first year of fiddle lessons and they'd worked hard.  They seemed like an interesting group of people. One man around 60 was very tall and probably half native with thick gray hair down past his shoulders. With the fiddle in hand he looked like someone straight out of a western movie set.

It was highly impressive to me that these people were learning an instrument relatively late in life. When I complimented them later they said I should join them.  Tempting prospect, though honestly less for this instrument and more for prospective socializing with a new mix of people.  Guitar and/or cello appeal to me a lot more right now.

Lennon part 2

I'm further in my reading of the book Lennon Revealed by author Larry Kane.  This time what has caught my attention is from when John reunited with his wife Yoko. And to be frank about my ignorance, I had no idea until last week that she was an artist too.

Page 82 "John, free of the addiction that had tortured his life, was now high on the thing he did best - talking."    "...their reignited relationship was illuminated by the art of conversation."

The author also said here, " From my perspective, the most memorable and invigorating part of knowing John Lennon was engaging him in any kind of debate or verbal joust."

Caustic though John could be, it would have been interesting to listen in on some of these chats or better yet to be part of them.  "The art of conversation" is one of the most appealing and energizing to me in life, especially with other creative people.  Like extra, extra dark chocolate there's never too much....or even enough.

Lennon Revealed

I'm reading a book by this title.  The author is Larry Kane.  Again, I'm probably way behind most people in their knowledge about John Lennon (and most famous musicians of last century, though I'm catching up slowly).  So far what I've found especially interesting is reading about John's highly creative friend Stuart Sutcliffe, a very early band member, painter and immeasurable influence on John.

Page 46 says,"..it was Stuart who honed and sharpened John's instincts as an artist. And that led to even more development of both John's art and being."  "...He inspired and challenged John to become a better artist..."

Sadly, Stuart died in 1962 just before he turned 22 but friends said John never stopped talking about him for the rest of his life.  A story that is intriguing, poignant and not without its shadow sides.  I'm curious to research Stuart now and see what kind of art he did.

Ellipses

Total? Lunar? Solar? Or.....punctuational???  Today I learned a new word.  "Ellipses." Webster defines this as marks or a mark showing omission, especially of letters or words.  I realized I've been using these....in an everyday fashion, like forks and knives, without knowing their real name.  Or their proper function. Hmmmmm......(space for thoughtful pause).  Slightly doubting my education now.  What else did I miss in English that is obvious to other people?  True, even simpler punctuation hasn't been my strong point. (And don't start me on spelling...)  I vaguely bluff my way through semi-colons, colons and even some comma uses.  I think learning and remembering these rules seems way too tedious for me in light of more important things like vocabulary and just getting something said. Very possibly it's also a subversive form of personal anarchy....

Near Kandern

I painted this from a photo I took during a 3 day high school reunion 2008 in southern Germany.  Maybe a bit idealized but it reminds me of many memories I have in common with classmates and how this fairy tale forested farmland corner of the world framed our years and experiences there.  It's been over 25 years since we graduated.  I still take dream trips back.

40 days

These are about 8 x 5 foot each, originally painted darker for the 40 days of Lent for a church sanctuary, then brightened up for Easter. Probably the biggest canvases I've done yet.  I've been pondering new 8 x 5 ' ideas so the analogue days for these pictures are numbered.  

Invisible

   Today I was thinking that writing a blog is like having an imaginary friend.  And why do people...ok, mostly kids...invent these anyway?  My first born was an only child for 8 plus years, and she had Junie, who was quiet but game for anything.  There were other friends she could see, but for a few years these weren't enough.

   Invisible friends are like instant coffee but much better.  They are good listeners. They are interested in everything we are. And they have unlimited attention spans. Kind of like...blogs...

   To wrap up the imaginary friends topic, below are two cartoons I've had on my fridge for years. They still make me laugh.

                             "Can Jennifer's imaginary friend come out and play?"

                     "At some point, the invisible friend thing spun out of control."

Rolling Stones Bob Dylan Special

    This week I've been reading the Rolling Stones magazine special edition on Bob Dylan (40 years of interviews) before I pass it on to an at least equally interested friend.  Realized today that my mother was born the same year as Bob.  Funny thing is, both my parents lived through the 60's, 70's, 80's...well, until now, without mentioning him or any popular artists of those decades to us kids.  Actually, there was one exception.  I remember our family driving in the Swiss Alps, listening to radio news when my Mother exclaimed in shock that Elvis Presley (whom I'd never heard of till then) had died.

     To me it's like there were other continents they never mentioned or the world being round but I had to find out 2 decades later than everyone else.  Baffling.  Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever catch up.

A Cure for Gravity

I found this book randomly at the library and am a third of the way through.  Not offering opinions on Joe Jackson's music because I haven't consciously heard it, but I'm searching for worthy adjectives for his writing.

The back of the book says,"Honest, funny, wise and inspiring; tells you more about music and the love of music than a shelf-full of textbooks." Still not adequate.

For me it's a feast for my funny bone and my word bone if I have one.

From my reading so far here are some quotes:

pg. 75 "This pub not only had a piano but..a 1902 Blechstein...which had lain dormant, like a volcano, for many years."

pg. 81 "My Mother was fixated on the idea that I should become a music teacher....I told her I'd rather be boiled in oil."

pg. 108  "...none of us could cook.  Jude tried; she battled tragically with the kitchen."

pg. 114  "The Big Time..was a place where you might become more, rather than less, vulnerable."

pg. 114, 115  "Music was more than just a hobby and more than just a job.  I was in this for keeps, no matter how vulnerable I might feel..."

pg. 115 "Critics...one thing we cannot afford to let a critic be is a guiding light.  An artist who lets critics make his decisions for him is doomed."

Grunewald Guild

Grunewald is an Arts Guild in Washington state which hosts retreats and courses.  I just got to spend a few days there. The property has studios for pottery, weaving, glass arts, print arts and more.  Art is everywhere on campus.  Volunteers can help out on the property in exchange for taking classes.  Permanent staff fill multiple roles and guest artisans and teachers join them from time to time.  

Above is the buffet counter in the communal dining area with a thickly textured plaster wall.  Below is facing the kitchen and self serve hot beverage area.  Each post was painted.  Behind the closest post is a small coffee table with a mosaic top.  Dining tables were covered in colorful fabrics and guests picked one of a kind cloth serviettes for their meals.  Many cups and bowls had been made on site in the pottery studio. Meals were hearty, earthy and delicious.

Below is the central meeting area surrounded by shelves full of art books and created things.  Lofts above either side were piled with over sized cushions. The guild's core value is hospitality and is modeled after the Benedictine monastic order.  For group sessions candles covered most surfaces and the wood stove burned in the evenings.

A view over the dormant garden to the library building in the trees. Nice bit of architectural salvage in the fence.

The back wall of the central building with more architectural salvage from an old church and pottery chimes hanging over the back porch on long cords.

 The guild library with stained glass windows.  One wall of books was devoted to spirituality.  A medium sized section held fiction and the rest was overflowing with books on creativity and art.

A very large painting in the stairwell of the building where I stayed.  Interesting dripped paint effect.

                              These stained glass windows were in bathrooms/restrooms.

      A large window in the central lounge/meeting area, sometimes obscured by a power point screen when art images were being shown.

The people we met on staff and at the retreat were as varied as the artwork everywhere, as were their philosophies of life.  An inspiring but also mentally and spiritually challenging stay.

Ron Findley: Guerrila Gardener

                   Ron says gardening is his graffiti and his art.   His inner city gardens transform the lives of neighbors on multiple levels.  "Food is the problem and the solution."  "If kids plant kale, they eat kale."

Outdoor painting experiment

           So, I thought I'd try painting outdoors like people in books or movies about artists.  Had 5 canvases to fill for a children's classroom.  The nice thing about being outside was catching some rare late February sunshine and not worrying about dripping paint.  Less appealing was discovering how many bugs like wet paint.  Especially black for some reason.  Camouflage?

Gallery class

     My youngest and I checked out a free family art class at a local gallery this past weekend.  A staff person told kids and parents about a few famous landscape artists, showing digital images of their work.  Then she walked us through this gallery's current display with its regional mountain/wilderness theme.  Finally we got to make a 3 D project as family teams or individually, using cardboard boxes, pre-made cardboard "mountains", masking tape, scissors and paints.
    This is mine.  It has 4 small pink mountains with snow-caps and a cascading stream that is sunk lower than the box top.  I liked adding pieces of cardboard with the smooth top ripped off to show the corrugation.  (See blog entry called Triptych for another corrugated project)  Fun to have to create something in about an hour.

Advent Painting 2012

           

                                 

                             
                        An Advent painting I did for this past year.  About 8 x 5 feet.  The idea emerged on an unpremeditated sketch as if it was waiting for me to start drawing so it could appear.  I was really pleased with the multiple layers of events and meaning that entered this picture and am still seeing new things in it.  One person came up to me after it was hung and asked me if I intended the meaning they saw in it.  Yes, I said! One out of comment-less crowds.  But it meant a lot and reminded me how important it is to tell other artists what I appreciate about their work.

Winter Trees

                         A couple pictures I did for a foyer for this past December.  Painting still doesn't flow as easily as sketching for me.  It felt awkward "drawing" on such a big scale with a brush instead of my humble but favorite tool, a black ball point pen.  

Mark Applebaum: Mad Scientist of Music

Mark starts by asking: Is it Music?  Through his witty, far fetched  and provocative presentation he brings the audience to the fact that the question for him instead has to be: Is it interesting?  He challenges listeners to reconsider the fundamental questions they ask about their discipline and where it might cross over to other realms.

Supporting Role

    This morning I'm thinking about people who support artists.  My husband is one of them.  He's not artistic  and has very little interest in creative things.  He won't be found reading books called "Imagine" or listening to pod casts about people who make things.  He does, however, value and enable those who are artists, especially in his immediate family.

   For my many music practices and events he has always been open to releasing me to do what I love the most.  When I've covered the dining table and kitchen island  in paints, fabric or pieces of plants or if I'm hammering nails into walls for decorative experiments he is blissfully tolerant.  When it's drama season for daughter number one he patiently works later to be there for her practice pick ups and attends as many performances as he can, even of the same show.

   To be honest there are times I envy artists who are married to creative people.  Just this weekend I sang with a music team that included 3 other couples who do music together.  But though I feel creatively alone at home,  I'm starting to think that maybe there's purpose. That maybe these are the circumstances I've needed to develop my artistic backbone and my own creative identity.  And without these circumstances maybe I wouldn't have gone as far to collaborate with other creative people who enrich my artistic world and my life.

   

The Power of Introverts

A Ted Talk for Introverts, Extroverts and Ambiverts.  Susan Cain, bookworm and introvert, explores how the 20th century redefined and redirected introverts in the classroom, workplace and N. American society, and what introverts really have to offer the world.

to quote Shakespeare

   I just finished an entertaining and informative book by Bill Bryson called Shakespeare, which wittily explored "centuries of mysteries, half-truths and downright lies about Shakespeare.."  Bryson writes that ," It is because we have so much of Shakespeare's work that we can appreciate how little we know of him as a person."

   What especially interested me was that William S. invented a lot of words and phrases, many of which we still use today.  Some first words found in his writings are: antipathy, critical, frugal, dwindle, extract, horrid, vast, hereditary, excellent, eventful, lonely, well-read, zany, and, says Bryson, countless others, including countless.

    His particular gift was creating memorable phrases which entered the common language.  Among them:
one fell swoop, vanish into thin air, bag and baggage, be in a pickle, budge an inch, cold comfort, to thine own self be true, salad days, flesh and blood, blinking idiot, with bated breath, pomp and circumstance, forgone conclusion, and many others.

    The end of the book describes anti-Shakespeare "experts" who claimed that Shakespeare was actually not himself.  I was amused by Bryson's debunking commentaries, saying of one that he proved Shakespeare's actual and other identity "to his own satisfaction" and of a countess believed by some to be the great bard "all that's missing to connect her to Shakespeare is anything to connect her to Shakespeare."

 

Djembe Blues

    The shorter the rest of my life gets, the less I hesitate to try new things.  What can I lose?  Face?  Hmm..sometimes.  Mostly privately if it happens.  I do know that I have to keep trying new stuff.

     Before I tell you about a recent attempt that bombed, I'll start with successes.   I played bongos for a small music event for the first time in November. It was ok enough.  I acted like this was normal and went for it. Then I played drums for the first time in public for another small music event with a forgiving audience.  Not terrible.  Kept mostly in time and even threw in a few fills.  My dignity remained in tact.

    The fail happened when I asked my daughter's group fiddle teacher if I could try the djembe as class accompaniment.  She already has a guitarist.  No problem, she said.  I told her, and she the guitarist, that I was pretty new to this and the damage was done.  The guitarist was openly skeptical even before I began.  He and his daughter, a fiddler, looked at me during the class and exchanged glances.  Afterwards I asked the teacher and guitarist for feedback.  No issues, said the teacher.  So I wasn't annoying or overtly bad.  Then to the guitarist with his highly doubtful expression.  "You won't be able to keep up later with the faster songs and complex rhythms..blah, blah, blah....".  His vote sunk me.  The fiddle teacher later agreed with me later that he'd decided against me before I began because he's a "professional" and knew I was not.

   I was miffed.  I recovered.  I pondered how to recycle this into something useful and non toxic.  What did I learn, I asked myself?

   1.  Don't dismiss newbies without an objective chance. Even two or three.

   2.  Perfectionists can be jerks for their own art.  Keep your standard but be kind. Try flexibility.

   3.  Don't lie but try to find at least one encouraging thing to say to a newbie about their effort. 

Creative Houses from Reclaimed Stuff

    Here's another Ted Talks video, this time by Texan recycling builder Dan Phillips.  I found his repurposing  surprisingly appealing and his philosophy "smartly" conveyed.