Keep your hobbies, and they’ll keep you sane.

Ambition. It’s not so different from inspiration, which I find myself culminating less of lately. At least creatively, and on my own time. I have all the means I need to make any variety of music at this point. 4 channel mixer, AKAI MPC and keyboard controller, loop pedal, wah pedal, a library of cords, blah blah. The list goes on. However, most of my time is still spent in front of an X-Box, or more specifically put, an expensive black Netflix machine. I won’t call it writer’s block, because I’m not trying to write anything. But maybe that’s the problem.

Back in the day, writing was my thing. All throughout grade school and high school I was renowned firstly for my last name (and my brother’s writing niche before me) but later for what I’ve been told are just the attributes of a good writer. I’ll take that for what it’s worth, but I started with cringeworthy attempts. My first writing project was an illegible ten-year-old’s account of medieval happenings in the place of several fiefdoms. Quite nerdy. The cover was drawn in green RoseArt crayon. I filled a spiral notebook with what I called a “book,” and I think I finally trashed the yellowed notebook a few years back.

When I got bored of writing, I took up what I figured would evolve into animation. Basically, I made all of these comics; I’d fold a piece of printer paper in half four times, and then I’d get 16 panels per page for comics. I’d show them around, detailing the accounts most Maryville Middle Schoolers would relate to, and eventually people were asking me when I’d have more. I’d make about one each day. Later on, when I too grew bored of comics, I made them 8 panels per page, eventually stopped coloring them, and then progressed in laziness until I stopped making them.

Bored of comics at about 13 years old, I took the household guitar into my room. I’d be lying if I said I played it much. I had no idea what I was doing. The strings hurt my fingers, and made them taste like pennies when I would always bite my fingernails. Unfortunately, this did not curb my biting habit, but I digress.

On my 15th birthday, I bought my first electric guitar from a pawn shop in Omaha, Nebraska. Spending all of the crisp bills I’d normally tuck away in a post office box turned safe I kept on my dresser, I was ecstatic about my investment. In the years to come I would be given my dad’s songbooks; stacks of Bob Dylan, Jim Croce, the Eagles, and Van Morrison. This was the start of my ambition in just another hobby in my childhood trail of interest. This one however, stuck. For awhile.

I’m not sure what happened, or if anything did really. For awhile, I was becoming somewhat of a travelling folk guitar jukebox, and then later on with songs I’d learned from tablature. Could damn near play half of Modest Mouse’s songs at one point. Song covers bored me, and eventually I started playing for me. I wouldn’t say I’ve given up on any of these three endeavors, but finding the ambition to keep on trucking is something difficult for me to do in such a convenient world. I fizzled out on my “book” because I realized it was ridiculous, hard to read and follow. The comics were cool; I had made 30 of them into a collection book which I printed for all of my family members interested at the time. After that, I started a new series that I never showed around, later growing bored of it so I quit. With guitar though, I’m making something that I want other people to experience. With that, I think I’m interested to see where just another hobby of mine ends up.