Bohemian rhapsody
Yesterday at AJ’s baseball game, one of the dads came up to all the moms on the bench and said, “Happy Mother’s Day Eve to all you mothas out there.” We laughed and someone said, “well, when you say it like that, I’m not so sure about the message…” I kind of feel the same way about this post. Maybe it’s a thank you. But maybe it’s not the message I meant. So let me assure you that my heart was in the right place.
As long as I can remember, I wanted to be making music. Dancing, singing, playing assorted instruments, my mom put up with it all. She attended many excruciating school concerts. She drove me to (and paid for) many lessons. And she was nothing but encouraging when I went off to college and graduated with a distinctly non-lucrative music major. Music has not made me rich, but it has made me happy.
Sometime last year, not long after I first started trying to teach myself to play guitar, I decided to try to learn to play “Blackbird.” I wrote about the process here.
And now, for my mom, here’s a status update. Like any good song, it will always be a work in progress. It took me a year to be able to sing and play at the same time and another couple of months to recalibrate the fingers to a capo on the third fret. I’m not fast and I only have access to a guitar every other week.
It has occured to me that maybe after all those years of music lessons, what my mom really wants for Mother’s Day is some blissful silence. But that’s not what she trained me for. Sorry, mom. Hope you find some peace and quiet somewhere else.
Happy Mother’s Day!
I love it!
I remember being able to play only the first few bars of Blackbird. Never did manage to figure out how to sing to it at the same time, much less play and sing the whole thing. What a great Mother’s Day present, for you AND your mama!