Keep Your Hands Attached To Yourself

You have to really like who you are, even though there are so many other people you’d rather be. For example, I just got done watching a show about savants, and any one of those people seem like a pretty good choice. Most of them can’t even dress themselves, but they all seem to have a wicked talent for something. Besides, there are plenty of people out there who can dress themselves. That’s been done to death. I’ll take piano-playing, like that 10-year-old kid, or to be able to draw like that crazy fucker over there.

I consider myself kind of an instrumentalist, because I think “musician” is far too strong a word. I enjoy creating short pieces of music – sometimes for money, sometimes for the satisfaction of it. There’s a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction when you put something together that sounds good to you. Tempering this is the fact that being a musician or instrumentalist means that you, on a regular and fairly frequent basis, are reminded that you are a talentless hack, and should just do yourself and everyone else a favor and cut your own goddamn hands off right now, since you suck so bad.

Yesterday’s reminder comes courtesy of Andy Partridge of XTC. He wrote a short song of thanks for a fan named Wes Long, and mailed ‘ol Wes a CD, unannounced. Just cranked one out and sent it off in the mail. Since it’s just Andy pissing one out, “Song For Wes Long” clocks in at under a minute. Oh, and those 57 seconds of music he so happily just pissed out, make me look like a savant that never got any of the cool benefits.

Hear it.

But, rather than feeling defeated by it, I can take inspiration from this musical example. With enough hard work, serious practice, and dedication, I could probably learn to like myself someday. Besides, cutting your hands off would only prove to be more frustrating. You'd need a lobotomy, too.