September 9, 2025

Still working on scoring that new laptop. I’m also rethinking how I want to format this blog. After doing a little research, it looks like WordPress is the go-to site for blogging, so I’m setting up shop here. I like the simplicity of it. But that’s not the topic of today’s entry. I feel like I’ve been reconnecting with an old friend, except that it’s not a person so much as it’s an element of what feels like a former life. Once upon a time, I was a musician. At least some might say I WAS a musician, but the truth is, I’ve never stopped identifying as one, even though it had been years since I had properly played a guitar or even set foot inside of a Guitar Center. I broke that streak of absence last week. I stepped into the only Guitar Center available in the immediate Omaha area, instantly hit with the nostalgia of my teen years. What inspired that return is in today’s picture. That’s a guitar I bought from my friend Robert Svilpa, who sadly had to shut down his guitar-making business. He had a load of guitars he wanted to find homes for, so I had a look through his collection, and settled on this red one. I was drawn to its red color and simplistic look. After going through the multi-week nightmare that was trying to arrange delivery to my apartment with UPS, the 12-pound package arrived at my door. Still, this new baby was in dire need of some supplies, and with all of my existing supplies catching dust back in L.A., I picked up a new strap, capos, a cable, and a tuner. I still need to get an amp and, in time, an acoustic guitar. We talked for years about getting a 12-string but it never happened, but now that I have my own money, I’ve felt inclined to snoop around the acoustic section of Guitar Center, and I’ve taken note of a few potential options. I’ll admit that a big reason for me going so long without playing stems from my often overwhelming shyness and fear of being the center of attention. I was good. I AM good. Plenty of people told me so. I had an innate ability to pick up random Rush songs and learn them entirely by ear. I bet I could relearn them again in time. And yet, I backed away from getting too far into the spotlight. I feel terrible about all that lost time, because I can’t help but wonder how good I could have become if I had stuck with it. Maybe I’d be in a band now, or gained some type of notoriety. Or maybe not, I guess no one can say. I just wish I had had the same type of determination that so many of my musical heroes had, and the fact that I went so long without playing sometimes makes me wonder if I’m really a musician at all. Do you ever feel this way? I know it’s not good to dwell on the coulda, woulda, shoulda, and I know that there’s still time to right the wrongs of the past, but sometimes I get too lost in thought, and it can be a hard funk to break from.