When I was growing up in Glendale when I was in 3rd grade my cousin played the piano and violin so I wanted to be like my 5 years older cousin and play music too. So, I studied piano starting at age 8 with his piano teacher too who was Mrs. Hall who was a great teacher. She saw I loved music but didn't force me to practice that much. So, I was interested enough in music to play all my pieces through once every day. then she started giving me Disney songs to play which entertained me a lot. Then eventually I played the Theme to "The Apartment" and also "Exodus" which were popular movies then. the apartment starred Shirley Maclaine and and Jack Lemon at the time and the music was a big deal then. Then she got me to play classical music like Bach and Beethoven too which interested me a lot because my mother really wanted to hear classical music played by me.
So, by the time I was 12 years old I was a sight reader which just means I could sit down at the piano and play almost anything I had music books where music was written in for piano right off the bat. However, I find most professional musicians I know are not sight readers they mostly play by ear which is an entirely different talent. However, in my teens I learned to create new songs by bouncing off of Heart and soul and doing variations on that theme. And eventually I also taught myself to play the Guitar and flute too in my teens.
But, how it helped me to become non-violent is that someone would really piss me off in school and then I would come home and play my music and I would forget about whoever wronged me that day and calm down. So, in this sense music prevented harm to me or to others because I had quite a temper.
Also, at age 12 my father came to me because I had just grown from 5 foot 2 to 5 foot 10 that year and said to me. "You are just so big and so strong for your age you are always going to have to be the adult in the room because of this. You can never let anyone get your goat or else they are going to die because of just how big and strong you are for your age."
Though this idea terrified me I learned self discipline and though if someone attacked me I defended myself at least I didn't go off on them and hurt them bad like I could have.
So, I became more of a peaceful Giant like a Clydesdale Horse or a Belgian Horse because I eventually became 6 foot 5 inches tall by the time I was 21 years old or so.
So, if you are as big and as strong as I always was you have to be very calm and self disciplined all the time or people are doing to die who attack you in your life.
The whole point is for you and everyone else to stay alive no matter how messed up psychologically other people are.
So, in this way music kept me and other people alive and out of the hospital (especially in the 1950s and 1960s) when I grew up. I lived in Glendale, California from 1956 until 1969 when I moved to the Hollywood hills where my aunt was an actress with a swimming pool. I really liked swimming and my parents had just moved to San Diego then. Eventually, I realized I needed my own place and moved to Venice California but that place was just too crazy for me in 1969 so I finally moved to San Diego and went back to college again. But, this time instead of studying computer programming and operations I studied Philosophy, Psychology and cultural anthropology so I could better understand myself and stay alive in the world the way it was in the 1970s.
Luckily, I didn't get drafted and have to go to the Viet Nam War as many of my frineds did but none of them were ever the same after that either. It's like when they went there they died (at least the people I knew died and were never the same ever again after that experience whether their bodies were alive or not.
So, College was a really good thing for my physical and psychological survival then and college allowed me to get married and have kids and start businesses to support them which was good for me and my children too.
By God's Grace
No comments:
Post a Comment