Perfect Compromise

It’s a beautiful, sunny late-summer's day. The wind’s gusting, which means the laundry I’m about to do will all be dry before the end of the day. Weekends are typically when I do my housework, because the week is really busy. When I have commitments on a Saturday, I’m forced to spend most of the Sunday slogging away at domestic chores, most of which are merely preparation for the next busy week. It’s a cycle that can be reassuring at times (“Life goes on”), but can also make one wonder whether one actually has a life, if everyone lives like this, or if there’s some other reality that has somehow escaped one, like a life where weekends are about relaxing. Sometimes it just feels relentless, unforgiving, and way too demanding.

So, in order to cope, we have to infuse little things into our lives that provide some form of entertainment - a respite, an escape. As long as it’s not hurting you or anyone else, it really doesn’t matter what you do to achieve that release. You have to have a strategy for getting through life, which can be very exacting.

(This might sound weird, but I’ve got the movie Chocolat playing, with the sound off, while I’m typing. It’s my favourite movie. I love everything about it – the setting, the colours, the costumes, the characters, the story, the theme, the music, and - of course - the actors, especially Juliette Binoche, Judi Dench, Lena Olin and Johnny Depp.  Central to the story is the role of the mayor, played by Alfred Molina, who knows just how to play a convincing villain.)

After typing this blog, I’ll get stuck into the week's laundry. Still without a washing machine, I’m stuck with doing everything by hand. I’m used to it now, after a few years, but 2015 is the year I get a washing machine, even if it means buying one on hire purchase (something I’ve consciously avoided for many years). When the weather’s this sunny and windy, it’s just tiring to do the work, but I have the assurance that everything will get dry – it’s in winter, when we have thicker clothes, as well as rain and limited daylight hours, that I really struggle.

I like the feeling of a Sunday, despite my whine about housework. I’m lucky to have the kind of disposition that bounces back fairly quickly, and wants to see the good in a situation. But there’s something else in my life making me feel wonderful, which is what I want to write about.

If you’ve been reading my blog, you’ll know I’m a musician, and that music is my oxygen, the thing that keeps me going, no matter what else is happening in my world.

Well, a few weeks ago, I started a solo gig at a restaurant (seats about 80 - 100) a few kilometres from where I live. It’s called Sabria’s, and it’s a halaal restauarant in Ottery Road, Wynberg. I started on Saturday 31 January, and, during my first break, was offered a second night per week, something I could never have anticipated. I now perform there every Tuesday, from 19h00 – 21h00, and every Saturday, from 19h00 – 22h00. I love every minute of it!

 

A selfie taken about a week ago, during my break, at Sabria's Restaurant, in Wynberg, where I play on Tuesday and Saturday nights.

I get there, set up my equipment, do a brief sound check, and start playing. I basically play whatever makes me happy. I check the people’s responses, and get a sense of what they like. The next time, I add a few new songs, check the response, and so on and so on. It’s a constant process of balancing what I like with what the general clientele like. I love it!

After 37 years of playing my guitar, and about 27 years of fairly consistent gigging, I have a huge repertoire, and one of my constant hungers is sourcing and adding new songs. I have about 16 flip files full of songs, ranging from 1920s material to recent hits.  I generally know how to read a crowd, but I’m also at peace with the fact that when I sing a song I love, it comes across well, and people like it. I’ve learnt how to work with my voice, how to choose songs and keys that don’t strain it, and, most importantly, that, when you do something you love, and you do it from your heart, not mechanically, the authenticity is what resonates with people, and what makes the outcome successful.

More than that, I do feel incredibly blessed to be able to do what I love, and that it’s something that makes people happy. I’m at peace with the fact that I’m not a full-time musician. Actually, in my heart and head, I am – I just happen to also have a day job, with a monthly salary that keeps the wheels turning for my little family.  The more I think about it, the more I realise what a perfect compromise it is, especially because I love my day job (teaching English), as well.

In recent years, I spent some time being a full-time musician - teaching guitar lessons and gigging – but it was not sustainable for me, as a single parent without assistance. I didn’t like the uncertainty of it, nor the fact that I couldn’t be selective about where I sang, anymore. Basically, it didn’t suit the way I liked to live my life – the responsible, single mother part; I hated not knowing what I’d earn for that month, and the gnawing anxiety that stayed with me, day and night, as I panicked about day-to-day survival. I particularly hated losing my independence, and constantly having to borrow money, in order to buy electricity and feed my family. No – there’s no way I want music in my life, when it plays that role.  I’m completely, head-over-heels, in love with music, so it has to occupy a beautiful, magical space in my world, and not be caught up in the ugliness of survival. Shoo, I’ve never articulated that before, so it’s quite strange to see it in words. It’s the truth, and always has been, for me.

Right now, I’m thoroughly enjoying the way this year has started for me, at least in my music life. Not only am I doing a bi-weekly solo gig, but I’ve been getting other gigs, too. Yesterday I played at an outdoor Valentine’s concert, with two awesome musicians – one of my favourite guitarists, Errol Dyers, and beautiful male vocalist, Louen Kleinsmidt. Next Saturday afternoon, I have another private function, after which I’ll go straight to Sabria’s. I LOVE IT!

I’m 53 years old. Many of my schoolmates are grandparents, happily bobbing babies on their knees, and deriving satisfaction in a whole different way to me. I work with a few people considerably younger than I am, and they have the strangest preconceptions about what life for a 53-year-old is like. Interestingly, not one of them has a creative outlet, or a passion that drives them, like music does me. They could never possibly understand how rejuvenating and empowering it is to have an art form in your life, and to have it consume you, as deliciously as music does me.

For as long as I’m able to, I will make music, even if just in the quiet glow of moonlight, as it hits my window. For as long as people continue to hire me, I will make music in those kinds of situations. For as long as I can, I will put on concerts, performing my own compositions, collaborating with beautiful musicians and giving emerging artists a platform. My mother was memorising and singing entire operas, in her fifties, so no wonder I feel so alive and musically viable - it’s a credo I internalized, without even being aware of it. My mother taught me this tenacity and passion through living it, herself. How do you say thank you for that? You live your life with the same joy and unadulterated passion, diving into your art form and swimming in it, for as long as you’re able to.  

And if you have children, they’re probably the ones doing the internalizing, now.