1) Set Goal. 2) Achieve Goal.

"..drumming can be used to shift through major issues such as fear, resentment, or anger...using your drum can help you pass through and accept the natural biological and spiritual changes that take place in the course of our lives.." - Steven Ash in Sacred Druming.

I've had a fair bit of anger, resentment and fear in the past four months. Tonight at band practice, after a four-hour session of rehearsing, criticism and fine-tuning our current tunes, we muted our critics and turned it out with this thumping dirty blues jam with Nate on guitar and Conrad on bass, Rocco improvising lyrics overs all of us. It sounded like a swarm of batsouttahell, but I knew as I was playing that I was bleeding out negative energy I've been storing up for months. I feel great knowing I left it all on the drum mat.

I'm not sure what I'm doing with this band or if anything will come of it apart from some sweet memories and fraternity, but I am having a great time, I'm not hurting anybody, and I sleep well at night, next to a lovely lady - so I ain't got much about which to bitch.

First student, Franklin: Success!

My first student, Frank from the Breukelen Coffee House just left, following a very successful lesson. I started our friend on a basic rock beat last week, and he came back today with everything fleshed out in his mind, and after an hour of working on hand and feet skills, was able to play an eighth note rock pattern to a metronome. It was a beautiful thing. Nice job Frank!

I am now about to leave for band practice, reinvigorated and recharged. I'm antsy to take my little traveler kit, The Alchemist, on the road. I would really like a few upgrades: a bass drum mount for a little crash cymbal, with a little crash cymbal maybe, and a small throne. After those first are acquired I will feel confident enough to take to the streets.

Also on the to-do list is business card production, gigging with the band, writing new tunes, rounding out the unwieldy ones, and staying sane.

Work all day and night, trying to do it right.

I'd really enjoy a day off. In fact, it would change my life.

I don't work every day, but I'm busy every day. Keeping my girl happy, choresing, push-ups, tapping on my practice pad. Fill in the time in between with video games (Final Fantasy III virgin no more) and pepper in the occasional dash of spending quality time with the folks from around the neighborhood, and that's my week.

I did recently set a Monday rehearsal night with the band, Kill The Huxter, but it ain't enough, baby! I've got more rhythm than one night behind a drumset per week can satisfy.

So, I'm waiting. I wait for the rare day to come when I a) grow a pair, and 2) trek with my foldy-uppy drumkit to somewhere inconspicuous, but not too inconspicuous, get me? And then I'll change my life. It will be a dream of my life fulfilled - a bucket list box checked, at least.

In my mind, it starts as an experiment gone horribly, horribly right. In my mind I can quit my job, or at least cut down my hours from a stipend I make chopping it up on the most primal instrument in the most primal city in the world. In my mind, people I don't know know my name. My purpose is realized.

...

So we'll see, right? Paciencia y fe.

I decided today to do it the hard way.

I had a very interesting Easter.

Let this not be mistaken: it had nothing to do with Easter per se, or anything religious at all for that matter. Or maybe it did.

I saw on the subway on the way to work two people - a young boy and an old man. There wasn't anything particularly striking about these two people except that they both reminded me exceptionally of myself. It's probably a normal thing to be searching for oneself at this mid-twenty year point in life, and probably just as normal to look for the self in another person.

Anyway, this boy was an explainer. He was explaining the best way to stand to his father, with respect to the shifting of the subway train at the moment of stopping. I think I solved an equation like that for calculus. I digress - the kid reminded me of me.

The old man walked onto the train, and asked if the train was going to a certain street (which it was), sighed "oh" with a trace of sadness, and shuffled to a seat next to me with the help of a cane. I don't know what it was about this man in particular that struck a chord, but he did.

At work, a tall man who could have been 5 to 10 years older than I sat at a table. I didn't serve him but I got a good look, and if his curly hair, thick-rimmed glasses and facial hair didn't closely match mine, I saw something familiar in his eyes.

Later in the night, as I'm waiting for the last tables to leave, I get into a conversation about drumming with a family as I'm relieving a fellow server of his duty. Immediately after hearing I play drums she exclaims, "Oh! I can't wait to take drum lessons! I have to get myself a little more stabilized and centered and my neighbors probably won't like it..." and so on. I also mention that I'd like to be behind a bar instead of on the floor, to which she says "Oh you shouldn't do that... You seem like so much more of a drummer - you should just do that all the time..play drums all the time"

So, after this strange day of brushing by people who reflect some part of my self to me, I decided to take this strange, drunk lady's advice. I will strike out to the streets of New York and schlep through Brooklyn to play drums. I will write about it and document it.

The most interesting way to do something is to do it the hard way. And if there's one way I'm really good at doing things..