The first time I picked up a guitar and tried to strum D and G chords
with some manner of competence, I could not believe I’d ever get the hang of
it. Like so many early students I would have given up and put it aside, but a
force drove me on. I had to do this! Humans create! That’s what humans do
because we are each a new day rising!
I persisted. I learned. Some chords became easy. Muscle memory I guess.
It became instinctive and so did the composing habit.
The odd time I would allow the guitar to linger for a couple days I
would start to feel uneasy; out of sorts, and then realize why. The instrument and the process had become an
integral extension of my mind.
I wrote simple folky songs that were not spectacular but worked, and
almost accommodated the wafer-thin range of my singing voice.
Though that urge still whispers to me now and then, the imperative has
faded and the calluses have become a mere tingle.
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