Day 4: Sometimes you write a song

December 30, 2009

I had this professor in college who I used to talk to on a regular basis. She was a writer herself and we often talked about the stuff we were working on. She was a published author, so naturally she had a much better work ethic then I did. She was a great person to bounce ideas off of and most importantly, she was someone that would help me stay productive with my work. I have not talked to her in a good year and a half, which may or may not be one of the reasons why I have not written anything in so long.

The reason I am telling you this seemingly useless information is because of something she used to always say to me. Whenever I would tell her that I had not written anything in a while, she would always tell me the same thing. She would say to me, "Just write. It doesn't matter what you are writing, as long as you are writing something, that's all that matters". Given, during certain times in my life I have obeyed this rule and have ended up with some truly terrible stuff. Though, if what she says is correct(and I am fairly certain it is), then tonight I lived by that philosophy to a tee.

Since I have been 14 years old, I have been in a band with some of my friends. It is not something we have ever taken too seriously, but recently we have started to record again. The recording process for us usually consists of us sitting around and writing new songs. Then after a while, we might record a song. The lyrics have always been easy for us to come by, which is really the point of this story. I have been trying to write a song now for the last month and for some reason I didn't want to put anything to paper. Whether it was because I was afraid of writing something bad or I just didn't feel like doing it, I was still unwilling to put anything down. Tonight on the other hand was different. I don't know if this whole "Turning twenty nine" thing has anything to do with it, but writing tonight felt like it used to.

Not to say that it was easy to accomplish or that the final product was worthwhile in the least, but at least I was able to write again. This of course is all that she was ever trying to say to me. As long as I am able to stay with it, eventually I might actually write something of substance. For that, I am truly grateful to have had her as a teacher and someone that could at least guide me in some way. Of course, if I would have just listened to her advise in the first place, I might not be in this situation to begin with. Live and learn I suppose.