Embracing Frivolity in the Dark
Or imagine calculus being fun
After a two month hiatus, I had a ukulele lesson this week. Since the holiday recital, I don’t think that I had played until I showed up that night. I cancelled my lessons for January for money reasons and I convinced myself that I needed a break anyway. And I almost cancelled again, because I rationalized that hadn’t played and I didn’t need lessons. It was a luxury when I needed to focus on necessities.
But I went. Partly to give my teacher a funny t-shirt that I’d bought as a post-recital gift. I could have dropped it off at any time in the past month, but I kept it in my car as I drove past his studio on my way to and from my office.
At 5:45 pm on Tuesday, I showed up at the studio unprepared but bearing gifts. I gave him the shirt, he gave me a new song. About half the time, he chooses songs based on my musical tastes, but also taking into account my abilities, the strumming and picking patterns, and it’s suitability to the ukulele. The other half of the time, I pick some piece of music that I think is cool.
This week, he handed me Imagine, by John Lennon. Now, I know the song, but it’s not on my regular playlist. Growing up the two albums I remember being played the most in our house was Kenny Rogers’ Greatest Hits and the American Graffiti soundtrack. And the other thing I remember is that dad hates The Beatles.
For me, I’m finding that I like, but don’t love the, The Beatles. And as a song for me to learn in February 2022, Imagine is just about perfect. It is a classic and it forces me to learn some new things both vocally and technically. And it invites me to use my imagination at time that it is sorely needed.
January was dark for me. 2021 was personally hard, and I hoped that 2022 would start on an uptick, instead I struggled.Since moving to Montana, I’ve never gotten used to how dark the winters are. I’ve never been diagnosed with seasonal affective disorder, but this year I could feel the darkness smothering me. I feel like I existed in January, but I wasn’t alive.
After January, being asked to imagine anything was like spark in the dead of night. And for now, I’ll have to imagine that I can play it, because it was not good this week. But I’ll figure it out.
The second half of my lesson was devoted to a song I picked out months ago, but got shoved aside by recital prep, Eddie Vedder’s Rise. I chose Rise, because it’s an uplifting song about rising up. I found a chord sheet, but it isn’t a song that my teacher knew, so he had to figure out how to teach it to me.
During my lesson, I got to see Matthew work through the song in real-time. It’s written in a time signature that we haven’t worked in much and it was great was him learning it and teaching it to me at the same time. At one point, I said, “Oooh, music math.” Which made him laugh.
In short, I had fun. I didn’t set out to have fun. In fact, I kind of felt guilty spending money on something as frivolous as learning to play music. I’m a 50 year old dude with no illusions of being any good, or playing in a band, or really playing at all. Why should I indulge my frivolity?
As I drove home up the hill, I remembered why.
On February 11, 2004, my mom died after battling a mysterious illness for over a year. I was there when it happened. I remember two things: 1) Uncle Jim holding me up by the shoulder and 2) how mom couldn’t be dead because her chest was moving up and down, but it was my chest heaving against the dying of the light.
After her death, I wandered for a year doing political fundraising in St. Louis and Mississippi. I was lost and angry and politics allowed me to channel my grief into work while hiding out in plain sight among strangers. When I went home, I went back to the Kansas Appellate Defender Office after a friend and colleague had died. But I was still grieving.
That spring, I saw my mom’s family at a large wedding. One of mom’s sisters is a statistics professor. After the wedding, I decided that what I needed was to take Calculus again. The local community college had to waive a prerequisite for me, it had been so long since I had graduated. The faculty advisor asked me, “Why?” I don’t remember my answer, probably something along the lines of “because,” and he said, “OK.” I hope he rolled his eyes at me.
That summer I commuted one way to work, then the other way to take class 4 nights a week. I made to all my classes, I did the work (I still have my notebook and my textbook), and I got a B. But mostly it was fun, because it didn’t have a grand purpose. It was something I did because I wanted to with little expectations.
But a funny thing happened. Embracing frivolity opened up space for me to view my world differently. I spent a lot of time that summer creating a profile my dream job. I still have my dream job flower hanging on the back of the door to the spare bedroom. It’s still motivates me and represents who I try to be.
I’m still fascinated by “helping people use law strategically,” “helping people avoid pitfalls,” and I’m thrilled that antitrust is back (and it applies to criminal defense work, think plea bargaining). But more important are my values that have stayed the same - and become more strident - over the last decade and half: combating bad ideas; having a vision of what could be, causing impactful change, improving, and fighting for lost causes.
I don’t have to imagine my life, because I already have. Progress is slow. It is definitely a work in progress. And there will be more dark days to come. But it is in my darkest of times that frivolity has been the spark that kept the heat on.
Bring on the math . . . err, I mean fun.