I caught myself singing to the radio the other day.

That hasn’t happened in a long time. I used to sing every day, almost all day. First year at Berklee, when I should have been practicing yet another percussion instrument, I was taking voice lessons and hoping to switch to the vocal department, which I did, second semester.

So I’m sitting here, as I write this, listening to the electronic tag on Last.fm, and I can’t help but think that some of this stuff sounds like some of the stuff I made for arranging that year. (with massive help from Matt Cahoon) 🙂 I had no idea how dependent I’d be on Studio Vision — that learning Garageband would take a bit of effort, and now I’m learning Cakewalk 6.

I finally feel like I’m *present* and am in the moment as well. I am not only creating art, but I’m doing it for no reason but because it makes me happy — and the second it doesn’t — then I can walk away from it and come back later. It sits heavily with me that *gulp* I am responsible for making my album. And it doesn’t get done by hearing the songs in my head, humming on the couch.

I have more than 10 songs. I haven’t created accompaniment for any of them on guitar or piano. I have no reason for that other than that I wrote the melodies to sing, but that doesn’t mean I can play harmonies for them. Yet. I’ll figure this out, though. I’m smirking on the inside thinking, “So THIS is why I took Harmony classes!”

But more importantly, I have a goal: to self-produce an album of electronic pop music

And fortunately for me, the larger goal has lots of mini-goals. Songs. And songs have parts.

Even better, with the move coming up, I’m about to be able to play piano almost all the time without worrying about waking anybody up. The best thing about my grandma and grandpa’s old piano is that there’s joy and no judgment on that keyboard. It’s where I come up with my best stuff.

And, if I don’t come through on this, I know have no one to blame but myself. And it would be pretty sad, because I know I could make some pretty cool stuff if I would just stop being lazy and/or a scardy cat.

I’m issuing myself a challenge. It’s the thing I’m most afraid of, to tell you the truth. So, I’m going to do it, and that’s all there is to it! I wish I were afraid of something easy, like bungee jumping. That’s at least quick. Nope. I’ve got to be scared shitless of whether or not people will actually like my music. So, I have to release an album, knowing that there absolutely, unquestionably, will be haters to go with the admirers.

But at least I won’t be stagnating. I’ll be learning and growing. I’ll be striving towards something and not spending my whole day on Facebook, doing laundry, and doing the dishes. That’ll just be part of my day. 😉

Besides, I’m out of excuses that I’m willing to accept. Marketability means nothing to me regarding this. I want a piece of me that I can leave behind for the generations and for the world. If I can get better to the point that I have increased energy and no longer have seizures every day by changing my eating habits, like I have, I sure as hellfire can learn how to use a computer program that will allow me to make music at home while my man is at work, and learn to record my guitar and my voice, and create an album that I can be proud of.

I like to tease that I’m not really on SSDI, but that I’m a government subsidized musician, artist, and blogger. Truth be told, I’ve been lucky that my MS has been playing nice recently. I want to say it’s because I’ve been so rigid about staying paleo, but I really feel it every time I cheat (which I really did this past weekend with… oh, every meal…).

I want so badly to run away from this challenge that I’ve almost erased this entry 3 times. But I’m not wussing out. I’m gonna put a hard time limit on the first song. I’ll have that one done and ready to hear by August 15. I’m giving myself extra time because of the move.