Guitar Heroine

I thought I would tell you about one of my new leisure activities. It's called Guitar Hero, maybe you've heard of it? Now, I know this thing has been around for quite a while but I am finally getting into it. I was never that into video games, even though I did have my 8th or 9th birthday party at Arnie's Place, a totally awesome arcade I went to when I was a kid. But being the contrarian I am, since everyone was playing them, I couldn't embrace them. The more people talked about them and how great they were, the less I wanted to even look at them. I also must mention that I sucked at most of them as well. I just didn't get it. Until now....

Most of my life has revolved around music. My first favorite band was the Rolling Stones when I was 4 or 5 years old. I also liked Kiss and ACDC at that time. I never studied a musical instrument, I know this is a total crime! But as I grew up, most of my friends were in bands or shared the same obsession with music. I even bought a bass guitar when I was about 23 years old and taught myself to play a few songs. I still really want to learn how to play the lap steel because I love Hawaiian music and old country, both which use this instrument. I have always wanted to be in a band, but I don't really play anything well enough. Anyway, when I first heard of this game, I thought it was an awesome idea. 

I first tried it at my friends' Christmas party. I was awful!! I was mortified. Then, my boyfriend's brother got it about a year ago, and brought it over to our place. Matt and his friends were psyched! They were all instantly good at it! I was too shy to try it in front of all the guys, because I can't do anything in front of people unless I'm really good at it. Some neurosis, that's a whole other blog. After all the guys left I'd ask Matt to show me how to play it. I sat there for 3 hours one night trying to get it, and I still sucked. It made me hate the game. 

But Matt really wanted to get it. So maybe two weeks ago, he brought Guitar Hero III home. It has amazing songs on it!! Watching him play, I couldn't deny my interest any more. I said "All right, I'm gonna try it again." I almost played Barracuda by Heart, quite possibly the most bad-ass guitar riff ever!!!! It was of course, at the slowest practice speed. But the seeds were planted. 

One day Matt came home with a second guitar. For me!! So we could play together! I then found out that you can play the bass or the guitar when you play with two people. Hey, I've played the bass before! Let me tell you, this completely changed the game for me. No longer was I booed off the stage. I was now Kim Gordon from Sonic Youth, I was Flea. I played the Strokes, Guns 'N Roses, I even played Sabotage from the Beastie Boys with that sick bass line in the beginning! It really feels like you're playing. And I'm not all stiff and nervous anymore. I can actually rock out now. 

Gosh, just writing about it is making me wish I knew how to turn it on!! I'll have to wait for Matt to get home from work.

How I came to be idle

Where was I? Oh yeah, my life of leisure. I took the entire summer off last year. I hadn't done that since freshman year of college. Even in high school I worked all weekend at Brooks Pharmacy. I needed to detox from work, from fashion, from the L train, from the constant bombardment of noise and people. I wanted to figure out what the hell I was going to do with my life. I realize now that I should've started this blog back then to chronicle my adventures real-time, but oh well. 

I started doing things that I wanted to do, for no other reason than my own enjoyment. I went to the beach a few times a week, taking the LIRR from Atlantic Ave in Brooklyn. I read tons of books, a few a week. I started cooking more. I spent a lot of time in my own company, which I felt I desperately needed to do in order to locate Christina again. I know that sounds really hokey, "I needed to find myself, dude", but it's sort of true. I felt I had lost my SELF in that world of go, go, go and do more, sell more, make more $$. The way I believed I could find my way back to myself was to literally do nothing. One of my old therapists taught me a great slogan or mantra, "When in doubt, do nothing." I knew I needed to be still and quiet, and listen for my own tiny little inner voice to make herself known again. I really tried to keep an open mind, and not have any preconceived notions of what I should do next.

Now this was not easy by any means. I suffered from guilt almost every day. Guilt about not working, fear that everyone thought I was a "slacker". I always hated slackers, mostly because I was envious I think. I was playing every day, going to the beach with my boogie board in the morning when everyone else was going off to work. Ha ha. Suckers! But after a while I felt a new pride when people asked me what I had been doing. "Nothing, " I would answer. It made more than a few people angry and confused. 

But doing nothing, to me, doesn't always mean staring into space dreaming. Although that is a big part of it. I was doing lots of things, I just wasn't working at a job or career. I started studying Italian, which I had always wanted to do because my great-grandparents were from Italy. I never would've been able to commit to taking a class when I was working! Leaving at 6:00 (the supposed quittin' time) was impossible with all the work and meetings. It was also frowned upon. If you left at 6:00, or Heaven forbid before that, your good-byes would be met with "Must be nice." The people would talk about you and say that you did nothing and left early all the time. 

Anyway, back to happier times....part of my doing nothing is studying, learning, attending classes, thinking. So I made a new commitment to keep taking classes. I'll leave you with a list of other things I enjoy under the umbrella of doing nothing. 

Paint by numbers, crossword puzzles, cooking, dinner parties, board games, listening to music, taking baths, playing guitar hero, knitting, reading, volunteering, croquet, gardening, puzzles, sleeping.....

I'll try to explain more about Leisure Society, the company, next time. Im figuring it out as I go along.