Often, Tuesday is my day to catch up on emails and errands and such. Since Monday is a very busy day (basically I teach from 9:15 am to 7:45 pm, and that includes some driving) I have a bunch of emails left to respond to on Tuesday. I got most of them done pretty quickly this morning. Wednesday is another good catch-up day, and then Thursday and Friday are very busy teaching days again, most weeks. This semester I have a couple “every-other-week” students so that means every other week is slightly busier.

Last week I had a little free time, and I’ve been mostly reading during my free time. I had a few craft projects I had been avoiding so I thought, well, why not. I made a little felt hedgehog and started a needlepoint project.

It was nice to do something different! I’m farther along now on the needlepoint, but I already had that picture and didn’t want to get up, find the project, and take another. I spend too much time scrolling my phone when I have a short break, instead of doing something more productive. I try to keep magazines with me while I’m off teaching so I have something longer to read, but sometimes something more mindless is better. We’ll see how this goes.

The other thing I’ve been doing is making one meal over the weekend to have for lunch about 3 times during the week. This past weekend’s was fantastic! I made this recipe for red curry lentil stew with butternut squash and kale. My only “beef” is that the recipe says 5 minutes prep time…what’s with recipes underestimating the prep so much? It took me about 30 minutes to prep…probably that was longer than it should have, but there’s no way one can gather all the ingredients and chop everything in 5 minutes. Blue Apron does a similar thing: they will advertise that their recipe takes 30 to 40 minutes, and I’ll look at it and notice that one step requires preheating an oven to 450 then roasting something for 30 minutes, which is already MORE than 30 minutes. Or they’ll say 20 to 30 minutes, but then tell you to cook one thing for 12 minutes and then follow that with another 10 minutes of cooking, which adds up to more than 20 off the bat, not counting prep! I’m aware that recipes always take longer than they say, but it doesn’t mean I’m happy about it. Nonetheless, I am happy with that recipe, which I put over rice, and also added the entire bag of kale I’d purchased which might have been double what the recipe called for.

This is the last calm week for awhile. I’m looking forward to this weekend as well, which contains a DAY OFF. (You all know how I love my days off). Next week is a crazy mess of work so I’m trying to embrace today by catching up on busy-work and find time for relaxation as well. After this I plan to go for a run, then maybe do a load of laundry and make arrangements to go to see the Symphony this weekend (we subscribe but I always end up having to move our tickets to different dates, which is easy to do but requires a phone call, and I’m close enough to being a millennial that I try to avoid phone calls) and also figure out if I need to do anything to prep dinner tonight. I’m also considering making banana bread (we have several frozen overripe bananas…it happens so quickly) and of course, practicing.

How is your week going?

I guess it’s almost fall now. It seems like summer was a long time ago, yet it’s not quite fall, so that doesn’t even make sense.

This week was a busy one. I felt like many of my students were tired and grumpy and that made my job a bit harder and now I’m tired (and a bit grumpy too, to be honest.) We are in the full swing of things and worried about preparing for things like the Arch Cup and various recitals, so that means I have to bug people about practicing (gosh they hate that the most, can’t they just be GOOD at violin) and that means more grumpiness.

I was reading something the other day complaining about people using the phrase “adulting” and how it’s a way of avoiding responsibility. I might disagree. It’s a way of trying to feel like an adult: when we were kids we thought adults knew everything! And now as adults, it often (even now) still feels like we are acting, and doing things like paying bills, going to the BMV, taking care of insurance and banking things, etc., feels like acting and like playing a part. At least to me! Maybe our parents (and I speak to all of you) actually felt like adults, but maybe they also just felt like they were making it up as they went along and that they were pretending to be real adults, perhaps unlike those other people. Hence, adulting. Also it encompasses all those annoying tasks you never knew existed when you were a kid…we thought adulthood was ice cream for breakfast and getting to control the remote, and while it IS also those things, it’s mostly paying taxes, comparing insurance rates, meal planning, and vacuuming.

I often go through the week thinking, oh, I should blog about this or that. Or, I should start a podcast! There are a lot of people doing podcasts, or mini blogs about how to have success as a freelance musician. I often wonder…1) should I do this or 2) are they really giving any helpful information. On the one hand, I often feel like I have no idea what I’m doing, I’m a failure, and I’ve done everything wrong…alternately I am fairly successful and blessed (#blessed) in my career and I’ve done a lot of things well and been pretty lucky. The truth is likely somewhere in the middle and that I would have some valuable information to give to those just starting out, but I’m not sure that my life looks like the picture of success those just starting out want to see. I live in a modest house in a modest neighborhood. I drive a modest car. I work a lot. Most of the work I do has fairly low visibility, and isn’t always as musical satisfying as I would have thought when I was younger, but I do enjoy many of my colleagues, and many of my students. I don’t travel the country or the world playing music, I don’t have students winning competitions…but I do travel in my own vacations, and I have students doing really cool stuff, not always in music, but I feel honored that I get to spend time with some of these cool people. But it’s not the sort of thing that gets you written up in alumni magazines or on podcasts about “success in the music world.” It’s just in the ditch daily work like many people do all the time.

There’s nothing glamorous about my life, generally, and I just work a lot of hours. Maybe that’s the true lesson I have to offer: that a musician can just work and make a living, and not everybody will become famous, but it doesn’t mean that a life in music isn’t possible?

Deep Friday morning thoughts Okay, I’m off to teach 3 students at the college, then back for 4 more (and 2 are already done for today) so…it’s a normal day.

It’s not really, and I know you are all going to be mad at me now, but I had an early eye doctor appointment (well…9 am…) and then I had to get some things at Target and run a few other errands, and I said, TREAT YO’ SELF and got a pumpkin spice latte. And to be clear: it is delicious.

I also tweeted about it, so I’m covering all my bases. I should be doing other thing, such as figuring out which pictures from Banff to share with you (if I’m going to be blogging) or perhaps organizing something in my house, or definitely practicing, but eh, there’s time for all of that. (Not tomorrow though, tomorrow is definitely too busy for any of that.)

I finally (fingers crossed really hard) have all my college teaching students set up. It’s all going to work out, and though Mondays are BUSY, Tuesday and Wednesday aren’t bad at all. In particular today I only have 4 students, so that means I can waste time here blogging and sort of half-heartedly brainstorming for a possible road trip to Colorado next summer (we won’t be doing anything massive, but I thought, what if I can plan something short that would only take one week plus weekends or something…I’m suffering from the whole “being back at work and wishing the scenery here was more beautiful” and “it’s never too early to plan a new vacation” syndromes…or I should become a trip planner for my side hustle.) I’m meeting a friend for lunch soon, and after lunch will be practicing. Probably. You can try to hold me to that. (I am a terrible example for my students.)

My cat is playing with a clock I brought home from work. It didn’t seem to work, so I thought Louie could fix it. He did, by replacing the battery…I thought it would be a more challenging fix! Thank goodness for engineers, right?

This weekend my band has our first of two “CD release concerts.” If you are a local reader, we’d love to have you there! https://www.facebook.com/events/2417799131800800/

Did I mention I have become obsessed with the Outlander series of books? I read the first one the other week and since then have been devouring them. (This is definitely cutting into my blogging time). I’m on the fourth one and have definitely missed a little sleep trying to read.

Anyway, I am hoping that this weekend will give me the time and impetus I need to tell you about the Banff part of our road trip. I know it’s been awhile now, but I will get to it. Plus there’s the Icefields Parkway, Jasper, and Theodore Roosevelt NP to talk about as well, so I’d better get back to that soon! Not yet though.

*sips pumpkin spice latte*

So far, this fall is going well. How about you?

I know we are all saying this, but how is it already July? And well into July. I was thinking about time the other day. You know how as you get older times feels like it flies by much faster…but does it actually? Can I accomplish and learn as much in the next ten years as I did in the last? I hope so, because I realized one of the things I want to do is read as many books as possible and learn as much about history as I can…though I’m more interested in historical fiction right now. I’m tearing through all the Philippa Gregory books in order and having a good time with it (and soooo glad I wasn’t born in the middle ages).

This week has been a bit hectic! We are preparing to head out of town for a short trip but I’ve had quite a few things going on in addition to prepping for that, my sister Carrie’s visit immediately after, and then only about a week until we leave for our epic road trip. It’s a lot, and Louie is more stressed than me, but I think we can handle it. I think my planning is done for the trip, and all that’s left is to pack, take care of the house, and actually do the trip! I woke up in the middle of the night twice last night to use the bathroom and thought to myself, oh my gosh why are we going camping because peeing in the middle of the night is so much harder while camping and also bears????

We had our annual “fourth of July” bbq on Saturday, but unlike normal years when it coincides with the Sublette Park fireworks, this year it didn’t as we are gone visiting family during that time. So we had a smaller crowd but it was a nice time anyway. The morning of July 4th Louie and I ran a 5k downtown here, and it was fun! I didn’t finish with any exciting time or anything (45:10) but it was a good run for me, based on where I am now with my running (slow). A woman found me in the crowd and decided I had a good pace and chatted with me the whole time..at first I was like, okayyyy, but then she was really nice and ended up being very encouraging and pushed me a bit, so I’m really glad she did. Afterwards Louie and I had a wonderful day off alternating yard and housework with watching episodes of Big Little Lies (loving the show!).

The race gave out medals, which was a little overkill, but hey, I’ll take it! And tiny pies.

A beautiful day! Lots of weaving around walkers at the beginning though, so I wasn’t THAT slow, I guess.

I saw this on timehop the other day. I believe this was shortly before I moved here…I sometimes miss my previous life, before moving to St Louis, because I get frustrated at the “small-town” feel here, but I think I can finally say I’m glad I’m here (Louie of course!) and I’ve met some great people and I am enjoying my life quite a bit. It’s been a struggle here, and I still feel like I don’t have much of a support group around me other than Louie, but I think friendship looks very different in your 40s than it does earlier in life. I know people who do things with friends several times a week, and perhaps live near them, and randomly hang out, but between not having kids (so often that is what brings people together) and working late too many nights, it’s just not a part of my life. I have a million students, more jobs than I can count, and I can see myself keeping this up and continuing my career as it is, so I think that I have achieved success. Or something

And now I have to make lunch, teach for about 5 hours, and then go play at the MUNY as a last minute replacement for a show…for one night, because of my trip. Every time I go on a trip I end up having to turn down work, but when I look back on my life I usually remember the trips more than the work, so I don’t feel bad choosing a balance. I do sometimes wish things lined up a little differently, but the truth is we can’t have it all, we can’t do all the gigs and teach all the students and have all the jobs AND have friends and family and vacations. But we can do many of the gigs and teach many students and many jobs and have some friends and see family and take a few trips, and that’s what I’m doing.

And we can read many but never all of the books! But I’ll keep at it.

My birthday was on Friday, woo hoo! This wasn’t a big milestone birthday, just a regular loser one. Mostly I’m celebrating being antisocial and not doing stuff with friends…

Louie and I had a lovely hike and dinner yesterday, but I’ll save that for another post. First, Tea and Scones! We took a class at the London Tea Room to make Tea and Scones. We each made about 10 scones and had tea and it was a wonderful. I forgot to pick up the recipe at the end of the class, and they haven’t responded to my email about it, so I may never know. I did find a similar recipe online and might try that in the future to give things another shot. The scones were delicious and the class was fun.

Many trays of scones!

I can’t even believe I took this photo, it’s so pretty!

Louie’s working on that egg wash.

On Friday night (my actual birthday) my band played at the Webster Arts Fair. It was a lot of fun, both playing and seeing lots of folks I knew (who were probably baffled at my playing with a didgeridoo, but it’s just getting more and more fun as I get better and my parts), and then browsing the various stands of art and trying not to buy anything (I bought something, but for a gift, not for myself).

It occurred to me this is something I might do in another life where I don’t work all the time—go to festivals and browse stands of art and enjoy a drink or ice cream while walking around. Instead, I chose this music life so I just spend the last hour catching up on emails, revising something I wrote, and searching for and printing music. I could spend more time, but decided I have enough time tomorrow to finish catching up on what I need to do, and it’s summer anyway, so things can be slower. I think right now I FEEL like I have more I should be doing than I actually do…though I still have plenty on my to-do list.

That’s how I feel right now too. I just want to lay around and read. Maybe I’ll do that now, after a quick run (well, by quick I mean short, not fast.)