I guess I retired early....

I was once a performer. Really...I was. I once sang and played instruments in front of actual people.

Total instruments = 4... with a couple licks on a few more learned for the sake of being able to play them. Although I only really stuck with one for more than a couple of years... the geeky band girl played flute and picollo for 8 years. Eight! First flute in a band that regularly won gold at provincials (does any of that really mean something?).

And I sang. In choir (church and/or school) for 14 years! Lead or principal roles in four musicals. Solo bits in songs of all kinds. (There were three of us who once made our music teacher cry - in the good way - singing three part harmony on "My Lord What a Morning.") I sang my heart out for years. Continued to do so even in the much more casual dorm jam sessions, working out harmonies with friends, singing the Mummer Song with the Newfoundland girls.

But now, whoever that bold girl was has retreated to status of observer, of fan, of music afficionado, patron of the arts. Indeed it may be the only shy part of me, but it's shy in the extreme.

Most of the time I'm fine with that. Most of the time being a shower singer and a road trip rock star (singing alone in the car) are just fine. But lately I've wondered what it would be like to sing again. Or to play along. And I'm a little sad about the fact that... I'm pretty sure I won't (in spite of the extremely softly murmered harmonies that once in a while escape while I'm sitting there - no one can hear me in the loud bar after all).

That's the rub you see. I spend far too much time with "real musicians" and music critics to ever dust off the old vocal chords or polish up the old flute or tin whistle. And who knows? Maybe I actually can't anymore (Lord knows my last stage experience was a disaster). My inside ear hasn't had alot of practice lately (and when I say lately I mean years).

Who knows?

My mother actually started taking piano lessons at the age of 48. And she's getting pretty good.

And weirdly, I actually have a certain affection for people who sing for the utter joy of it, loudly and off key, in church or during the national anthem. It's just that I can't bring myself to join them... and today I think that's sad.