MIKE'S BOOMER BLOG

HERE ARE MY OLDER, YAHOO POSTS, CUT AND PASTED TO THIS SITE. BEATS RE-TYPING THEM!

The Next Chapter in My Life -June 07, 2008

I just quickly composed the following piece for an AARP (American Association of Retired Persons) essay contest and submitted it a few minutes ago:
The next chapter in my life will not be as much of a struggle as preceding chapters. I retired from teaching high school English, a stressful endeavor if there ever was one! The next chapter of my life will find me reducing stress by becoming a songwriter. I’ve always enjoyed playing guitar, and I’ve been in a few bands playing mostly rock oldies. But my age and lack of expertise at playing and singing music now suggests I’m better off taking it easy and concentrating my efforts on songwriting, and hopefully leaving a legacy of songs my children will be proud of.
I’ve written many songs, but the more I write, the more I know I have a lot more to learn. It will be an uphill struggle. I’ve made up my mind to not be concerned about selling my songs, but to concentrate on pleasing myself. All I want is to write, perform on, record and produce my own material in my home studio. I’m in the process of soundproofing my garage right now.
I’ll write these songs while sitting at a short, plywood podium I had custom made so I could sit in front of my class, textbook, grade book and copious studysheets, worksheets, and quizzes easily at hand because of the generous shelving in the podium’s interior. That podium is covered with the well-wishes of my students. Knowing it was the only thing I would take with me when I retired, they would grab pens and write nice things about me on it, and then they’d sign their names. It’s my “yearbook,” representative of my years trying to make sense of this world to my students. In this next chapter of my life I will continue to try to make sense of this world, but this time through songwriting.
Using that podium for songwriting will remind me to not waste my time writing songs of superficiality, songs that may have a great beat, but are devoid of meaning. I’m in the closing chapters of my life; I don’t have time to waste on superficiality.