I think that almost everyone who has played music for a long time has thought about giving it up at one time or another. <...snip...>
I've been gigging since I was in Jr. High School, and that was a long time ago. I'm past retirement age and have no intention of giving it up. I must be the exception.
I did try a couple of 'day jobs' while investigating what it is to be 'normal'. During those day jobs, I continued to gig on the weekends and live for the weekends. Normal just didn't work out for me.
Even when I had a gig with a title of Cable TV Field Engineer, I still identified myself as a musician moonlighting as an Engineer (actually, I was a technician with an inflated title).
I took the job because I could fly out Monday, fly back on the Thursday Red-Eye and have Friday, Saturday and Sunday off for gigging. The electronics I took in school allowed me to get my foot in that CATV gig. But it wasn't for me.
My technical chops on the sax have not improved in years, buy my ability to play expressively and tastefully have. My voice is still strong, because I use it a lot, in fact, it's better than it has ever been. Voice was the most difficult instrument I learned. My lead guitar chops keep improving. It's my 8th instrument, and I have a lot to learn. I don't have time to practice it a lot on home, but I'm doing 15+ gigs per month, and if you can't practice on stage, where
can you practice?
I used to fish a lot in Florida when I was young. But now the fishing isn't what it used to be. We would throw back the fish people keep like the jacks and take home the snook, grouper, red snappers, mangrove snappers, yellowtails, and lookdowns. Everything else was catch and release. Nobody used more than one pole, and it was more of a fishing game than a waiting game. I lost patience for that, so I suspect it's a lot like Billy losing patience for music and going fishing.
I feel like I'm living a charmed life.
After I divorced my first wife, I vowed not to marry anyone else who isn't in the biz. Second wife, Mrs. Notes is a fantastic singer (I'm decent, she's great) and she plays guitar and synth. She has intense work ethics like myself, has fun entertaining, and is the kindest person I've ever met. We hardly every disagree.
But that's all about me (sorry).
The point is, time is the only currency we have. Wasting time doing something we don't want to do is throwing away that currency. Life is finite, we only get so many minutes. Do what makes you happy as long as it respects the rights of others.
But don't sell your gear until you are sure that's what you want to do. Especially items that are no longer in production.
Insights and incites by Notes ♫
Norton Music
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