When I was a teenager playing basketball, all I wanted to do was get in the game. Once I was in, I never wanted to come out.
No one ever wanted to be on the bench.
Years later, I played in a recreation league with other adults. I played far better than I ever did as a kid and enjoyed it much more. But the difference was that as adults, we were always happy to go to the bench and take a breather. In fact, there would be some nights when there would just barely be enough guys show up to field two full teams. If there was one extra body, we’d fight over him because nobody wanted to be on a team where you weren’t going to get to rest.
Ironic.
Lately, I’ve been in the game, but I have not been giving myself a chance to get to the bench.
KG (Kevin Gorman) and I have pushed as hard as we can – along with taking care of all our other responsibilities – to move our music project forward. Right now, I am taking a step back from it. It is one I have to take. If I’m to be honest, I’d have to confess that I doubt I’d stop with everything unless I had to.
I’m not proud of that. I’m working on it.
I was supposed to get into the studio last night, but I knew I just didn’t have the steam for it. KG was cool with it and said he’d work on some of his parts without me there, which may end up for the best (it must be nice for him to occasionally work without me nattering at him after everything he does).
As for me, I did what I never do: After I got my boys to bed, I went back into my office, returned a few emails and calls, and then I shut the computer off. I then forced myself to sit on a couch and watch a movie.
The whole thing.
In one sitting.
Laugh if you like, but I never do that. It feels like too long to sit still. I don’t say that as being a virtue: it’s a weakness that I am trying to manage more effectively.
Hence the “time out.”
Tomorrow, I’m headed to the Performance Racing Industry show in Orlando along with my teammates from CPT Entertainment. We should be very proud of the fact that we’ve grown to a point where we can do this kind of thing. But the fact is that we’ve been so busy that none of us has really stopped to think about that. As for me, I struggle with being away from my family, so I have mixed feelings about being away for a few days. I am very busy and I do a lot of things, but I am very involved in my kids’ lives and I guard that time pretty closely. It’s just that, when everyone else is sitting and watching network TV, I’m working on something after the kids are in bed. But I think I understand that my kids learning to cope when I’m not here for a day or two is just as important as me learning to cut myself some slack and take a step back here and there, and let the game go on without me.
I can always “sub” in later, when I’m rested and ready.
So tomorrow I’m leaving on a jet plane, as the song says. It’s not a vacation. We’re going to work, make new contacts and benefit our business. But maybe it’s the best thing that can happen right now. Perhaps I’ll arrive back at my own doorstep in a few days feeling eager to get my mind back into all these things that it is struggling to compute at the moment. Or, even more likely, I’ll meet some people or see some places that will give me ideas for new songs. One never knows.
And as for how my voice stays on the air on BX 93 while my body is in another country?
Well, that is a story for another day.
– Kevin
Recent Comments