Hello Old Friend. Pleased to meet you.

After over a decade, I picked up my guitar and enjoyed playing. To be honest, it's been longer than that. After my mostly negative experiences as a young music major robbed me of any enthusiasm, I stopped playing altogether except for short-lived spurts. Over the last few weeks I've rediscovered the sensation of learning and playing. All of my old aptitude and misplaced confidence in my abilities was gone. I started again, this time with old hands and a mind made feeble by the years. Still, I can sit for hours and contently noodle away if I allow myself. Sometimes I do.

I bought a new guitar. I didn't mean to. It just happened. A Gretsch with a Bigsby. There it was in the Guitar store, resplendent in its Cadillac Green glory. It didn't have a price tag, and I knew if I had to ask I couldn't afford it. I asked, and I found it irresistibly in reach. I took it home. 

I started frequenting music shops again, picking up odds and ends. I justified the new Gretsch by saying it would travel with me to the sites, to kill the hours in a semi-productive manner. Focusing on playing instead of my failures as a husband and father. I didn't want to risk my cherished Fender Telecaster, which I had purchased when I was 13 with my saved pennies (just over 75,000 of them, as I recall). Nope, it's not what I'd call a travel guitar.

After a couple weeks, I realized I liked the new Gretsch too much to risk it to TSA and the harsh environments I frequent. Crap. I started looking for a compact guitar that I would be drawn to play every time I passed it. Problem was, I was heading out in a few days and was having issues finding a purpose-built electric travel guitar in town, and a mail order guitar would arrive long after I was gone. Every shop said the same thing- they sell out of them as soon as they get them in, and they can't get them at the moment.

I stopped by the local big-box music store, and went back in the acoustic section, resigned to settling on a style of guitar I wasn't really interested in playing. I idly looked over the selection, until up near the rafters I saw it. An electric travel guitar. It was beautiful. It was locked up. I had a salesman get it down (he had to find the keys), and he explained it was moved back there after a couple of them had walked out the door. I mentioned hiding it was an interesting sales strategy, and he just shrugged.

I spent a little time playing it in the store, spent more than I wanted to (but less than I could have thanks to a timely 15% off coupon), and just like that I had yet another guitar. Compact enough for flying, but still a full-sized guitar. It's pretty (as these things go), plays well, and after I replaced the pickup with something a little less "hot", it actually sounds pretty good. It has a built in headphone amp and tuner, so I don't need to carry a lot of stuff to keep myself entertained.

After a month away from home, I'm still playing and learning. I haven't watched TV. I don't spend a lot of time on the internet. I ride the trainer, but not to the point of exhaustion in a futile attempt to kill the hours and occupy my brain. I'm engaged, and I find that to be the best salve for the deep aches I'm currently experiencing. It's a positive activity, and I need all I can get.

Now I just need to stop buying guitars. Right after I pick up that sweet short-scale bass and the G&L ASAT and maybe a guitar for my son, who has shown interest...

The only negative is to my savings. In that way, it's kinda like riding a bike.