As I look around my home office/studio I'm pretty dismayed at the view. Actually the room itself is very nice and was an important part of our deciding to buy this house nearly 30 years ago. But I am not a tidy person. Not even close. This office looks worse than most dorm rooms. Like a bomb went off.
I am currently working on three different projects. I'm learning a new song for a wedding that I will be playing soon. Actually I'm working on several new pieces for upcoming weddings and a recital that I will be giving in July. I'm also putting together lessons and studies for my students. I've done this before and hopefully this will be my last time. And third, I'm writing out a solo guitar arrangement of "Smoke On The Water" for my students.
I'm also too easily distracted. So I'll stop in the middle of something to work on something else. Now I've got two somethings laying about in various states of completion. I need to do a few things in my life to escape this. First I need to get organized. You know - "a place for everything and everything in it's place". In the case of my paperwork I'm about 90% there. I have file cabinets filled with file folders all marked with the appropriate titles. But I get busy and distracted and so the papers are piled on top of my desk waiting.....and waiting....
Many wedding ceremony musicians will tell a bride or groom (or their mothers) that they must choose their music from a provided list. That's not how I do it. If they want a song performed I will do my very best to accommodate. That makes for some weird arrangements sometimes and always requires a great deal of time. For a wedding I played last weekend the bride requested a song by Mendelssohn. I probably had 50+ hours tied up in learning and practicing that one song alone. Gee! Who had time to file papers? I suppose I could have said NO, but it's their wedding! And this may be the last wedding they ever have.
I arranged "Smoke on the Waters" to shut up the wise guys at the events I play. I'm always getting some guy (and it's ALWAYS a guy) asking me to play "Freebird", something by Led Zeppelin, or Ozzy, or.....well you get it. So I did this tongue-in-cheek arrangement. The problem is the students like it and want to learn it. So I'm writing it out so that they can. I could have said NO I guess, but if something like this will motivate them to do the work it takes to advance their skills then I'm in.
So I guess a large part of my problem is my inability to say NO to anything except house work. I'm not sure if I always say YES to avoid tidying up or if that's my "normal". But I really like the response I get when I deliver. The brides are thrilled and the students are excited and for a minute I feel like a Hollywood hero. Besides, if a messy desk is the sign of a messy mind, what does an empty desk suggest? And I would rather be Batman than Martha Stewart any day. Now if I can just get Mr. Clean to stop giving me dirty looks from across the room.