The Root Of The Problem

I forgot about everything. I forgot about the game I was looking for cheats on, I forgot about where I was going and what I was doing, I forgot about the apple I was going to eat...

Two words. Singing lessons.

We did the exercises. The usual. I’m more at terms with scales now, even on my own. This is a slow slow process though. Then we did The Vacluse Lament. I still can’t stand to hear myself sing it. But I figured it out, she’s very crafty that teacher you know. I never ever thought that I would see myself falling for Super Nanny techniques. I hated that show and thought I would always win. But here, whether deliberately or inadvertently, she was conning me into not crapping on in the exercises about hating them and sucking. The faster I just do them the sooner I get to sing.

If she knows that I actually really do like and enjoy singing then she is doing it deliberately. If she doesn’t (and I wouldn’t blame her for a second if she did, of course I am taking and paying for the lessons, but this is thoroughly countered by the fact I act like it is the bane of my life most of the time). If she gets more of that than passion then it’s merely a complete accident in the planning of things.

Anyway. We got to talking, about Uni, the future, exactly the things that I have been talking about here. I almost felt like saying – yeah I’ve been discussing that on my blog lately. But that may have been weird. I got a little teary just thinking about the abuse and the effort in the highly sensitive state I am always in whilst there. I faced the fact that I won’t get into the course I want like this, which happens to be the one that she did. I have never seen two people who wanted so much of the same things out of life, be so different. The first course I wanted she went to and then seeing it wasn’t all they made it sound like it was, she transferred into my revised choice. It’s scary.

Then we got onto the fact that I will follow a voice but I will not lead. This, as you may well know, is a Deep Seated Psychological Issue. I have no idea why or what or any of that.

Go on, hypnotise me.

I like to sing with another person, so much more than I like it on my own. So why would I want to do something that I don’t even like doing? I just sound better, feel better, and sing louder clearer and with more joy, with another person than I do by myself. I see no problem. Even if they suck worse than I do, or don’t even properly know the words, it’s better than nothing; it’s the principle of the thing. Even if my microphone is turned up way louder, as long I can hear them and sing with them, not have them block out my voice, then I am a lot happier. I like to do everything else alone, singing is just different in so many ways.

By this stage, by this amount of lessons I felt like I could get wise with her about it. All eloquent, cheeky and determined. I explained not knowing well enough and with enough passion that she let it go. Moving on instead to “Why do you want to do this, what do you want out of your lessons?” What do I want? Oh, could you ask a harder question please?

I tried not the drag ‘what I want’ into this third round of lessons. It’s what collapsed that poor blonde chick’s head right before she kicked me out. Me turning up all eager with my fat folder of songs I wrote or wanted to cover. Laid it all on her, went through pages and pages of it, song after song, without any music trying desperately to convince her I was anything less than utterly un-teachable.

God I’d forgotten about that. That certainly played a part.

I don’t know. I woke up this morning and felt extremely connected to whatever song happened to be playing. I do want to be out the front, or rather I will, when I sound better.

“Music is all about self expression” she says. Sure. I get that, I know. That’s why I’m doing it. I want to express my songs through my voice to the world.

“Your singing teacher can only do so much” Yeah. Well things might be different if it was only me who thought I needed the lessons. If someone in my life had ever thought I was good or able to be listened to. That might change it. I would be improving a passable voice. I would try to lead. I need her to tell me that I’ve improved; I need her to say I’m teachable and listenable. I need constant encouragement. And if I wasn’t such a masochist I wouldn’t even be trying to drag myself down this path. Does that count for something? I need to be told that one too.

Then the problem of “Why does no-one like me?” comes after that one. At least I’ve been dealing with that one all my life. People even say it out loud to me, use my name, just to remind me... Another thing that ‘helped’ my singing was this girl I knew. She was everything I wasn’t, both good and bad. She had huge tits, of which I was jealous, she was popular, boys liked her, and she lived in the city and used it. She was also a bit unhealthy, and very very tragically depressed. And she could sing, she made it sound like she was fucking fantastic, but I never heard her sing much while we were friends. I only realised afterwards that maybe it was part of her ploy to manipulate me and keep me depressed and on her level. She insulted my singing a lot; she’s the girl who kicked me out

of the as-yet-to-be-formed band for not learning drums fast enough. That was bad too. This is a path littered with tragedy.

I do a lot of that taking to a wall stuff. Like in the movies where the person makes all their own conclusions and the other doesn’t answer once, then the first says “You’re such a good listener.” and walks off.

I’m afraid of a lot of things in my life. Regardless of that smile that is so happy and fake it’s genuine. “How are you today?” “Aw I’m good thank-you!”

This is like what I said about the theme of Identity and Belonging in this year’s English curriculum- I wanted to pass English, not find myself. Although I am completely fine with that part of things, he can probe my religious beliefs all he wants, just don’t ask what I want out of my singing lessons.

Am I supposed to tell her? Is that what is supposed to happen now? Should I take my books of lyrics and my blog and show her? I only just got the courage to talk to her properly. I mean it has to happen, eventually, the connection with the soul and all of that. I think I’d be less embarrassed about singing in front of her if she knew what was going through. Musings said recently, “I can only write poetry if I’m being an attention whore about it.” Well I am under the suspicion that I can only perform (sing) if I am being a drama queen about it. But one thing, I’m not paying for the lesson where I have to pour my heart out, for one it’ll take forever and secondly, I won’t be learning to sing in it.

Another useful quote from Musings: “That’s why I think it's important to share what goes on my head, because although life can be lonely, the attempt to make you understand what it is to be me, and for me to understand what it is to be you -- that can make the world seem less lonely”

Isn’t that what it’s all about? Isn’t everything about that desperate need to express and connect through it? Drawing, painting, writing, singing, dancing, teaching, frigging tax accountancy? It’s all about helping, showing, or even making people understand or know who you are. Everything. This Identity and Belonging shit, making friends, performance, the internet, books, the media generally - life.

So maybe it’s not quite that profound. But how I arrived at this theory was fascinating. It came from a rather obscure conversation about sexual fantasies of all things. Then I wondered why people wanted to know that about each other – they’re trying to get into each other’s heads and connect through the fantasies with the possibility of starting a relationship, and then I thought about that quote from Musings and how that relates to my teacher situation.

But all that aside, I’m only making a convincing argument on the side of the thing I don’t want to do, which is have to bare my inner struggles to my teacher. Only seven people ever read any of my songs. My mother, the two readers of this blog, my two best ex-friends, a drum teacher and an English teacher. I guess, why shouldn’t she? But I don’t know, this is too close to the bone. We’ll see.

Maybe I’ll bring her a recording of me attempting to sing one of mine own songs. At home. Much revised. With the headphones on and instant feedback from the microphone so I can hear how out of tune I am. And a short short piece, just a chorus. Maybe.

I was also thinking about putting something of that sort up here. So you can make your own judgements about what I actually sound like. Then you can stop listening to my long pointless self-deprecating descriptions of my voice and either console me about the woes of having such an awful disobedient voice, or scold me for unnecessarily insulting myself for all this time. But then that would take all the fun out of it, wouldn’t it? And now that I’ve said something I should actually do something about it. *sighs*

All in good time, right?

Much love

☆Anika☆