music, therapy, and me

It is my season for thinking about what comes next for me. This year has been especially challenging due to leaving the worlds of church and internships within a couple of months of each other. I am faced with less income and more time - things that are both good and not so good. So, my natural period of reflection and planning is laced with thoughts about finding more money and using the time I have from this current iteration of my body and mind. I am not struggling with my current salary, but more money is always nice. I am also going to have to pay quite a bit for some medical procedures this year, so extra money would be good for me. I feel that I have some options, but it will mean breaking a habit of needing to crash as soon as I get home from my 7-3 job. The big question for today is "where do I feel I need to be?" Lately, something that has bothered me for most of my career has been expressed by someone else, so it has come to the forefront of my brain again. It is t

Two weeks ago, I shared music from people born in the month of October with my students as part of our Musicians of the Month series. One of the musicians that I shared was Weird Al Yankovic - one of my favorite people since I met him in a sandwich shop at 2am in West Hollywood in 1986. I put "Eat It" on the playlist, and my clients got angry! They were upset that the song that they were listening to sounded like Michael Jackson's song, but it wasn't. For those that were able to listen rather than just engage in bluster, I explained the concept of a parody song, and I remembered that I haven't written about this valuable tool in this blog series. I combine the concepts of piggyback and parody songs into one. It just makes sense that I am doing the same thing when I use a melody for a piggyback song or a parody - they are the same things. I have used piggyback techniques for myself, with my clients, and with my interns over the years. How do I do this? I strip the

It is Saturday, and I am getting a slow start to my day. After a day of horrible pain and behavior management recertification, things are starting to calm down a bit. I put my feet up on a chair and did some stretching before behavior management, and that seemed to help. We will see how the back and the knees go as the day progresses, but I know how to help it if it goes bad on me again. Well, not if, but when. Do you ever have a time when you feel like something needs to happen, but you don't know what? My brain is spinning. My body is hurting, and it feels like autumn outside. We are expecting rain throughout the weekend which is good because it will tamp down the dust kicked up by the harvest. That should help my breathing - less dust and plant-based mold in the air. What do I want to get done these days? I have no idea. I just have this feeling that something needs to be accomplished. So, I will take some time to explore this feeling a bit more. See you tomorrow!

It is the day after Halloween, and other than a screaming fit from my first group of students where I had to yell in order to be heard, the day went pretty well. I am in immense levels of pain from my repaired knee - don't know if it was sitting on the floor so much, CPR recertification, or the weather that has had the most effect on this level of pain, but it is pretty bad. So, here I am, facing physical behavior management training this afternoon with a bum leg and a close to bum back. Can't wait! Anyway, let's talk about fun things on this Friday. This week, I have been introducing my 21st century musicians to 20th century music technology. I have managed to break two cassette players, a record player from the 1960's, an RCA cord, and my RCA input in my karaoke machine. I did something really hard for me - I threw out the broken cassette players after trying to open them up and fix them. I hate throwing things out that might be able to be fixed, but I also cannot jus