Sickness and Music (pretty much rambling)

So if you are one of the people who is subscribed to my twitter or if you are a facebook friend or even a real life friend, you probably know that I am sick and have been since last Friday. What I call "The Perfect Storm" of disease hit me and this photo shows what it did better than words can tell.

I probably shouldn't have drank that Pepsi from 1999. We found it at work, among some items that some folks had donated. It was a 1999, bottled, Elvis-edition Pepsi still sealed and full. Joseph said he would give me a dollar to drink it. I asked for more, and we finally settled on two. I wouldn't normally do these things, but at work I get so bored I will do lots of things just to make the day go by. The deal was for me to drink half of it in order to get the money. I actually drank almost all of it, to prove my manhood or something. I told Joseph to take a sip but he wouldn't do it. Wuss.

The next morning the Pepsi from the last millenium caught up to me at the same time as a sinus infection. The perfect storm of disease had hit and now, almost a week later, I still am fighting it off.

Which hasn't been fun because the week has included two tough history exams, an informative speech, and a rough draft for a poetry essay that needed to be written (but hasn't yet). Normally, I would be complaining; but if something like this doesn't happen at least once a semester I think I would try to pinch myself so I could wake up from my dream. College is just like that. Stuff goes wrong at the worst time and you either rise up to the occasion or things get messed up. It's one of the hardest lessons learned for many students.

And so this week I have been fighting through my assignments while also trying to keep my nose blown and my body hydrated. I've been trying to make sure to take all my pills at all the right intervals, before or after the right meals. I haven't seen a lot of improvement since Friday when the food poison finally went away (I won't say how). Now I'm just kind of tired and my face hurts from all the sniffling and coughing. I have been laying down so much that laying down is even uncomfortable. I had to miss church tonight and I didn't want to. Tomorrow I have an essay rough draft due and I haven't even started it. And this congestion doesn't seem to be going away.

Just a few minutes ago I did something that I don't really do all that much anymore: I got out my guitar and just started playing some of my favorite songs. I wasn't practicing for anything. I wasn't preparing any songs for church. I just picked out a couple favorites and played them for the sheer joy of being able to play my favorite songs and sing along to them as well. And my mind began to wander back to days when I made music a much bigger part of my life.

I have been leading worship songs for church since I was in the 11th grade. Before that I played drums in a worship band. At the same time I played drums in a rock band with some friends from that same church. A few years later, after I started college, that same band (with some member changes) started playing local shows. They were very small, but if we kept at it we might have gone somewhere. Of course, everybody had their own ideas about how they wanted things, and we eventually went our own separate ways. But we had some good times.

Ask anybody who plays music and they will tell you, there is something about cranking the amps up, banging on the cymbals, and as a unit of band members playing a song that you love. That's a feeling you can't get by playing Guitar Hero or Rock Band. It's a reward for the hard work and practice. There is something about taking a solo, or coming up with a great riff, or a sweet drum pattern.

I miss it, and as much as I like sitting in my room strumming the 6-string, that's not enough. I'd like things to be a louder, and more full. I'd like to feel the energy in the room when you have the guitars, bass, vocals, and drums all going at the same time--and I want to be in the middle of it.

Either way, I've noticed that there is one place I go when I'm sick, lonely, down, or whatever else. I always go to my guitar. I don't know why that is, but I always go there and it makes me feel better. Today, with all the coughing and hacking, the public speaking assignment, the feeling of wanting to be anywhere else but on this same couch, it's no surprise that that's where I found myself once again.