folk music

Five Good Things

/ Alyxander James / Leave a comment

Hello, dear readers. I’m feeling stuck for something to write about this week, so I’m going to default to the five-item list of some happy things from the past week:

  1. The EMG last Thursday went well. I mean, it wasn’t fun, by any stretch of the imagination, but it did at least rule out pinched nerves as the cause of the chronic pain I’m dealing with, so that’s good. The rheumatologist recommended PT (which I still need to follow up on) and some supplements to try, as next steps. I’m not exactly hopeful, but at least we were able to rule something out.
  2. We bought a Harry Potter LEGO advent calendar last month, and it’s been so fun to open it each day and build a tiny thing. (Granted, we have forgotten about half the days, because we’ve not had an advent calendar in past years and also it’s the season where we come home and are tired and not thinking very clearly. But still.) We’ve had a handful of characters, some Christmas trees, a turkey (with legs that pop off so the minis can hold them…it’s adorable), and a few other random things. It’s a nice source of joy.
  3. We’ve made so much soup the past couple of weeks! Since we’ve been under the weather and it’s been cold, soup has seemed like the correct course of action. I’m getting to use the techniques we learned in the knife skills class we took last month, which is making my food prep way more efficient. This is the recipe we’ve liked best so far.
  4. We’re finally both getting over this awful cold. My partner’s a few days ahead of me in recovery, so I’m hopeful that by the weekend I’ll feel much better. I’m already much better than I was last weekend, so we’re moving in the right direction!
  5. I wasn’t sure what class to sign up for at the Old Town School for next session (songwriting filled up suuuuuper early and I missed my chance), but I finally made a decision and signed up last night – I’ll be taking a mountain dulcimer class! My partner’s aunt had given an old dulcimer to my partner’s dad a while back, and he’s not using it much, so he said I could borrow it. I’ll pick it up when we’re there for the holidays. I have felt kind of stuck, musically, and I think learning a new instrument is a great way to get unstuck. So I’m excited about that!

What Day Is It?

/ Alyxander James / Leave a comment

Hello, dear readers, and apologies for the tardiness of this post. I had Monday off from work due to a Jewish holiday, and I have spent the whole week confused about what day it is. The week has been a little chaotic on top of that (more on that in the coming weeks, I’m sure), so yeah. Definitely forgot it was Thursday.

Over the weekend, there were some big shifts in plans for the next couple of months. It looks like we’re moving in August when our lease is up, which we had originally intended to put off for another year. We’re looking at places on Saturday, and I am holding my breath and hoping we find the right place ASAP. We’re still planning to go to Song School in Colorado in the middle of August, so it’s going to be quite the month.

Last night we got a beautiful break from thinking about moving logistics, though. We got to see a supergroup of our friends Heather Mae, Crys Matthews, Joe Stevens, and JJ Jones play at Evanston SPACE, which is one of our favorite venues in the area. They’re doing a Pride tour all month, and it was a beautiful show. (If you have a chance to catch the Singing OUT tour in your city, do yourself a favor and go.) The room was full of family. We all cried. We all laughed. We all sang along. And then we got to get hugs and handshakes from some of our favorite musician friends. It was exactly the sort of life-affirming experience that I needed…that so many of us need. It feels good to feel seen.

Saturday we’re heading back to SPACE to hear Barbara Carr and On Big Shoulders, which we’re also super excited about. If you’re in Chicago and looking for Saturday evening plans, I recommend checking this show out, too!

14 Songs

/ Alyxander James / Leave a comment

I hit my goal of 14 songs for FAWM on Monday. Fourteen songs in eighteen days – I’m pretty pleased with those numbers. There’s still about a week left in February, so we’ll see how many more I can get done before the month is out.

Things I’ve learned or relearned so far this month:

  • Showing up is the hardest (and most important) part. I learned this last year during FAWM, and while I haven’t put it as much into practice as I’d like, I’m getting there. I think creative folks can easily fall into the trap of waiting around for inspiration to hit and avoid doing creative work because it just doesn’t feel like the right time, but the thing is…if you want inspiration to show up, you need to show up first. The times I have been most prolific have been the ones where I set aside an hour specifically for writing, and then just wrote. Sometimes I hit dead ends, yes – but not as often as I expected to. More often I found that inspiration caught up with me and I was able to write some interesting and unexpected things.
  • FAWM is fun on its own, but it’s way more fun if you know people from outside the internet who are doing it. My partner has been participating this year, as well as some other friends, and it’s so great to have a little community of people I can run into in my day-to-day life and gush with about this bonkers thing we’re doing.
  • One of the best ways to get unstuck if I feel like I can’t write is to experiment. This month I have written in a total of three guitar tunings, used a slide for the first time, and written a song on the mandolin (or, well, on the ‘ukulele, but it’s currently tuned like a mandolin…). Switching to something that’s outside of my comfort zone is a great way to let a song go to unexpected places.

And now, here’s song number 14, which is one of my favorites from this month:

Adventure Calls

/ Alyxander James / Leave a comment

This past week has been a fun one. Sunday, I got to take a class on hand-sewing bow ties, taught by the fabulous Franklin Habit. The bow tie I made turned out a little snug, but I’m already gearing up to make more (with some adjustments to size so I don’t strangle myself when I wear them).

My partner was visiting his family in Minnesota for a few days, so I got some time alone in our apartment, which is a weird and rather uncommon thing. I definitely missed having him there, but it was nice to be a hermit for a few days, too.

I’ve been struggling to focus at work this week, after a couple of weeks that felt uncharacteristically (but refreshingly) productive. I don’t really mind that I’m a little scattered right now, though, because tomorrow, I will be on vacation.

My partner and I leave tomorrow for a grand adventure we’ve been wanting to take for years now: we’re headed off to a week-long songwriting camp in Colorado.

I was feeling pretty anxious last week, mostly, I think, because I started worrying that the experience wouldn’t live up to expectations, since we’ve been looking forward to this for so long. I feel like yesterday I finally hit the point of accepting that the journey is just as important as the destination, and that even if it isn’t perfect (which it probably won’t be, because life is messy), it will still be a new experience and a thing worth trying.

Besides, my partner and I love road trips, and this will be the biggest one we’ve gotten to take together.

There will be no blog next week, because I’ll be busy making music and ignoring my phone/the internet as much as possible. Catch you all in a couple of weeks!

Things are Looking Up

/ Alyxander James / Leave a comment

Last week was awfully full of feelings, many of them rather negative.

This past week has been full of feelings, too, but largely of a more positive variety.

Last Thursday night, my partner and I went to a songwriting workshop at the Old Town School put on by one of Mouths of Babes, one of our favorite folk duos. It was phenomenal and inspiring and made me want to write all the songs.

I haven’t really had time yet to start on writing all the songs, though. Friday morning I picked up a giant rental SUV before work, and that evening, my partner and I went to IKEA, where we picked up four pieces of furniture and a handful of other organizational tools. Saturday was spent building furniture and rearranging most of our apartment. We finished up Sunday, and even had time to go to MSI with a friend and then to a Mouths of Babes concert (which was also phenomenal and inspiring).

And then Monday came.

Monday evening, a friend arrived in town who will be staying with us for a total of almost two weeks. My partner and I can’t take any time off during the week, but we’re looking forward to playing tourist a bit over the weekend and take advantage of some city sites we haven’t taken in yet in the 3+ years we’ve lived here!

But before that, on Monday, I worked half a day, and then went to a consultation appointment with a surgeon here in Chicago who, among other things, performs gender-affirming chest masculinization surgery for transmasculine folks.

The appointment went really, really well – the surgeon was charming and knowledgeable, and considering the rather intense anxiety I generally have regarding medical facilities, professionals, and procedures, I felt surprisingly safe.

Long story short, I set a date for surgery, so come October, I will be getting two literal weights off my chest. I am unbelievably happy, and far less anxious than I was a week ago now that I have that giant unknown better nailed down.