YOU. YES, YOU.

So...

I'm very much a novice at guitar, but I can sing. Extremely well at my most open and free. I guess I want to find someone who's also learning, because that might be a better motivational force than attempting to push on by myself, without any friends, really, around me...

I've never found my type of people in life. So on my own, I stagnate, and secretly yearn for a connection like that...but rarely consciously realize it, because loneliness, period, is a major problem.

The friends I've managed to make in the past were almost all friends at their convenience -- lies and ditching you; macho, peer-pressure mind games; you're always there for them, but they rarely, if ever, have your back...and they never seemed to me like they had any do-or-die creative ambition or burning desire to learn and express themselves in that way. And, I'm a mess, really, at this point in my life. At my best, I can connect and be true and gushing with anybody, but now it's like...well, I'm willing to try, though I've become so insecure. Measured against everyone else in the rat race, I guess I could consider myself to be a complete failure at life. But I don't care about that race. It's a colossal waste.

I just want to connect with someone, especially creatively, who also doesn't care about that.

We could learn together, teach each other, and draw the hidden depths of our creativity out!

I've always wanted to harmonize with somebody, too.

I like all music -- including the oft-derided genre of country...which, in its classic incarnation, is actually a lot different from what most people today think it is. I'm even listening to John Phillip Sousa's old marching band stuff because of these "progression of popular music" playlists I've been working on (starting from the year recording became commonplace -- 1890). I can get into anything. It all has merit.

First and foremost, I love beautiful melody. But I'm at a weird place where my head is trying to find peace and beauty and, er, sleep. I wanted to hibernate because my thoughts have been uncontrollable. So I listened to songs like this, this, this, this, and this.

But there's certain music that feels awakening and important to me, like...Lauryn Hill's Mystery of Iniquity, SURF'S UP, Don McLean's American Pie, or Moonage Daydream by David Bowie...

I'm obsessed with fabled lost albums -- like why didn't SMiLE by the Beach Boys or The Who's Lifehouse ever get finished? The concepts they were devising and toying with seemed like they were attempting to stretch beyond the boundaries of what people even think of as music today. A symphony to God, with songs designed to subconsciously encourage you to eat vegetables and drink water? A vision of an interconnected future where no one is free, and we all consume and do as we're told?

Now, popular music's become about side-hos and money, and "find you a bitch who can do it both ways". Broccoli is a song about smoking. It's like...corrupted children, because we've chosen to echo the wrong ideas. The sounds are like a nightmare to me. Yes, there's still plenty of good, but I don't even like a lot of modern singers because they're putting on that veil of perfection. That show-biz bravado that doesn't betray any hint of vulnerability. It's technically perfect, but often spiritually and emotionally bankrupt.

We're afraid to reveal our genuine selves and emotions, but when we do -- when you align yourself with that method of being...it's the most wonderful thing ever.

Fulfillment is only ever gunna come from freeing the channels that have become clogged as you grow up and start to compare yourself to everyone else, which leads to worry.

Yet we all have and know things others don't; we're all changing each other's lives whether we mean to or not...
We're all weak in isolation. You're only as smart or as together as you feel in the present moment. Which can be whisked away in a moment. We need each other's support.
No man is an island. Or something. Shut up, Tom.

But really. You blast someone with support and encouragement, and you'll see that the effect is like water to the seed. You don't know what you can be, because today, there're always dissenters keeping you hesitant, doubting and second-guessing yourself. And that, in return, makes you liable to do the same back to them! But find that pocket where everything is okay, where you can be as crazily open as you like -- then your real inner thoughts are allowed to arise. And who knows just what they are or how valuable they could be?

And...gosh, ignoring all that -- I just wish I could find someone interested in that first step of learning an instrument and singing together in the name of fun. It's easy...if you try.