I’m back from my most recent travel adventure. And a fun adventure it was. For a little while on both my trip to Houston and returning from there, I made some travel friends. Which I think is cool. It started at my departing airport with the airline changing my departing gate 5 times or so before settling on the final departure gate.
I was sitting at one of the assigned gates before the final gate when a woman and her two children came over. There was a free seat next to me and one of the kids said in German something about it being a free seat. I responded in German that he should sit there.
For those of you who don’t know, I have been working on learning German for quite some time. I can’t vouch for how good I am as I don’t get to use it much, but this was a small opportunity.
I asked a few questions of the woman, and we talked a while. As it turns out the little group was traveling back from Munich and visiting family. The gate changed and they needed to go do what you do with young kids, so they left. I got some water and then wondered over to the next assigned gate. They were there and the kids were having fun with a gentleman who was on the phone. He was really nice about it all and everything was genial. And then it came time to board.
When I got on board it turned out, one of my seat mates was the woman with the two kids. The boys were one in the row in front of her and one behind.
The little boy in the row in front ended up spending most of the flight with us in our row. At one point he was stretched across the laps of the three of us. Some of what was fun was that because he would talk to his mom in German I got to listen. And I was pleasantly surprised to find I followed most of his conversation. It was also a lot of fun to answer him in German. He didn’t expect it and he would clam up. It was quite comical.
The boy in the row behind made friends with the woman sitting in the window seat and was really quite self-contained especially considering that at four and a half he was the younger of the boys.
They had been traveling for a day or possibly more and were all a bit on the punchy side. The woman was hoping the boys would sleep on the flight, but they didn’t. At least not for most of it. I think they finally fell asleep just before we started our decent.
I know this doesn’t even begin to explain why but for me this was probably one of the most fun flights I’ve taken in a while. I suppose it had to do with how relaxed we all were about it. It didn’t matter that the one boy wanted to sit with us. Or that the other crawled under the seats to visit our row when his brother first came over the seat. It didn’t matter that the one was trying to get a nap but couldn’t get comfortable until we stretched him out. And it didn’t matter or bother anyone that we were talking too much and keeping him awake and he let us know that. It was funny. And for me it was a great flight. Hopefully those couple of hours gave the woman a bit of a respite that made it a little easier to make it through the last leg of their trip home.
My trip home started with some fun as well. Though it didn’t continue on the plane this time. I think much to the relief of one of the other passengers.
I was sitting at a bar/food place ordering some breakfast when this gentleman comes up next to me and leans a guitar case against the counter next to me and sits down next to the guitar. I could probably stop the story there and many of you would just figure out that we got to talking. Which would be accurate. But there is a little more fun to this.
So yes, I asked what he had in the case and that started a conversation. We each ordered some breakfast and he asked for “hahm” on his breakfast sandwich. The server didn’t understand him, so I translated, “ham”. Which then prompted the question of where he was from. He’s from Australia. So, more conversation.
We were a fair bit early for the flight, so we chatted while we waited for the flight. And we talked about all kinds of things. It was a great chat. I really enjoyed it. It came time for boarding to start so we continued to chat while we were waiting for the boarding groups. As we were standing around waiting, a guy who’d been sitting the other side of me came up and said something about if we were sitting next to each other on the flight because if we were, it was going to be a long flight. He was sort of amazed about the gamut of topics we’d covered in the hour or so that we were sitting at the bar. We got a good laugh out of that.
We weren’t seated near each other so once I boarded the plane that was the end of the conversation and the fun. The flight was quiet and uneventful. Which is how you want a plane ride to be, uneventful.
The trip was good and covered a good bit of ground. The original purpose was to visit a friend and see the Space Center in Houston. We did that the first day. It was cool to see. I think what was most interesting and disorienting for me was that it was in the city for the most part and as far as I am concerned.
I’m used to Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral in Florida which is an hour or so drive east from Orlando and is part of the Canaveral National Seashore which means there’s not much around the complex. It’s sort of in the middle of nowhere relatively speaking. So that was a big difference with Johnson and Houston Space Center. My friend and I were a bit tired from my late arrival the night before, so we opted for an Uber to and from the Center. We had a great driver on the way back from the Center. Apparently, we got positive marks from the driver for good conversation.
The next day was the Houston Zoo. Yes. It is August. Yes. We went to the Zoo in August. Yes. It was hot. And apparently, I was holding up much better in my jeans and boots than my friend in his shorts and sneakers. I have no explanation. I did get a bunch of great pictures though. That’s what I was hoping for with the trip to the zoo. I was hoping to get photos of animals, and maybe some plants. And I did manage both. I got a lot of animal pictures and a few really cool flower pictures. I’m excited because it means I have more to work from and choose from for some of my next art pieces. Hooray!
The next day, my last day in Houston, was a trip to the Houston Museum of Fine Art. That turned out to be a great treat. It was nice that it was all inside and cool since outside it was hotter than the day before. I found a couple of Van Gogh paintings, a few more Monet’s, a Caillebotte, a Seurat, and a Rousseau. They even had a prime example of a Fauvist painting. That was cool to see. We pretty much spent the whole day in the museum. We got there when it opened and left close to closing time. A day well spent in my books. And I had no idea Houston had such a nice fine art museum.
This was a fun trip and a nice change of pace. And, though it may take me the week to get rested and recovered, I’m excited to get back into all the things I’ve been working on. More soon. Cheers!
Too People-y
I’ve been trying to stay off the soapbox and stick with art or music because, well, there are lots of soapboxes out there with lots of people hanging out on top of them with much more to say and most of what I might say would just be noise. However, I’ve noticed something recently. And it triggered a thought or two. So, I’m going to share that and then get off the soapbox and back to art and music.
Many people I know, would likely say I’m not much of a people person and that I definitely fall in with the people who complain on social media about it being too people-y and about having to deal with people. And not long ago, I probably would have agreed, and related to the memes and laughed at them or commiserated or related. I’ve seen in how I feel about them which is that I don’t relate any more. I don’t find them as funny as I used to. It’s not that my world has changed so much that it doesn’t matter anymore. I work in IT for my day job, and I do sometimes marvel at some of the questions I have to answer from some otherwise very smart people. And yes, there are times, after I’ve answered the same question 4 times that I would prefer to alleviate my frustrations with the person through a little violence. This is one reason I take Taekwondo and my manager encourages me to go to class. That being said, I don’t hate people.
I like people fine. I get along quite well with most people I meet, and I put my best effort into being a welcoming and pleasant person. I’ve got no reason to be nasty to people and I try to show some patience with people, and if the opportunity presents, offer a helping hand or kind word. I’ve even been trying to do a little more of this lately. I don’t always succeed. I’m a work in progress.
One thing I’ve noticed though is the overall apparent decline in civility in the country I live in. People seem easier to anger, quicker with a harsh word, and more likely to avoid, or to want to avoid other people. Now, there is some crazy going on, I won’t deny that. But I think we are in a vicious cycle.
People are angry, scared, frustrated, unhappy, lonely, short-tempered, and hurting on so many levels. They’re like a child who doesn’t have the words for all the feelings that are overwhelming them, so they lash out. And then, other people try not to go out and deal with that. But that just means the people avoiding interactions are making themselves isolated, lonely, intolerant, and letting their social skills rust. Meanwhile, the angry people, the scared people, without a calmer or more positive interaction, or even just a little understanding, are left to their own devices and to feed off each other which just makes them angrier, lonelier, and harsher in their judgement.
I’m not saying put yourself in danger, or harm’s way, or in a position to get hurt. Or even that you need to go out of your way to get out and interact with people. I am suggesting that maybe we all need a bit of practice. Social skills need practice. We have to interact with others to learn how to interact with others. And we have to practice that because it’s really easy when you don’t have to interact with others to forget not to roll your eyes, or make faces, and so on. It’s really easy to not take the time to hear someone out when they want to talk to you about something or express their opinion, or even share something they think is really cool. We get used to living in our own world and forget that other people have their own worlds as well and maybe they want to share it.
I know it isn’t easy, especially these days. And I’m not saying I’m good at it. But when I see some of the memes on social media about not going out because of the people, or ordering online so they don’t have to go to a store and maybe talk to people, I’m not as inclined to hit the like button. Oh, I do share the occasional one that says I have a limit and now I need a shovel. We all have limits. But what if, we exercise our social skills a little more and get a little better at understanding and showing a little more patience and judging a little less. How might things change? Might they “go back” to a time when it didn’t feel so assaultive to be in public? Could we break the cycle we’re in? Could we then not feel as lonely, isolated, scared, angry? And what would that look like? What would that feel like?
Yeah, I get it. It’s a little pollyannaish. And yet, still worth looking at.
I’m going to climb down from the soapbox now and get back to some art.
I am still working on the Koala piece. I knew, when I started it that it was going to take a lot of work, so I’m not surprised to still be working on it. I’ve got a lot completed and it looks much more like the subject. There’s still plenty of refining to do and balancing which means several more hours of work. I’m really looking forward to seeing the end result.
I had planned, over this past weekend to spend time working on the Koala both Saturday and Sunday but it didn’t work out quite as I’d wanted, and I didn’t get to work on it Saturday. However, I got to spend several hours on Sunday working on it. I was really excited about that. It felt great to spend all that time on art and watching the piece build as I worked. I’m hoping to get more time to work this week and maybe a little at the weekend, though I have plans that will impact how much weekend time I have this week.
I have several ideas lined up to work on next, after I finish the Koala. I probably need to choose one and take some time to start the outline/rough in so I’m ready to go as soon as I finish this one. It makes it so much easier to keep the momentum going if I’ve started the next piece before I finish the current piece. The majority of the next pieces I’m planning will be color pieces, I think. One is a question. I’m not sure how I’m going to approach it. I also have another stippling piece planned, though I’m not starting it right away. And I’m still sorting through all the pictures I took in Houston to decide which ones I want to work from. I got some great shots, so I have lots of choices.
I only have a little music stuff to share this time. I had a thunky D string on my Les Paul, so I changed the strings this weekend. Usually, when I change strings, I don’t have music playing. And if I do, I don’t really pay attention to it. This weekend, I was listening to a playlist that I’d really been enjoying, and I did something, I don’t usually do, and haven’t done in a long time. I tried to play along with what I was listening to. I know this is not revolutionary. I know this is how you figure stuff out and learn songs from listening. I do know this. I just haven’t been doing it. There were two songs in particular that I was trying to play along with and as I was doing it, is when I realized something.
I realized, I hadn’t done that in a very, very long time and I was having fun with it because, amazingly, I might have been getting close to something that was almost the right key and maybe chords? That was exciting. It also hit me that one of the next steps for getting better might be to spend more time with the guitar and stereo than with the guitar and TABS. I’m not disrespecting TABS, or sheet music, or any of that. I just know one of the areas that I have always wanted to be better at, and that I’d have to get good at if I want to play some of the songs I like, is being able to learn to play from listening, or ‘by ear’. I’ve been intimidated by the idea of trying to learn from ear for so long, because I had the impression of it being long and tedious, and laborious. And that I’d never get it or be so far off that it was nothing like wheat I was trying to learn. So, to have sat there and done a little of that this weekend was a big step for me. And more fun than I’d expected. Now, to work that into some form of regular practice. It’s kind of exciting.
I probably sound like a broken record or maybe an over enthusiastic teen-ager when I say this, oh well. I am really excited about the current art piece, the Koala, that I’m working on as well as the pieces I have planned. I’ve got so much reference to work from with great shapes, and details, and colors. I can’t wait to get to them all. And on top of that, with the little ‘break through’, if you want to call it that, with the guitar this weekend, I’m super excited to take a new approach to my playing, learning, and practicing. It’s changed some of my mindset and I’m so looking forward to figuring out what I can do. I can’t wait to add more of that to my current routine. I’m excited. It’s going to be cool.
I’m off now to make art and music. And hopefully, someone’s day a little better. Cheers!
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