Goodbye ?

 Drums... such a big part of my life.

My dad died in 1978.  It was shortly after that, when I was 12, that two things cushioned the blow of that major change.  A few friends of mine introduced me to baseball, specifically the Boston Red Sox.  I got to know the team through friends, watching the games on TV in the TV room at my old house just four rows from where I live right now.  The very room my father died in became that room.  Maybe it's a bit fitting that the Red Sox helped fill the gap left by my dad.  I still remember the players I admired when I fell in love with baseball and Boston - Carl Yasztremski, Rick Burleson, Fred Lynn, George Scott, Mike Stanley, Dennis Eckersley, Jerry Remy, Carlton Fisk, and the mighty #14, Jim Rice, my favorite player ever.  I'd watch Rice hit home run after home run in the clutch long before Big Papi would rise to fame when they finally won a World Series in '04.  The escapism the Red Sox provided for me in those days was invaluable.  The Boston Red Sox are more than just a team to me... they're saviours of mine in a sense.

KISS was the other thing that came into my life that year.  Just a year before, they'd come to town for the second show of their epic Love Gun tour, just a tad too late for me, because I only got into them a year later.  Star Wars had hit the big screen in '77 too, and that was more escapism for me, even though I never got to see the movie when it first came out.  I was just a little boy, and no one would bring me, as much as I pleaded.  I had Star Wars toys, the soundtrack record, comics, but didn't see the movie until it was re-released a little bit later.  I remember my brother Pete from Ontario came down and actually brought me to the Riverview Twin Cinemas to see it, finally.  It was like magic.

But KISS was the big life changer.  My brother Rick had the KISS Alive! 8 track that I would play in my sister Cindy's room on her stereo all the time.  In those days, there was no internet or anything like that, so you took whatever media you could find.  They were barely on TV, but there were lots of magazines and records out there.  They were the talk of the entertainment world.  Four guys in makeup and costumes who no one saw without them, adding to the mystique of the band and the legend.  I'd play KISS Alive! over and over.  I was especially bedazzled by a song on it called '100,000 Years', which began with these creepy bass notes, and was injected with a phase-effective drum solo by Peter Criss.  The crowd sounded electric.  The drums were bombastic.  The cymbals glistened with sonic brightness with the wishy-wash sound of the drums echoing through the venue, and then Paul Stanley would speak to the crowd, riling them up like I'd never heard before while Criss provided this jungle rhythm for a backdrop.  This was absolute magic to me.  My Pop was gone, and these guys became my babysitters while I grew up.

It wouldn't be long before I'd take an old broom handle and whittle down my own pair of drum sticks, collect some boxes, and play along with '100,000 Years in Cindy's bedroom.  I'd ask friends to come over and watch me play these boxes.  I can imagine they'd be pretty nonplussed now, looking back, but I also can see how it's a bit sad.  This little kid struggling to make sense out of things, searching for some kind of escapism from this gaping hole in his reality.  It's a ball that I took and ran with.  I'd bang on desks at school, on furniture at home, tap my fingers on books and tables, you name it.  I think my brother Greg noticed all this, and bought me my first drum set for Christmas in 1978.  It had a snare drum that was upside down with no snare bottom with the strainers on the batter, a bass drum and a hi hat.  Greg paid $75 for this blue-sparkled kit for me, which is a whole lot of cash really in those days.  He must have really felt for me getting that.  When I first sat down at that kit and started playing, quite terribly of course being the first time, I knew I had work to do.  I taught myself over the years to play - I had to figure it out completely on my own.  But that Silvertone drum set Greg bought for me is where it all started.  

It also wouldn't be long before the kids at school got wind I was a huge KISS fan.  For big KISS fans like me in those days, there were their detractors.  You either loved them or hated them, there was no in-between.  For those of us that loved them, we'd revel in everything KISS, and embraced all of it.  There was a small section of us, me included, that became targets of the budding punk rock era that was as anti-KISS as could be.  And being anti-KISS meant beating up little guys like me for no reason other than that we were KISS fans.  I was prodded relentlessly.  There was one kid in particular named Mark that was such a bully he gave me nightmares.  Him and his group were pretty relentless for a while.  But he eventually let up and actually became a friend.  But scarring damage had already been done.  He used to call me 'Poff-head', because I had this cow-lick in my hair that would never stay down, and he'd smack me on the back of the head all the time and call me that.  I can feel a sinking feeling in my gut just recalling it.

There was a kid named Kevin McManus that liked drums himself, and he was a friend of Mark's, as well as a KISS fan, so we bonded that way.  Kevin was kind of a bridge between Mark and me.  Mark never picked on Kevin for liking KISS, so I guess with Kevin taking a liking, and maybe some pity, on me, Mark relented.  I hung around a cousin who was in my class in grade 7 named John, and we were good friends until I failed grade 7 and he moved on, while I was left behind.  I failed that year maybe mostly to do with my dad dying and all the bullying I endured.  I'm not innocent, either.  I became somewhat of a bully myself later in junior high, clearly it was learned behavior.  I have to hope I didn't cause too much damage to a few other kids around me.  I know I certainly never beat up anyone.

So when I repeated grade 7, I wound up in a class with a guy I met named Larry Finn.  He'd been playing guitar for a bit longer than I'd played drums, but we wound up starting to jam, finding out who we were as musicians.  Although I don't consider myself a musician today, if I'm being honest.  Larry improved very quickly with his own style of tuning his guitar and dazzling flash, shredding on his Gibson SG copy.  We'd learn songs from KISS, Van Halen and Judas Priest and other odd things, like 'Another One Bites the Dust' by Queen, 'Cars' by Gary Numan, 'One More Time' by Streetheart, and a bunch of other forgotten gems.  It was a blast, especially by the time I got my hands on a bigger drum kit after giving it up for a very short time.  I then heard Eric Carr play drums on KISS' 'Creatures of the Night' record, and it permanently re-lit my passion for playing.  Then I began to idolize more players like Stewart Copeland, Steve Smith, Liberty DeVitto, Alex Van Halen and others.  I'd analyze their playing and try to hone my own style from them.  Namely from Carr and Copeland.  I liked to combine the snap and energy of Copeland with the boom and bombast of Carr.  I pretty much just played with Larry in those days.  We both improved together over the course of several years.  We never had gigs or anything, but sometimes we'd have friends come over and watch us play in the basement of my house.  I'd even have my drums set up on milk crates for a makeshift drum riser.

Eventually, Larry went his way and I went mine, though.  I wound up playing in a band with a friend I'd gotten to know through another friend named Kevin Cloutier, and his name was Pete Howell.  Pete was a bass player, learning his own craft while I was still learning mine.  We played enough that we began to jell pretty good as a rhythm section, with different guitar players coming and going.  We finally settled on a band we called Asylum when a guitar guy named Wayne 'Tweak' McCleoud joined us with another Wayne (Weldon) who sang.  Those were probably the best of times for me as far as playing goes.  We played parties and gigs, even competing in a Battle of the Bands where my old nemesis-turned-friend Mark also played, and he turned out to be our biggest fan!  It's especially flattering in retrospect, because today Mark is in the East Coast Music Awards hall of fame.  Pete eventually left the band and took off for Ontario, with a super-tall, super-friendly guy named Wallace Horn taking his place.  We would play places like the hall for Knights of Columbus and Club Kacho, on the university grounds here in Moncton.  Those were exciting times, too.  Eventually, though, with Pete leaving Asylum and me having a bit less of a say, we began to veer more toward Metallica style stuff that I liked, but wasn't exactly passionate about.  I wound up leaving the band.

But Wayne Weldon and me stayed in touch and jammed with various individuals off and on through the years.  We played with a great guitar guy named Mike Trites, along with a singer named Gilles, along with Paul who played bass.  We'd jam at this tattoo parlour while people came in and got tattoos.  Luckily my new girlfriend at the time, Janice, recorded one of these jams on video.  This band didn't go anywhere, but it was a fun little time.  Wayne and me also formed this group with Wallace and a guy named Marc, I believe, and played a lot of this then-new grunge stuff, which again I wasn't terribly passionate about.  Marc was very critical of my playing.  He wanted the meter to be spot on and perfect all the time, which is something I couldn't really offer.  I think that has a lot to do with my head injury history.  I couldn't take the constant criticism, because I just wanted to have fun, and that sucked the life out of playing for me.  

Somewhere along the way, I jammed with another guitar guy named Mike.  I don't think he liked my playing at all, really.  I saw him making fun of my backup singing out of the corner of my eye and never forgot it.  The singer at this jam didn't like my playing, either.  This was very jarring to me, as I'd taken pride in how meticulous I felt I'd gotten at playing.  I never got invited back to jam with this bunch after that.  

Then my old buddy from Asylum, 'Tweak', got himself into a hot band around town called Aftershock.  Somehow I wound up auditioning with them, but there was a guy named Rick in that band that hated my playing.  That was  one-and-done thing.  These guys, Rick and Mike from that other jam, are decent enough guys I think, but they're seasoned players who didn't think that I was, myself.  That's just the way it is.  I won't mention those guys' last names because I don't want anything derogatory to be thought of them or anything.  They just didn't like my playing is all.

So I took some time away from playing for a short bit, until a fellow named Scott, who was playing 'standards' with a couple of other guys on Main Street, invited me to play with them downtown one night.  I've actually written this story already, so I'll summarize... I needed to know the songs so I could learn them, and he said not to worry, just come jam.  I'm the kind of guy that likes to know what I'm going to be playing.  Needless to say, it was a horrible experience.  Scott and the other guys haven't spoken to me since.  After that experience, I gave up playing for years.  It was one too many rejections for me.

Pete was back in town for a long time after that, and we eventually got back and formed our originals band, YQM, with Jody playing bass.  Jody was only learning bass, actually, while Pete played guitar.  Pete actually was a left handed player who re-taught himself to play right handed.  After recording our very own album and playing one show at the University, though, it was over. 

After that, I jammed sporadically with guys here and there, but nothing serious ever really happened.  I have to think that, seeing all my friends having bands and playing gigs all through that time, that I was just never meant to.  As I look back on those numerous rejections, it made me realize that perhaps I'm not a drummer at all.  I'm just a guy that tries to play.  To this day, I still get things for the newer kit that I have.  Just last week, I bought myself a set of rototoms to go with my kit, which seems to be steadily growing - yet I have to psyche myself up to go down in the basement and play.  I guess there's this nagging feeling that I'm not good enough.  A couple of friends have asked if I wanted to jam, but I wonder to myself, to what end?  So that I'd be deserted again?  It's not their fault, it's ME.  I'm tired of disappointing people.  It seems to be all I do.  Even the last job I had before going on disability, I was pretty much forced out.  I have this complex that anyone that I get attached to will eventually just want to take off soon enough.  It seems to be all that ever happens.  Being alone might be the safest.

Now my idea is to record drum covers on video and share them on YouTube, with comments disabled of course, so that maybe if anyone wants to jam, they can just turn up their TV or computer speakers or whatever and play along.  I've had that idea in my head now for a long time.  Even with no chance of rejection, though, I still feel like someone will find a way to do it!  Hence the complex.

And that's where I'm at with playing drums.

I know a lot of this has to do with my mental illness that I'm saddled with since Dad died and the accidents and stuff.  My confidence steadily eroded from that time forward, I think.  I'm not trying to make excuses, but I've never had the tools or wherewithal to find myself out of that hole, even when I asked for it and sought it out.  It continues today.

But I do have my wife, Janice, and our cat Marbles steadfastly at my side.  I have a roof over my head, a lovely daughter, and government support for my disability.  There is no pressure on me to do anything or be anything for anyone.  But I suppose that might be part of the problem.

As I continue to follow the Red Sox and KISS, I ponder leaving the other big passion, drums, behind.  I can't sell them or get rid of them or anything.  I guess I'm looking for that spark that KISS Alive! gave me, and Eric Carr after that.  Or maybe just wait for that spark to ultimately burn out.  Maybe it has already.

So for drums, I guess it's goodbye.  But perhaps it's only for now.

?

Voices inside my head echo things that you say

 You IDIOT.  You have the nerve.  The nerve to talk to her that way, with everything she does, everything she says, and you just throw away the filter, and dump it out there.  So when will you get hold of yourself and realize, you just have to shut the fuck up?  You fancy yourself this "writer".  You're better at it than talking.  That doesn't mean you can boast about it at all in any way.  The best way you can equal what you say verbally with what you write is to just be quiet.  Be.  Quiet.

It's been since February that I've self-harmed.  That's quite the milestone for me.  I've come close a few times, though.  

First, tell any potential readers you might just bore the shit out of them with this.  You've heard it already from some.  Why are you even writing this to begin with?  

To keep a record of my thought processes as I'm trying to figure out why I'm even existing.  That maybe I'll come across a professional that would help one day.  Although I did try that with a 'counselor', where I invited them to read one of these things and was met with silence and no callback after that; desertion.

That's kind of pathetic, isn't it?  Why are you doing This?  Because no one else will?

I'm doing this because no one else will.  I can talk to my wife, but how much more can I make her carry?  I'm already on disability.  Bringing in half of what I used to.  She rather insisted I not work if it means that I'll live.  I just don't really feel like I'm "living".  I'm surviving.  Outside of my wife, I don't contribute very significantly to anyone else's life.  Except maybe my cat.

At the gym the other day, you spoke to your wife on the next treadmill when you were working out.  She couldn't hear you, and you got short with her.  You know she's not great at hearing sometimes, it's not a big deal.  But you seemed to make it that way at that moment.  So, seriously...what will it take?  What will it take for you to grow the fuck up?

I recognized that happened when she gave me a 'look' that I saw last November when I took a major anxiety attack, and she blurted out my full name.  This time she didn't strike me so it shouldn't be a big deal, but I took it upon myself, again, that I ought to punish myself for it.  Except I didn't.  Rather, I'm trying to suppress any emotion that might come out.  I deserved to be slapped last November with 'the look'.  I also deserved to punish myself, but I shouldn't have.  I thought I might be growing up a little more now that I got through almost five months of not harming myself.  

So you want credit for not hurting yourself.  Makes a lot of sense. (sarcasm)

She gives me credit for that.  But I wind up faltering when I impulsively react sometimes.  People slip; I just slip too much, in my own judgment.  

You seem to think you did good work with that last job you had.  You had a boss who told you many times how he valued you.  But you know the truth there.  You could have been better.  When the new boss came in, and things changed rapidly, you couldn't adapt, and you broke.  Nobody else did.

Others left.  I wasn't missed, though.  At all.  I worked there for over ten years.  The last thing I heard from them was they wanted a letter of resignation.  I gave it to them, and I heard nothing since.  Basically, "good riddance".  I'm left feeling like I'm incapable.  The fact that I took so many anxiety attacks at work over the last several years forced me to believe I wasn't good enough, and basically, the new management agreed.

If you never heard anything, then that has to mean you AREN'T missed.  You WEREN'T that good at it.  Maybe you're just not good enough at anything.  Including being a husband or father or friend or sibling.

It's true I'm not good at any of those.

You're not good at much.  Fucking things up, though, you're great at that!  High five!

People will tell me that I just have to stop telling myself these things.  I don't feel this way all the time.  It's when I screw up that the avalanche comes.  I have neurological deficiencies that I truly, frustratingly, don't know how to deal with.  But everyone seems to think I just have to change my mindset.  As if I would have done that long ago if it were that easy.  If you have two construction workers, one with brand new power tools and a support system, and the other who has manual tools and is a novice and always will be, it's not hard to guess which one will get more done. I am that novice.  I am that novice that unwittingly elicits pity and just longs to be normal, but can't grasp the fact that I never will be.

So, best to just lie around when the wife is at work and hope things will magically turn around, then.  She comes home, patient as she is every single day, you spring to life a little bit until it's bedtime, and you lay awake while I tell you all this stuff you already know.  Now you're actually blogging it.  Will anyone read it?

Probably not.  I don't think this is the kind of blog I want to actually announce, so it'll have to be 'stumbled upon'.  I thought the psychiatrist I used to have kind of cared, but even he gave up on me.  Like my last counselor.

Oh, poor fucking you.  So this is a 'hail Mary'?

No.  

Then why do it?  Why bother?

It's a lottery ticket.  I know I won't win.  But I need that tiny glimmer of hope.

You think others might clue into this and actually understand more?

No.  This past week that was made clearer than ever.

Maybe you don't want to be understood.

I want to be understood more than anything.  My doctor kind of does and my wife does, mostly.  I'm out of words to convey it.  

Maybe you're not worth understanding.

.....

If you're on disability, why can't you just embrace that you're understood to the point that there are others that understand your need to be on it, and just try to live?

And just accept that I'm useless?

Yes!!  Don't burn out, just fade away.  

I've already removed myself from the lives of a lot of those who I sense are fed up with me.  I can't be a burden to anyone.  I won't be.

Are you going to imply you're suicidal?  That's just pathetic.

I'm not suicidal.  But I retain my being pathetic.  I guess that's part of the sentence.  I'm not a very good guy.  I deserve to be ostracised.  Up front, I'll do what I can to make people think everything is fine.  In my dreams, I always seem to be alone, or abandoned.  Might as well live out my dreams.