Learning how to Breathe / My fears

Last night Carlos went out to a local pub, the Black Horse Pub in Hollister. My dad works at the restaurant owned by the same man, Dr. Mike, and he told us about an open mic night they have every monday at 7. I haven't been into playing music with anyone other than myself and the trees lately. Carlos, however, loves playing as much as ever and rarely has the opportunity to play with other folks.. so we went.

I was already feeling very self conscious before we went because when my dad was telling us about it, he said that Carlos should play there and that it's a place for practiced musicians to play, that I wouldn't be able to just sit around and beat on a drum... So I felt like I wasn't good enough.

In most tasks in my life, I am very self confident. I know that I'm a great gardener, a wonderful artist, an interesting story teller, a good driver, a great cook ... so none of these things make me nervous. As soon as I even think about singing in front of people, I feel like I swallowed a whole melon. My throat swells, my heart races, I get totally anxious and nervous. Needless to say, I did not perform last night. Carlos performed wonderfully with many different musicians and was asked to record music with them and jam with them again. I am very happy for him, but I also felt very distant - especially when he started singing House of the Rising Sun, a song I love to sing but never want to sing in public. My anxiousness made me sad because I want to be free and do whatever I feel like doing every moment of my life. I wanted to sing and share my voice with everyone, but I don't want to for fear of criticism from myself and others.

The people there were so wonderful. We met incredibly kind and warm hearted folks that go there every Monday night. It's like a home for them, it's like family. I told stories and shared my passions, but the most valuable part of the night was near the end.

Teddy is a beautiful lady who played the bass the entire night, with every single musician that went up. She has incredible energy about her. I told her that I loved her music and her energy. She spoke to me saying that she could feel my beautiful energy too. Come to find out, she contacted us 5 months ago when Carlos and I were trying to get a band together. We already had some other guys playing with us, and soon after that I went into my holed up fear of singing again, and this I told her.

She told me the trick to singing is to breathe. That it is all about the breath. She noticed that my breathing is completely wrong for singing and put my hand on her belly to show me how she does it. I have always been breathing into my chest, not into my belly. I don't completely fill up my lungs. Everything makes so much sense to me now! The main thing that bothers me when I listen to my singing recorded is that I sound tense. Carlos doesn't hear, but it's all I hear in my music. An incredible tenseness that makes me feel totally uncomfortable just listening to it. If my breath was deep and easy, my singing would be easy and less tense. I told her I think a lot about the people watching me, the microphones, the amplification... she said not to think about anything - only think about my breath.

Since then I have been practicing my breath pretty constantly! :) I think this will save my life. One day I will be fearless.

A Farm and A Concert

Wonderful things in my future.
Wonderful feelings in the present.
Wonderful tunes in my ears.

A Farm...
It started with a Craigslist ad that I posted for Carlos a few months ago offering music lessons for anyone interested. A lady named Catherine called to schedule violin lessons for her little niece, an adorable shy little girl who picks up dead moths and thinks turtle shells are cool. She started coming once a week and like most kids she picked it up pretty quickly. Personally, the violin is not for me. The crazy posture involved in holding a curvy, fancy block of wood and plastic between my chin and collar bone or shoulder....not for me. Anyway, the two of them hadn't been around in a couple of weeks and we didn't know what happened. Then, out of the beautiful blue, Catherine called Carlos to share a proposition with him. Turns out she has this farm on 16 acres of land with a geodesic dome house sitting on it in Omaha, AR which is right across the border of Missouri maybe 20 miles away from here. She's also got this place in Springfield, MO and she travels between the two which is a trek and she is getting tired of it...

Here is the kicker -
She wants us to be caretakers on her farm!!! WHOA I know. She has food growing there so I'm sure the beds are all prepped for lots more goodies to be planted aaand she has chickens. Chickens. I think about them during the day and I dream about them at night, chickens. We are going over there to look at the place on Tuesday so I'll try to remember and take a few pictures of the place. I'm very interested to see what this geodesic dome looks like. She said it has 1 bedroom plus 2 lofts and it's 1200 sq. feet I think... that's a big dome. It's a dream come true and I love it here.

A Concert...
Tomorrow Liberty and Justice will be playing their biggest show yet! That's my band with my boyfriend Carlos, for those of you who aren't too familiar with my life. We decided to call ourselves Liberty and Justice because our songs are about freedom, community, nature, and self empowerment... and we also mock the government a little bit, here and there. So it's a literal take on the ever popular slogan "liberty and justice for all". We take it pretty seriously and try to bring honesty into a very jaded world. We started our little duo on the road during our hitch hiking adventures last May. Me on harmonica and Carlos on banjo and we played all over the country to unsuspecting pedestrians. I now play the ukulele and Carlos also jams out on the guitar and mandolin every now and again. Since moving to Missouri we have played a show at the Farmers Market of the Ozarks and got paid with delicious local food and we also had a gig at the Springfield ArtsFest with a total of maybe 8 folks in our audience. One lovely lady gave us a $20 tip at that one! Tomorrow is day one of the Summer Concert Series that the mayor of Forsyth, Missouri is putting on as a fundraiser to feed hungry kids. Liberty and Justice will be kicking off the series at 5PM tomorrow evening and we are playing for a full TWO HOURS. Whoa. A two hour set. We've been practicing a dang awful lot the past couple of days.

There's a kicker to this story too -
A boy named Adam broke Carlos' banjo about a week and a half ago, so Carlos had to buy another banjo on ebay and it hasn't gotten here yet. The banjo and my voice are the centerpiece in our 2-piece band. Luckily we have a friend named Jim who plays the upright bass and practices with us sometimes, who just bought himself a banjo a little while ago. He said he'd meet us at the show so Carlos could borrow it. Either way, the show is going to rule!

Check out some of our music on our totally hip facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Liberty-and-Justice/206637086113219

Have a wonderful night everyone. 'Tis almost a full moon again. :)