I've been thinking about the number three a lot recently. Bad things come in threes. Three for five dollars. Country music is nothing but three chords and the truth.
I've been picking out the threes in my life a lot recently too. Don't really know why, but I don't really have to, do I? It's just a passing thought.
The first thing that made me think in threes was the trio. The nuclear family revolves around a mother, a father, and one or two children. Being an only child, I thought of this as a triple. Nobody where I look, it's three. Living in my house: Aaron, Pops, and I. I could think of it as Aaron, Aubrie, and I. In Tahoe, it's Mom, Mike, and I.
My team is composed of two Buddas and a Pancho.
In my life, there are three families. There are always more-- ALWAYS more-- but for the sake of this blog, I am narrowing it down to three. Family is what I have and where I learn my greatest lessons. The Lindsey's taught me how to fall, how to fight, and how to put raked up leaves in the compost. The family taught me how to turn the compost over and over with a pitchfork, until it is steaming and teeming with bugs. And the Family taught me to always add to the compost and, when it is rotted to stinking perfection, to use it to grow a garden.
I've been thinking about it, and I know that The Valley is my home. When I'm in Riverside, I am always listening to music. Scratch that. I am always listening to music. But when I'm at school, I especially listen to the people that I am close to. To have their words and their souls pouring into my ears, my brain, my soul, it makes life away from Home easier. In one song, Willy Tea sings, "I know you're gonna stay here, there's too much you're going to miss, but babe I'm gonna die fast if I live here like this." I think that, no matter what happens while I'm at school, I can never stay far from The Valley. Maybe I could live in San Francisco, but I doubt it. I'm not a city person. It makes me sick. Bitter. It makes my heart as bitter as the creatures' (from Stephen Cranes' "In The Desert"). When I'm in the Valley, I'm free. I can feel it in the air I breathe, the oxygen coursing through my blood. When I'm with the orchards and the rivers and with the Valley people, life makes sense to me. There's no definition. It just is. It's slow here. City life is too rushed, a constant go gO GO! and it drives me crazy. No, the Valley is definitely the place for me. The weather, the water, the wild parties and the good people. This is where I belong.
Just as three families have shaped me, three women taught me how to sing: Loretta Lynn, Neko Case, and Bethany Joseph Taylor. I used to be a horrendous singer, probably even tone deaf. I've always wanted to be a singer. In elementary school, choir was my first choice (followed by orchestra and then band-- of course I played percussion in the band). I've never been in choir or taken voice lessons. I've never been a good singer, but I know I am now. Somewhere, somehow, I managed to hit notes. The first note I ever hit was to "Don't Talk (Put Your Head on my Shoulder)" by the Beach Boys on my home from Lake Tahoe one year-- it was one of those high impossible notes, and the only reason I know I hit it was because Aaron turned to me and went, "Whoa, Budda, you hit that note!" The Beach Boys didn't teach me how to sing though. Loretta Lynn and Neko Case have always been two of my favourite musicians. Both of them are beautiful women with singing voices that give me the shivers. When I met Bethany, I thought the same of her. I've always tried to sing like Loretta and Neko, or at least be able to sing their songs, but I've never been able to do it.
Practice, practice, practice, that's all I did. I sang everywhere-- in the shower, doing the dishes, in the car, cleaning my bedroom, walking down the street and around the house and at school. EVERYWHERE, I was singing, practicing. I don't know when I officially "learned" how to sing, but I think it was around the time when The Good Luck Thrift Store Outfit started recording Ghost of Good Manners. Bethany is the first woman that ever gave me shivers to music, which is a weird thought, considering how long music has been a part of my life. I think I really started appreciating it when Aaron joined GLTSO. That's my Family, right there. But anyway, I started singing along to that album, starting playing guitar too (that's actually the first song I learned how to play by ear too), and eventually I could sing it and I could sing it well. I kept singing along to everything, and now I can sing. Of course it's not perfect. I still have a hard time hitting notes, my voice still gets wavery. I get nervous, and I still have to seek out the notes with my voice, think about my range and pitch, but I'm getting better all the time. When I can finally sing in front of people without feeling TOO nervous, I think I can officially start calling myself a singer. That's one of my goals for the summer-- sing in front of people. Get rid of my fear, get over myself. An inflated ego is what kills the talent-- I'm not going to get one, I promise to myself, I never will. I'm going to cherish this forever.
So, yes, these are thoughts on my mind recently. I know I put a lot of emphasis on threes, but these are just SOME that I have been thinking about.
Friend trios are good, but one person hanging out with a couple never works-- third wheel status. You usually get three lives in video games. Pancho only has three nails on his front left paw.
There are always three panels in A Softer World comics:
Here's three things I believe in:
Finally, three words that mean the world to me:
