Two days from now I’ll be in Barcelona, on a days-long trip for which I’m not in the mood. It’s supposed to involve research for a writing project I’m supposedly working on, although I haven’t written anything in a month. Barcelona is a beautiful city. Unfortunately, it’s also a crime-ridden shithole. I expect to feel anxious from the moment I step outside of the rented apartment.

I haven’t been in the mood for much recently. I may actually be having a mid-life crisis, although I’m past the midpoint of my life; now forty, and very unlikely to live to eighty. I keep fantasizing about dropping everything and moving away to some cheap town, to a one-bedroom place near nature, where I could live in peace while working part-time at the most. If that ever happens, I’ll likely be in my late fifties, or sixties. Mainly, I want to get away from everything and everyone I’ve ever known. Unfortunately, due to my brain configuration, my intrusive thoughts keep reminding me of every terrible little thing that has ever happened to me. I can’t flee from that.

A song came to mind: Jackson C. Frank’s “Blues Run the Game.” Jackson was a well-respected songwriter in the sixties and seventies. When he was twelve or thirteen, during music class in middle school, the school’s boiler exploded just under them. Jackson survived with half of his body burned. His girlfriend, Marlene, burned to death. In spirit, Jackson died that day, although it took his body decades to catch up. He wrote one song directly about his dead twelve-year-old girlfriend (“Marlene”), although obviously most of his songs are tinted by what happened. In the seventies, Jackson lived in England, and dated a then-famous musician named Sandy Denny. Shortly after they broke up and Jackson returned to the States, Sandy fell down the stairs of her home and died.

Jackson went crazy, likely out of PTSD and depression. He couldn’t find in himself to produce a new album, and he couldn’t get the first album reissued, as Paul Simon, who held the rights, wouldn’t do so. Jackson ended up homeless in NY. A fan sought him out and offered to house the songwriter and help him revitalize his career. As Jackson was waiting on a bench, some hoodlum shot out one of his eyes with a BB. Jackson died maybe one or two years later from a disease.

Here’s to you. Creating art can’t save anyone, but at least it captures what needs to survive.

These days, my beloved guitar satisfies my emotional needs. I head to nearby wooded areas to play. This Saturday, I had walked to one of my favorite spots: in front of a huge tree, on a relatively unknown trail. As I was playing through Joanna Newsom’s “Kingfisher,” suddenly I heard someone hollering. I tensed up, but didn’t look up until someone threw his voice at me, interrupting someone who unequivocally was playing an instrument. I raised my gaze to the grotesque sight of a topless gypsy holding a dining room chair over his head. Of course this fucking mongoloid had to talk to me as I was playing the guitar. He asked if I played rumbas. I told him I didn’t know what that was. He then said that it was flamenco. I told him no. Shortly after, he hollered back to someone to following him, then continued on his way, likely to drink and leave the bottles and other litter there. A couple of other people, presumably gypsies although I couldn’t tell, followed in silence. One of them was a young woman. I got the feeling they felt a bit embarrassed. I finished Joanna Newsom’s “Kingfisher” to the best of my abilities, and then packed up my things and left.

People don’t learn from history; a well-known fact. If we did, we would have learned from the fall of the western half of the Roman Empire, and would have realized that some terrible mistakes should never be repeated: first, don’t convert to Christianity. Second, don’t share your civilization with barbarians. You may enjoy diversity on your plate, until someone shits on it, and then the whole plate is ruined. As for me, I’m not remotely a diversity enjoyer: I want everything in its right place.

Anyway, I suspect that such an encounter with one of the locusts of society would have dissuaded me for a while from playing outside, but the very next day, at about half past three in the afternoon, I picked up my guitar and headed to the deeper woods (in the opposite direction from the other woods). First I headed past the Roman foundries (a reminder that we used to be the city of Oiasso), but the place I picked to play, close to the river, obviously interfered sonically with my playing, so I picked up my things and ended up setting up shop on a raised area next to the foundries. I had only come across a pair of women on my way there, so I thought the afternoon would be quite tranquil. However, I found myself playing songs for older couples and families with children, who stopped to record the foundries, and also ventured deeper into the woods. These people were civilized, so the only interruption I got was three tweens clapping at me as they walked past. Guitar-playing impresses girls, I guess.

When I was in middle school, I remember an instance in which I had to read some essay in class, and I was so nervous, as usual, about speaking in public that my hand shook to the extent that you could hear the rustle of the paper I was holding. Now I casually play the guitar in front of strangers. I’m not entirely comfortable in front of people, of course; I never am even in the best of circumstances. But my concern is that someone may mess with me or even attack me. I don’t feel any genuine connection with human beings, so it’s quite similar to how I’d feel if a deer suddenly stopped to listen. I’d also worry that it may flip out and charge at me, offended at some aspect of my playing. Sadly we don’t have deers around.

Well. Five more days to go, and my vacation starts. I’m heading to Barcelona. Not really in the mood for it, but it’s writing-related, so I’ll have to endure through plenty of aspects of that city that no doubt will infuriate me.

This afternoon, on a Saturday, I wanted to leave the house and get some fresh air. Whenever I consider going out, I usually need to have a purpose; walking around town mainly depresses me with how much it has gone to hell, and sitting at a coffee shop means dealing with human beings. Suddenly I thought, “Why don’t I just grab my guitar and head to the woods, like old times?” I hadn’t played the guitar since 2021, around the time I started my currently unfinished novel We’re Fucked.

I’m not entirely sure why I stopped playing, given that I loved doing so. Of course, I’ve had bad experiences: a neighbor complained (although I used to play my electric Gibson at the time), one time a bunch of punks mocked me because I was playing (as in, “Haha, he’s playing the guitar, what a dork.” It made me wonder what was wrong with their generation), another time some guy interrupted me because he thought I had stolen his phone, another guy interrupted me because he wanted to talk at length about his own journey with the guitar…

I don’t play the guitar because I want to be listened to. I do it because if feels great. It’s another way of communing with my subconscious, which is mainly why I do things unrelated to keeping my body alive or amassing money. That said, I did have one unexpectedly positive interaction when playing the guitar: a young mother with her daughter, who may have been six or so, stood there smiling at me as I played the entirety of Godspeed! You Black Emperor’s “East Hastings,” a perfectly reasonable song to smile at. At one point of the performance, the mother brought to both our attention that a squirrel had stopped to listen to my song as well. When the song ended, both clapped (the young mother and her daughter), and they went away pleased. I usually feel that most people around me are annoyed or disturbed by my presence, and wish I wasn’t there, but in that case those two seemed genuinely grateful.

Anyway, I have taken the guitar and headed to the nearby woods. I also brought a camping stool that I had only used once before and that came away diminished because they had the bright idea to attach removable end caps to each leg, and I lost one of them; the moment you sit in mud, it gets pressed down hard, and the mud closes over it. Anyway, I sat down as comfortably as I could, which wasn’t much, and played through some songs, mainly Iron & Wine’s “Passing Afternoon,” Eagles’ “Hotel California,” Waxahatchee’s “Swan Dive,” and Van Morrison’s “Brown Eyed Girl.” Over and over. Van Morrison’s song always reminds me of my Izar, motocross legend, love of my life. I found myself belting out the lyrics while playing those simple chords, and it felt so good, man. Freeing. Like connecting with something meaningful.

As far as I’m concerned, everyone should learn how to play an instrument and then some of their favorite songs on it. Creative people in particular should do so, even if they’re not musically-inclined in general, because it facilitates communication with your subconcious, which every artistic endeavor relies on.

Now I’m back home. My right hip hurts from the sitting posture, the fingertips of my left hand regret that I allowed them to lose their callus, and I feel chilly from having stayed in the shade of those woods for a couple of hours. But I guess I enjoyed the experience enough to write this post about it.