There's Still Much To Learn

Everyone has left and it's time to break down the equipment. Amps get pulled apart, drums stuffed into bags of various sizes, cords wrapped. Bartenders and waitresses are counting the take and splitting tips. Many enjoy a long-awaited smoke, now that the doors are closed for the night and this is no longer a place of business.

We're exhausted but in good spirits. Stupid jokes are cracked, and any regrets about our performance will be tabled for later discussion. There is a time and place for criticism, for honest self-assessment, but this is not it. We are getting things done and basking in as much glory as a dive bar in the suburbs can provide at 2 a.m.

There might have been as many as 200 people here, if you factor in that we played for the better part of five hours. Groups come and go. Some arrive alone and leave together. Others do the opposite.

A sense of uneasy camaraderie pervades the place, although that might be the misplaced romantic in me talking after it should have gone to bed. I don't always read situations correctly, and I'm not getting better at it either. Then again, that's not a skill I try to cultivate.

This also means that I'm frequently surprised by human behavior, which has its advantages. Even when people are boring, they are boring in different ways, which is fascinating. The very fact of their boringness makes them interesting.

When I was 13 years old I went to a small private school in a small mountain town. That's where I first yearned to play guitar, though it wasn't until a few years later that I got up the nerve to take up the instrument. On nights like these, I'm glad I did, though there's still much to learn.