Today’s journaling / reflection prompt: What is something in your life that feels uniquely yours? That nobody knows about, a private thing you hold most dear. Why is it so, and what value does it bring to your life from not being shared by or with others?
When I first moved to Hong Kong Island, after two years of living a near-monastic experience in the mountains, I began craving music again. My home in the mountains was still and silent, filled with sounds of nature, my own breathing. The city felt like someone had turned the volume dial all the way up on an old-school staticky radio, cacophonous and bustling at all hours. I lived in a tall building sandwiched between a mega-department store and a giant Adidas shop, whose fluorescent TV projected flickering lights into my small bedroom at all hours of the day. The first week, I barely slept, gazing up at the ceiling where the lights peeked from behind my curtains, timing my breathing to the pace of the circulating ads.
All at once, I missed making music, missed feeling it in my bones. I craved something beautiful to rattle my ribcage other than the thundering noises of the bus coming close to my nose every morning on a sleepy commute. I aggressively listened to new albums that were outside of my usual go-to’s. I started singing all the time, humming on the train and doing karaoke while I cooked on my one makeshift induction hob, which pretty made up my entire “kitchen.”
And one early evening, on a whim, I walked 20 minutes to a nearby piano shop. To get there, I passed two busy highways, the walking bridges marked with bright colors as trucks pummelled the streets below. Down a few alleyways, the volume suddenly dropped. I pushed the door and asked the small room — a few women, including one at the front desk — if they rented studios for piano practice. Luckily, they did.
Over the next few years, whether at this shop, or the next hole in the wall I found close to my next home, I would go on to rent pianos housed in small rooms by the hour over a few studios all over Hong Kong. The pianos were subpar, often abused with endless beginner classes so the middle octaves had bent sounds compared to the rest. The spaces were small and stuffy - if you leaned back slightly behind the bench, you’d hit the wall with your back. But they were affordable, I reasoned. Cheaper than a workout class or a nice dinner!
Each of the studios gave me a punchcard with my name and number of hours left. Each of them had an encouraging, kind, sometimes cagey, sometimes flamboyant woman at the front desk, signing me in, initialing card after card of my borrowed time.
Because I was undisciplined, I have very little to show for these hours. I learned 2-ish ballades, and a few nocturnes. For the many hours I did spend, I mostly just sat there in the closet-like space and let my mind wander. Play old favorites or new easy pieces, just to hear how my body could make these sounds a reality.
It was my small universe, a playground that was entirely mine. I rarely told anyone I did this, even rarer did I record and share. When the front desk woman would sometimes remark on my playing on my way out the shop, I would be intimidated all of a sudden that someone had been in that private world all along.
A few weeks ago ago, I bought a digital piano. A dream come true - that I could make music in my own space again.
I spend most of my hours with my headphones plugged in to the console — where the sound doesn’t go anywhere beyond my own ears. So if a tree falls in a forest, if I practice and nobody else hears it, did the hours even happen?
In other parts of my life, like in my day job and in the world of social media, so much of “productivity” comes down to how much of your work is seen and amplified and “leveraged” by others. I feel that pressure sometimes - should I be sharing more of my practice? Trying to create something tangible out of this?
This morning, seeing daffodils on my desk slowly open in front of me, a moment impossible to capture, I’m grateful for these private moments, an entire universe of feeling where I can be - alone, fully myself, and free.
Margin Notes
Hello dear friend. You won’t believe it, but it’s snowing again in London-town! This time, it’s the swirly horizontal tiny styrofoam ball like snow that doesn’t stick or land anywhere, and makes you feel like you’re inside a cozy snowglobe. Magical :)
K is watching cricket in the next room, and I’m plant sitting two bunches of daffodils we bought yesterday on our weekly long walk to brighten up the place for a very peculiar, solo Lunar New Year in the week ahead. “They need more light!” says K, sticking them under our sun lamp (a bright studio light) — I’m not sure if this is the photosynthesis they are seeking, aha.
As much as today’s thoughts were all about beautiful private moments, I miss seeing other people. Beautiful public moments. I miss Lunar New Year gatherings of years past, red envelopes from the kind ladies of the office cafe pressed in my hand with bright smiles, “we should! you’re young” (only young, unmarried people get red envelopes) - oranges and mandarins everywhere for luck and fortune; bright cherry branches and perpetual candies and steaming dumplings everywhere you look.
So much of my life feels private now in lockdown, or 2-D, so much so that when a new friend asked if we’d like to go on a monthly walk together, I froze up at the idea of sharing the same airspace with someone other than K. Today’s prompt was a good way to get back into the positive aspects, and not get too stuck in the negatives. (Ask me again in a month where I will have full cabin fever..!)
Until next time, be well, sending you big hugs, Kerri
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