Lucky

- Impromptu -

I never expected I’d be a piano teacher, much less for this long.

In hindsight it seems like a crazy notion, but I thought I’d make it as a concert pianist. To be honest, I had no idea what that meant or how far away the ceiling actually was—the only thing I had in mind was getting paid to play.

Had I understood the true level of the competition I was against, I probably still wouldn’t have quit. But had anyone I respected talked to me in a way that made me listen, I would have at least done things differently.

But you never learn these things in school; school, at least in my experience, only helps someone who already knows what to do and how to get there.

The truth doesn't matter as much as your enrollment.

It was only many years later, after I graduated, that I learned what I should have. Of course, by then it was too late.

So I started teaching piano, not out of desire but necessity. And I really thought I would have my pick of the cream of the crop—I have a master’s degree.

It took a long time to realize I wasn’t entitled to that either; it took an even longer while to understand all my years of education didn’t prepare me for the real world.

The rudest awakening is when you find out that no one is coming to help you.

You take what you get. You try to appreciate the fact you’re making money, but it’s not close to enough.

The years take their toll.

You try difficult things. You fail. Find yourself permanently stuck in a temporary situation.

Anything but this.

It doesn’t seem like it can get any worse when you hit rock bottom. Maybe that’s why becoming resigned seems the only logical thing to do.

Give up.

But it’s precisely when that happens that things slowly start to get better. It’s simply a matter of acceptance, yet you can never know this in advance. Knowing would prevent learning, becoming.

It never works that way.

That mirror gets held up to your face and you’re confronted with option one or two—run away or look at that ugly mother.

Well, I saw my biggest problem. Funniest thing was how anticlimactic it all was. The stupidest I ever felt, all that time I spent being negative and feeling bad for myself.

Telling yourself you have no choice is a lie.

Look, I don’t know how much longer I’ll be teaching piano, but I don’t care. I love it too much.

Only took me 16 years to figure that out.

How lucky can you get?