maya vs. the guitar, the saga continues

Welp, my second month of guitar playing has passed.  I finished all the ‘beginner’ lessons, all 150 of them over at nextlevelguitar, and can do major barre chords off the sixth string and minors off the fifth string, but forget the reverse of that, or 7th, or anything fancy.  But as I build up my barre strength (and it really does just seem to be a strength issue—some finesse, yes, but mostly, brute muscle), I couldn’t stand still, just sitting around waiting. So I skipped over to fingerpicking, a less strength-based technique and have been having a ball learning some fingerstyle blues.

You know what I’m talking about, that thumping bass line with the chords and/or melody on top?  Sounds like the guitar is more than one instrument?  I love that stuff.  But what in the world is a little white girl like me doing playing the blues?  What in the world could I possibly have the blues about?  I’ll tell ya.  I don’t.  You know, except for the general existential angst, artistic ambitions thwarted by the man, ecological disaster on the horizon, money toubles blues.  There’s those.  But in a personal, daily-life-satisfaction kind of way, naw.  I’m doing just fine.

Still. Although I feel like an impostor playing this music, I find I love it.  There is a lot of fingerstyle that I love, and there is a lot that is just too damn sweet.  And this music is not that, not sweet, not at all.

Learning to get my thumb to do something totally different from my fingers is cool, too—I can feel the neural connections being hooked up for this new activity.  As if these little dudes in construction hats are in there rewiring the circuitry, “Oh, now what does she want, a walking bass line, a boogie vamp, and a melody lick?  At the same time?  For heaven’s sake, we aren’t miracle workers here!”

Look at this guy, Lightning Hopkins, he just blows me away.  I mean look at his face, the gorgeous ruin of it, that’s the blues right there. Damn.

I’m just a poor, little white girl…trying to play the blues….just a poor, stubborn-headed, white girl…may I never get the really, real blues, please gawd, never, not really, no thank you….