Inertia
Man...it's tough balancing creativity and responsibility. Well, I guess responsibility is hard for me whether or not I have to balance it with anything else. But creativity makes the whole thing fall apart.
So, I officially graduated with an M.A. in music almost two weeks ago, but my hopes for the fall are to teach high school math. This demands that I actually go through the process of finding a teaching job, and I refuse to say how much progress I've made on that front. All you need to know is: not enough. So, this week I hoped that I'd get a bit caught up on my job search. Then Monday night, my muse struck. I stayed up until 4 AM composing, and kept at it the next day, and in less than 24 hours I had a good 5 minutes of music, and it was really good music, too. The sort that makes me jump up and down when I know what the next note is going to be. A good 2/3 of a complete movement (for double string orchestra, no less -- I thought I'd never be able to write for strings) in my notebook, half of that fully orchestrated on my computer. But I was neglecting my present responsibilities. In grad school it was easier, as composing was my primary responsibility, but right now creativity is a bit of a burden. So I put the new piece on hold, so I could get back to the things I had to do. Since Wednesday, I've managed to accomplish about half of that. And really, what I need to do right now could be done in an afternoon. I'd probably have gotten about as much done on the job search if I had kept composing. And I might as well have been composing, since a large part of what kept me dragging my heels was being haunted by the music I had written. It took a good deal of effort to pull myself away from that. But this evening, when I tried to take up my oversized manuscript paper and return to the piece...nothing. Crap.
I hate creative inertia.
-TT
So, I officially graduated with an M.A. in music almost two weeks ago, but my hopes for the fall are to teach high school math. This demands that I actually go through the process of finding a teaching job, and I refuse to say how much progress I've made on that front. All you need to know is: not enough. So, this week I hoped that I'd get a bit caught up on my job search. Then Monday night, my muse struck. I stayed up until 4 AM composing, and kept at it the next day, and in less than 24 hours I had a good 5 minutes of music, and it was really good music, too. The sort that makes me jump up and down when I know what the next note is going to be. A good 2/3 of a complete movement (for double string orchestra, no less -- I thought I'd never be able to write for strings) in my notebook, half of that fully orchestrated on my computer. But I was neglecting my present responsibilities. In grad school it was easier, as composing was my primary responsibility, but right now creativity is a bit of a burden. So I put the new piece on hold, so I could get back to the things I had to do. Since Wednesday, I've managed to accomplish about half of that. And really, what I need to do right now could be done in an afternoon. I'd probably have gotten about as much done on the job search if I had kept composing. And I might as well have been composing, since a large part of what kept me dragging my heels was being haunted by the music I had written. It took a good deal of effort to pull myself away from that. But this evening, when I tried to take up my oversized manuscript paper and return to the piece...nothing. Crap.
I hate creative inertia.
-TT