I just watched this french film in the movie room of my hostel called The Beat My Heart Skipped. It was the perfect film to fit my mood today- a bit home sick, a bit sick of home, a bit introspective and meditative. I have been so busy everyday since I've been here to see and do, and I think it's about that time when I start to miss certain things back home. Right now, it's the sound and feel of my baby grand piano. It's never mattered to me that I can't play perfectly- actually that's the part that helps me blow off steam- trying to figure it out helps my brain relax. There's something so simple about life that we forget about as city dwellers and technology-centered people. The simplicity of the pure sound of the piano is timeless to me. It's therapeutic beyond all measures and makes me feel at home in a world in my mind. It's so personal that no one can understand the feelings that a certain chord or note gives to me, as the experiences in my own life shaped the sounds that I hear. They tune my life. Back home I don't play often- mostly just when I have the house to myself or feel really alone, but when I do I always slip away into another world where my life is simpler than I can understand at that moment. I've always liked the minor keys for as long as I could tell. I remember being 6 and singing Sunrise, Sunset around the house because the melody of a minor key made me feel a world away yet right where I belonged. There honestly is no way to describe it in words. I know that no one will ever understand perfectly, but my life is always shaped by the music in my head. I loved the fact that in the film he was afraid to play and no one believed him, but it was that fear yet connection that drew him to it. That's how I feel about my life: I get these feelings about things- like traveling to Australia, jumping off a cliff, or even just getting on stage at a karaoke bar. Just a little spark starts up in my mind and from there my instincts unstoppable. The fear pulls me to it and that little world that I escape to makes me follow through. It doesn't matter if you succeed or fail, just as long as you fulfill that desire that pulls you towards that goal. I jumped off a 50 foot cliff at the south point of Hawaii and ended up with a huge painful bruise and a concussion, but it was worth it to me because when the universe pulls you toward something you just have to jump. It all started with a spark in my head about escaping to Australia, and the rest is a story I'm still writing.
