Plan A

Today I got diagnosed with something called “dupertrans disease”. It’s not a particularly serious thing if you’re not, say, a musician. Basically it’s a degenerative disease.

It’s going to result in the curling of my finger. I’ve lost some ability. You can see it happening here, but I haven’t been able to extend my hand properly for a while and I could tell something was going on.

So it’s not great news, but I think there’s a couple teachable moments here. The first one’s obvious. Use your gifts while you have them, kids.

If you don’t use them, it’s like you never had the gift at all. I spent a lot of time playing piano on this hand. Obviously I’m a little bummed out, but I’m not devastated.

And the reason for that is thing two. I don’t need to worry about a plan B. I’ve never worried about a plan B.

It’s always been plan A for me. The thing is, make sure that plan A is inclusive enough that if you have to shift chorus, you’re still doing plan A. Plan A for me was never just being a pianist.

Plan A was immersing myself in music and making musical thinking a part of my everyday life. So when gigs dried up for me around 2000, I was doing music production. It was still plan A.

And when I closed my studio around 2015, I was doing music for media and I was teaching. It was still plan A. I may not have the facility that I used to have, but I am more a musical thinker than I ever have been in my life.

And I don’t see that changing. I’ve been successful in my career because I’ve allowed myself to define what success means. And that means sticking to plan A, even when life throws you a curve ball.

So I’ll keep you informed about this. In the meantime, I may be doing some more music theory stuff for you.