Hard Reality

Yesterday I painted at two jobs before playing music for 6 hours. I grosed about $50 for my skill and labor, and probably spent $5 in gas while I helped beautify houses that are already in the top tier of real estate in the USA, and even more so world wide. Some of the houses on the way to Point Venture feature the worst displays of ostentatiousness that I've seen. Along the road are signs advertising "million dollar views."
Relief (or torment) comes in the form of Rock'n Roll. As soon as I turned on the Marshall, I fired off into a frantic version of REO Speedwagon's Riding the Storm Out, to which I was soon joined in by the drummer and bass player while everyone else stood in amazement. It's hard not to get excited when you can slash at the guitar with abandon and yet have it sound like music, very loud music. The Marshall's 8x10 cabinet screams like a 747 taking off while I stand in front absorbing the energy along with the guitar as the feedback creates a nuclear reaction of energy which explodes into a furious lead. It's like being able to grab a 10,000 volt wire and yet you don't get hurt. After hours of musical ecstasy, suddenly the last song has ended, and all the equipment is quickly packed up. I drive back to the place I will park the van and spend the night after heating some tortillas on the camp stove for dinner.
This morning was very cold. I noticed during the night that I had condensation on my moustache. The sky was perfectly clear for the first time in at a week if not two, and it quickly warmed things up into the 60's. I got to take a leisurely morning and then went back out to PV to work some more. I have to be thankful for some work, but it sucks to be working in the same neighborhood doing the same thing I did when I was 16 and 17 years old, and hardly making any more money, while everything else costs more and the houses have turned into bling bling. I could do anything, and I've done so many things, and here I am back where I started doing the same old thing, playing the same old songs. This too will pass.