“And Then There Was Steemit” or “My Blocky Beginning”

Last Time on “Musical Memories”

Yeah so last time I showed you all my senior recital from UCSC on upright bass. That was pretty great. Lots of memories there. The end of an era indeed. I like being a student and I still consider myself one. Going back to college at 26 was great because I was very much on the outside looking in and I could use the institution as a tool for my own ends instead of becoming the tool. I actually never technically got my degree despite being awarded highest honors in the major because I bailed on a class during my last year and never went back to finish it. A total of 7 years of college and no degree. Hah. Now thats an accomplishment.

Too Legit

So after school I spent a year playing music with Groove Service and realizing that trying to make a career out of music sucks. Especially when you don’t like clubs or bars, don’t really like people, are not a skilled marketer, and give a shit about the planet (if you’ve never been on tour then trust me, it’s a slow eco-disaster). So I quit and realized that my real childhood dream had initially been being alone. Pretty weird right, but I really always just wanted a little homestead away from most people.

Solitude.

But that sounds even stupider than being a professional musician to most people so I quickly learned that that wasn’t really my dream. But at that point, early 30’s, disillusioned, broke, tired of pretending, I decided to get back on track. I had been studying permaculture in my ample free time and I’ve always had a green thumb and a knack for manual labor, so slowly my permaculture dream took shape in my mind. This lead me to move back East where an old friend and I were going to try to buy some land in Vermont and start growing things.

Obviously that didn’t work out but while going through that process and realizing that it just wasn’t the time for that step, I had this overwhelming urge to go to India and study Yoga. My teacher had recommended that I do that a few years prior and I really never thought that I would ever do that, but there it was. So I spent the summer working and saved up enough to spend 6 months in India.

It’s getting hot in here...

This turned out to be the beginning of a very new chapter in my life. Between the clarity and perspective I gained in that time, meeting my life partner on my first day there, and of course finding Steemit 😂

After my first 6 weeks there, the new love of my life had to go back to England and I had a lot more free time. In that time I decided to join Steemit and start blogging on my 60 dollar smart phone. The great thing is that data there is about 5 bucks for a gig per day and free nationwide calling/texting. So that should tell you how much we’re getting ripped off in the western world.

I had bought a cheep acoustic guitar and was learning a few tunes and writing some tunes so I got involved with the Steemit Open Mic. This had a little support from some the Blockchain Barons so there were great prizes, which in turn helped to grow a huge and very involved community. It’s amazing what a little incentive can do folks. I was posting under Hive account@shookriya at the time (which is a funny story) and I made a lot of friends and built up a pretty good following pretty quickly thanks in large part to that community.