Not another New Year Resolution post!

Not exactly. Philo recommends taking up something you once loved to do but have quit doing for some reason.

I’m struck, too, that one can still take up paths long neglected, and that doing so is surprisingly rewarding. I took up playing the bass again after thirty years; in fact, my main Christmas present was a Crate BX100 bass amp. I’ve started composing music, something I hadn’t done since college. Dymphna has taken up ice skating. If you’re in search of a New Year’s resolution, I recommend thinking back and taking up again something you used to love but gave up along the way.

I've given up so many things in the past that picking one is going to be difficult. I think I'll look over a few.

In the not too distant past I was serious about learning to play the piano. At my 33rd birthday I showed up at my first lesson with a book of Scott Joplin's rags under my arm and told my teacher that was what I wanted to play. She kindly took the book away from me a gave me the basic Piano 101 books that every beginner must start from. Before beginning lessons I drafted 10 goals I wanted to accomplish. After receiving much encouragement from an AOL online group of teachers I dove in. Five years later I stopped taking lessons. I estimate I made about 2 years worth of progress, and probably met only about 2 to 3 of my stated goals. Sounds disappointing, but not really. Having elementary and preschool age children made practice time difficult. Plus I am not a natural - everything learned was through hard work. I still can play bits of the music I did learn, and at the time listened to much music I wouldn't have otherwise heard or cared about. I went to the Scott Joplin Music Festivals in Missouri, met performers there, became a distant friend to one of them. I could go on. Piano was good to me.

Before starting high school I was bitten by the chess bug. Bobby Fischer was playing for the world championship against the hated Russians, and I followed that match closely. I received a chess set and clock for Christmas 1973, of which I still have the pieces, lots of books and began playing competitively. I actually would get into trouble for staying out too late at night going to chess meeting held at the local university. I got better through study and practice, to a point, and then hit a snag. At some point I realized that chess is a really difficult game that would take some major studying in order to get beyond the average competitive levels. I wasn't ready to give up my golf game for chess.

For some odd reason hockey is a family favorite. My two boys played quite a bit of roller blade hockey growing up. It always looked like fun. A few years back I tried it playing in an adult league in Round Rock Texas. It was a blast. I can't remember a team sport being that much fun. Hockey was fun, frustrating, physically demanding, and exciting - and that's from the adult slow motion league. In my final season I scored the 2 goals in the championship game.

Of the 3 listed, hockey ain't gonna happen. My skates have been cannibalized by Evan and Tory for wheels and bearing and the hardware is missing. Plus I am so badly out of shape I wouldn't last 30 seconds on a shift, and I haven't skated since that last game.

Piano - I like it. Still play occasionally. I am all for playing more but I won't be taking lessons anymore. I will play simpler music and practice reading music as much as possible, and try to enjoy the music. At times when I was learning, I tended to get angry and frustrated at my progress or lack thereof and wouldn't be able to hear what I was doing as a whole. Playing for my own enjoyment sounds like a worthy goal.

Chess is the likely winner here. Tory has shown great interest in learning the game in the past few months, going as far as helping start a club and ladder group at his school. He has managed to beat me once so far, but other than that I have had the upper hand. The bad news for Tory, as I have told him, is that I am not very good meaning he has a long way to go. Looking at chess books and playing through instructional games does not seem so onerous anymore. I think I am more patient and able to take in the intended information, maybe even pass it on to Tory in a way he will absorb it as well.