My guitar.  It sits behind the couch, on the opposite side of the fireplace from my cello.  And it hasn’t been touched for a long time.

Pressing the strings with fingers is needed.  Songs and chords and flat-picking are in my future … such as in a few hours.

I took group guitar lessons in Ottawa, Canada in 1972.  Is that really fifty years ago?

Way back then, and later today, I played only in the key of C – three major (or happy) chords (C, F and G) and three minor (or sad) ones (D, E and A).  You can make a lot of cool music with those six!  Here’s what they look like on the fingerboard, along with six cousins:

What the diagram doesn’t show you is … pain.  The calluses on fingers 1, 2, 3 and 4 disappeared centuries ago.  The tips are now sweet softness, not tough enough to press the strings hard for more than a few minutes.  Oh well.  Time will show me the way.

Back in my 20s, I thought I would learn to finger pick one day – practicing different patterns of right hand finger movements to create a complex sound.  Now I have no interest.  My flat pick, held between the thumb and first finger will do the job well into my 90s.  Here are twelve of them:

And then there’s tuning the guitar.  I just looked it up on the internet and the method returned to my mind.  Tune the lowest string (E) to a piano or an electronic tuner and then press your finger on the fifth fret of the tuned string to give the correct pitch for the next one.  Clear? 

I can do this.

I’m all set (sort of).  I’ll report back later in the day about how the new guitar playing turned out.  As they say … “stay tuned”.

***

Oh my.  My fingers remembered the chord shapes – so imperfectly but they’re still in my cells.

I decided to sing and play “Someday Soon”, written from the perspective of a woman and sung by this man! 

The first chord was C Major.  It was nice and bright.  It went with the words “There is a young man that I know.”  I could feel that the next phrase “And his age is 21” required a minor chord.  I tried E Minor.  No, that was wrong.  Then A Minor.  Yes!

I worked through the lyrics, finding the right chord for each moment.  Lots of trial and error.  The fingers of my left hand mostly landed on the right spots … with a pleasing sound.  But sometimes not.  “That’s not the chord!” 

I could feel my strength waning.  As the fingers couldn’t press the strings as hard, the sounds went buzzy.

Here’s what my digits looked like after a few minutes of playing:

Groovy! And not a callus to be seen.

I just strummed the strings with the flat pick.  Picking individual strings sounds far better but I’m not ready for that.

***

So …

I began … again

And a troubadour is emerging