Astreja's Journal: Night of the Living Clarinet

It's official: I am now the proud owner of one (1) student clarinet. It made puppy eyes at me and followed me home from the music store.

(blows into 2' long licorice-coloured thing, which emits squeaky noise vaguely reminiscent of the opening of Rhapsody in Blue)

I see a correlation between music and computers: It's hard to learn that first program, a bit easier the second time, easier still with each new attempt. Same with instruments. I ripped my fingers to shreds when I first picked up the guitar. Took me forever to learn how to improvise on the piano. Clarinet is the tenth instrument I've attempted, and it's the easiest learning curve yet. Decent sound on the first day.

This got me thinking about paradigms. I've heard that we can't really wrap our minds around something we've never seen before... It takes multiple exposures before we even start to understand.

And -that- got me thinking about innovation, invention, and future philosophies. What's the best way to cultivate our minds to eliminate that lag time between seeing and Seeing?

A.K. Odinsdottir
2005-02-12