Opinion: In Time

“Pick a sport or an instrument.” 

Those were my dad’s words, or at least they might as well have been. I always did pretty well at school, but besides my schoolwork, my legos, and my XBOX, I didn’t really have much going on for me in the way of extra-curriculars. As it is with many Asian kids like me, my dad always had one or two strange rules or demands, but this wasn’t one of them. Now obviously I wasn’t going to do a sport seeing as I have the agility and endurance of a half-blind snail, so that leaves the alternative. 

“Instrument.”

“Which one?”

“I dunno, drums.”

Truth be told I didn’t really like it so much as a kid. Instead of going home gorging myself with ice cream sandwiches and violent video-games, I spent my Friday afternoons in a tiny room playing stuff from the sheet music over and over and over ad nauseum. Such was the case for years, until some way, somehow beyond human understanding, it clicked:

I loved this. 

I loved rhythm. I loved music. And boy I loved showing off.

I studied drum grooves, I practiced my fills around the kit and back, I learned as many different musical styles I could. I knew my single stroke rolls,my double stroke rolls, my flams, my paradiddles, my double paradiddles, my paradiddle-diddles… You get the picture.

A lot of people are 50/50 on whether the whole high-school thing was their peak or the worst thing that ever happened to them. Don’t get me wrong, I did a lot of stupid shit that I ponder frequently in the shower, in bed, or in line at the grocery store, but even after all that, I had a lot of fun. Some of the best times of my life were playing the drums in bands, in shows, and at church. Call it a flight of fancy, but for a time of my life, I thought: “Hey, this’ll be my thing. I’m gonna do this for the rest of my life.”

Yet for one reason or another, like a lot of things good and fun in life, it didn’t really pan out. I never did apply to those music schools. The gigs I dreamt and talked about never happened. And one, two, skip a few, here I am in my fourth-year at UCLA pursuing a degree in political science.

If you’re wondering what happened, you’re not alone. I find myself asking that question a lot too. There’s been more than a few times that I’ve found myself wondering about all of the would’ves, could’ves, and should’ves of my life. There was a time too where just getting on a drum set seemed wrong, like it was just rubbing in my own face some unbaked dream. Eventually, I figured out my own excuses: it wouldn’t work out, I’m not into the whole “starving musician” vibe, or some other thing. I found ways to make my decisions make sense.

But hindsight is a cruel thing; I know better now. Truth is I’ve never really known what I was doing with any of that. Maybe I got cold feet, maybe I felt like I didn’t have enough talent, or maybe it was a lack of dedication, maybe divine intervention…  Who can say? All of the above.

I guess I realized that a complicated reality was better than a sensible fiction. And that’s what I’m rolling with right now. I’m not the kind of person that I thought I’d be, and that’s okay. I can live with that.

Of course, I’ve never stopped drumming; it’s a part of my life. I’ve never stopped myself from enjoying the simple pleasure of making music with others, and I don’t expect that to change. I’ll admit, there are some days I’ll play, close my eyes, and think of halcyon days of high school musicals and early morning rehearsals. But it’s different now, I’d say. Those moments will always belong to me, but I can look forward to tomorrow too. After all, tomorrow’s just a day away.