I thought 2024 was going to be the year. Just like every year at the beginning when you think to yourself, “This is my year and things are going to turn around.” But so far…nope. Not Joe’s year.
The last few weeks of my life could possibly make for the quintessential sad country song and I’ll work on that once I finish processing the emotions. I’ve been jobless, my dog is dying, and my guitars were stolen.
I’m not sure why I decided to blog about it today. It seems silly to me honestly because I should probably focus on music to get my mind off the bad parts and remember the things that make me happy, but I need to get it off my chest somehow. So I will start from the beginning.
It’s just hard to find a job in the music industry. Once I graduated as a middle aged man from college, I thought it was going to be easier to utilize my pieces of paper to distinguish myself as an employable sound engineer from when I didn’t have a degree to prove that I’m pretty good at what I do. But after searching and applying for 50+ jobs after finishing my part of building a massive garage/apartment in my backyard that still isn’t totally done, I now still give music lessons and drive for Lyft. I take rejection pretty hard so for all the employers that probably didn’t even look at my resume, thanks for the crippling anxiety.
Don’t get me wrong, I love teaching music. I think every musician needs to teach what they know in order to learn what they don’t and remember things they forgot. I also think that teachers are far under appreciated since it’s them who really raise the future of humanity through education. The problem is that it doesn’t pay well. Thankfully I am passionate about it and it almost evens out the mental and emotional turmoil of always being late on bills. Hence driving Eryn’s car for ride share apps. I do like meeting new people though! (I’m supposed to be less negative about things, so I’ll sprinkle these in whenever I’m getting too whiney cry baby boo hoo.)
WARNING: this next part is super sad and I will be crying during the draft.
I was never a dog person. I used to just like dogs. I used to just think they were neat and fun, but I hadn’t really owned a dog as an adult until I started dating Eryn. I didn’t realize how attached I’d become to our Great Dane. I didn’t realize how many fond memories would come up when I found out he wasn’t going to be around much longer. I didn’t realize I’d love my dog Toro so much.
Last month Eryn, Toro and I were on vacation visiting family and friends in the van across the country during the recent eclipse when we noticed something was off. Toro wasn’t excited like he normally was on road trips. Eryn and I were stoked to be bringing him on such a long adventure, but he seemed nervous and lethargic and didn’t want to eat the whole first half of the journey. We at first brushed it off as him not being comfortable in the big stinky van and him just trying to mind his manners around the new to him people we were visiting. What we thought was him being nervous and a perfect gentleman was in fact lymphoma. We found out halfway through our vacation and then cut the trip short to get him home and on new medication to make him eat and take the swelling down. He doesn’t have long, but he’s been getting so much love and human food from all his family and friends, so he’ll be going out happy. I’m gonna miss my big doofus Toro. He’s the bestest boy in the world.
So now that I’m crying about a canine, I might as well get pissed off and irritated about a Homosapien as well.
I woke up early yesterday because I am trying to be better at getting up and being productive instead of sleeping in and just hoping for the best. I’ve been told recently that I should be more assertive about the things I want to be doing and work harder towards the goals I’ve set for myself in my life. So, I’m trying to make that effort. Unfortunately, some human beings are filth and take advantage of me from what I’ve learned throughout my history.
At 5:45 AM I got a notification on my phone that my garage had been opened at 2:15 AM and then closed at 3:09 AM. Nobody in my house was awake at that point of the night so I went out to see if anything had been stolen. The large items like my drums and interface and speakers were still around and at first glance it looked as if it was just a glitch in the garage app. Then Eryn had the thought to go check our cars to see if they were still ok. Mine was fine, but hers was not. Someone had broken into her car and taken the garage door opener that I had naively put in there not long ago.
After realizing what had happened I went to check on our things again. To my dismay the thief had taken my guitar, my bass, my pedal board, my briefcase full of audio equipment, all of my drum mics, and my backpack full of necessary gigging items. I’m pretty much cleaned out right now. Many thousands of dollars and years of hard work gone in less than an hour. SOFB.
We spent most of the day yesterday filing claims and reports and finding the monetary value of what went missing. I had to call bandmates to ask about borrowing things for what gigs I have tonight through the foreseeable future until I can get my life back together. It was hard keeping the emotions at bay while teaching my students about the art that I so very much love, but only having whatever resources I had left over after the violation of a stranger. I hated people yesterday. I really did. I regrettably had violent thoughts of vengeance and couldn’t stop thinking about what I would do if I caught the thief. I need to apologize for that. I woke up today disgusted at myself.
The hardest thing for me about it other than the really really bad timing is realizing and accepting that I will never actually get my belongings back. I’m the kind of person that doesn’t buy a lot of expensive things because I’m poor and I like the things I have. I could work with those things. I could have used them until they crapped the bed. But now they are gone. It’s a real pity. It’s pretty shitty. (I can feel the song coming on now.)
I didn’t want to write this blog if I’m being honest. I seem to just write a lot when I’m at a negative place in life. Perhaps I just have to put it out into the world so I can move on. I want to live my life to the fullest. I want to write and play music and have all my bills paid and know my family is taken care of. I’ll keep teaching, I’ll keep driving, I’ll keep writing, I’ll keep playing, and I won’t quit. I am proud of who I am and what I can do. I just get sad sometimes.
With all that said, I hope that your life is going well. I know I’m not the only person who has had experiences like these and won’t be the last. I want you to know that if you ever need to talk about things so that you can move on from a funk in your life, that you are welcome to reach out. I’m not a therapist at all, but I know it’s good to get things off your chest.
Thanks for reading.
-Joe
jpalmermusic.com 