Classical

Ever since I was a kid, I've had a fascination with music. I would hear songs and think that they came from a different dimension. A song on the radio would play, and I would question how it was humanly possible to create something so incredibly beautiful. As the years went by, my fascination with music grew, only this time I wanted it to be me that would bring the music from the dimension of creation, with a guitar.

It's hard to create without tools, and because my family's richness did not lie in money, it was out of the question to buy a $200 beginner guitar, let alone a $2,000 telecaster. This was upsetting, but it didn't stop me from keeping my hopes up. I decided to focus on things I did have access to.

Since I had to put my desire to learn guitar on hold, I decided to completely put my focus in writing. Anyone can afford a pen and paper. Whether it was a song, poem, short story, even a play script, all I did was fill the pages of dozens of notebooks. This went on several years, to the point where I was slowly starting to forget about music all together. I still wasn't any closer to being able to afford a guitar, so I was starting to lose faith.

Being so far away from my dream drained me of my energy to even write, to the point where I started writing less and less with each passing day. Eventually I got writer's block, and left writing all together. It was hard to do anything in fact. Around this time, my family and I would find ourselves constantly packing, and moving to the next city. We would never stay in the same place long, constantly wondering where we would go next.

In one of my favorite places we lived, my brother, who moved out some years ago, gave me his Fender Squier. He lost interest after a month that he bought it, so he decided not to let it go to waste. The excitement I felt was like no other. My first guitar! It was disappointing that it was a Squire, but I was grateful. Before then, I'd never even held a guitar. I started trying to learn right away. I couldn't convince my parents to pay for lessons, so the next best thing was youtube. Days of watching hours of guitar videos, playing until I couldn't feel my fingers anymore, I've never been so committed to anything in my life.

Fast forward a couple of months, my family hears that our grandmother is sick. We had to do something so on an impulse we decided to go to Mexico. We were only allowed to bring clothes, so I had to leave my guitar. When we arrived, we almost immediately hated it. All the roads were cracked and broken, the houses were crumbling due to age, and I didn't have my guitar. But we were there for my grandmother, so it was something that we had to deal with. Her house was a mess because she only had one of my many uncles, and since he was too busy taking care of her to clean, the house got messy. As my mother tended to my grandmother's needs, my siblings and I would clean until the house had not one speck of dust. Doing nothing but cleaning made us hate being there even more.

After a couple of months, the house was spotless, and my grandmother got better, but we didn't leave. We couldn't. We had to stay because we didn't have enough money to go back to the states. My siblings and I were beyond angry, but there was nothing we could do about it, so we saved our energy and decided to just bear it. Since we finished everything we needed to do, we finally found ourselves with time to go out and explore. To our surprise, it didn't take long for us to fall in love with Mexico. We met family we never knew we had. I even made friends that I'll cherish for the rest of my life. For the first time in a long time, it felt like I was at home.

As if things couldn't get better, one day on a walk, we came across a man with classical guitars tied to a string on his back. I asked my mother if I could just ask how much he would sell them for. She said yes, and I excitedly asked. I couldn't believe it when he said that it was $500 pesos ($25 dollars at the time). I begged profusely to my mother, until she said yes. A guitar that was nobody else's, just mine. My hands eager to play like an alcoholic craves a drink. But it was different, this was a classical guitar.

I was used to the thin neck, small close proximity strings, and feel of an electric guitar. This was almost the complete opposite with its very wide neck I couldn't fully wrap my hand around. But this made no difference. Even though the classical made it feel like I was learning for the first time, I was still determined to master it.

Fully dedicated, I started practicing more than ever, but youtube videos weren't enough. It felt repetitive, and I wasn't learning anything new anymore. Luckily, an old family friend who is a pastor, his son ran a music academy. We quickly became friends, and I asked him about admissions. He told me I could be admitted and the fee would be $20 a month. I started working at a mechanic shop under the wing of one of uncle's friends. The pay was almost nothing but enough to cover the school fees.

Immediately I felt the difference. Not only would they teach me how to play classical guitar, but they'd also teach me music theory. After non-stop studying, I was top of the class for guitar, and transferred to advanced classes. Everything was going great. I was finally fulfilling what I've wanted for all of those years. That was until everything went sideways. We had to go back to the states.

During our stay in my grandmother's house, we encountered our eldest uncle. A drug addicted drunk who was known around the city for being a violent man and hanging around dangerous people. He came to the house peaceful at first. It was the first time he's ever met us, and he loved my mom dearly, so he didn't make any trouble then. But after a month, he changed. When he wasn't high or drunk, he would be irrationally angry and would pick fights. One day he got too aggressive to where we almost got into fisticuffs. This was the pushing point for my family, so we had to leave.

Our family friend, the pastor, offered to take us in until we left. I was heartbroken. I had to quit my job, I dropped out of the music academy, I was going to leave one of the few places I was able to call home, and on top of all of that I had to leave my guitar behind. We couldn't afford the airline's instrument fees.

Before we left for Mexico, we lived in Washington. There we left the majority of our things. When we returned back to the states, we went to California. So not only was my classical guitar in Mexico, my electric guitar was also out of reach in Washington.

Since we had to come back in a hurry, we didn't have time to find a place to stay. So now, at present time, we are moving from hotel to hotel and I am without my guitar. My passion is ,once again, put on hold until I find we find stability. My hope is to one day return to Mexico with my guitar, and play to my heart's content. There I would be able to create all the music I want.