Last Blog of 2012

Today’s Fashion Attire: Today I’m wearing a red Gap hooded sweatshirt, and a matching red sweatpants (Gap Outlet $34), underneath I’m wearing a black t-shirt with a tiny green bedazzled Christmas Tree (Gift from an old coworker) paired with grey New Balance Sneakers with green details (New Balance Outlet $26)

Outfit Justification: I’m wearing sweats to work.  Not really an outfit. But it’s holiday appropriate. It’s my last day in the office before my winter break. I wanted to be comfortable yet festive. This is my attempt.

Last Blog of 2012:

Here’s the deal, I don’t have a bunch to say. But I felt compelled to write a little something about my year in fashion, music and well all things Vivian.   2012 has been a tough year for me.  But little gems like this blog has helped me get through it. Here are some highlights that I want to share.

Discovering the pinup girl style. Finding the Pinup Clothing store in Burbank and the online store at pinupgirlclothing.com. Finding this style has helped me come to terms with my clothing my body and really showcasing my curves. Yes I’m overweight and I’m working on that, but that’s a long and slow process. I was already dressing my body in such away that things were flattering on me, but discovering this style has given me some empowerment that I was lacking.  I get more compliments when I wear these close, and I feel amazing. So thank you for to Pinup Girl Clothing boutique for giving me some new style.

Reconnecting with an old friend.  Reconnecting with this person has done so much for me. She has offered so much encouragement in my pursuing my music career.  At a time in my life when people were leaving my life because they either moved away, proved they were no longer good friends, passed on, or just drifted apart, reconnecting with Starr made me feel like I came back to life. She made me feel like I was the fun girl I thought I had lost years ago.  I was especially feeling low when my friend Jen moved to New Orleans. She was my shopping pal and my go out and drink and karaoke gal, and weekend getaway friend. Last year when someone in my life made me feel like no one really liked me or thought I wasn’t fun, Jen reinvigorated my spirit like no one’s business. So when she got a great job and had to move, needless to say I was sad and heartbroken. Just after Jen moved, I bumped into Starr at my new favorite karaoke place, and then ran into her again at her show at the Liquid Kitty. I felt like I had found my long lost little sister. We had a truckload in common. And that voice of hers, it’s rare that I meet someone who has such an amazing voice, and is such a phenomenal singer, that really moves me like Starr’s voice did. The first time I heard her sing she did Give Me One Reason, which was one of my signature karaoke songs, I looked at my husband and said, I have officially given up this song to her!  I did stop singing it for a while.  I was impressed. I was in awe. I was a little jealous of that talent.  But mostly I was inspired by it. Next thing you know, I’m singing a song or two with her in the bands she sings in, she’s encouraging me to audition for things again.  We encourage each other. And I’m passing some of my smaller wardrobe off to her because she can wear the hell out of it. As I write this, I’m smiling, because as my husband describes my relationship with Starr, as basically the same person living in two separate bodies.  She’s a kindred spirit. I’m very happy to call her a friend.

Finally I have to talk about my husband. I’ve already devoted a blog to him this year during our wedding anniversary.  But I need to say it again, I’m so lucky that this man is in my life.  I never thought I would get a second chance at real love, and I have with him. This man’s patience with me is just staggering.  After dealing with me and my health issues this year, he is still hanging around.  In many ways I’m still a very damaged soul, who is continuing to heal day by day. He is so kind to me, and it’s so obvious that he loves me, just for me being me. He is the pure definition of unconditional love.  The encouragement he gives me everyday keeps me going. I wake up constantly discouraged about my life, my job, my body, my pursuit of music.  He does whatever he can to combat all my negative feelings.  Earlier this month when I said I wanted to dismantle “my studio” in our apartment because “I’m not doing anything with it, and it was just a waste of money and space”. His response to this, “Don’t do that. It wasn’t a waste of money. Just because you’re not using the equipment and stuff right now, doesn’t mean it won’t be used in the future.  You are a musician and a singer. You’re creative.  You’re amazing. No one in the world sounds like you. And people love it when you sing. Just because don’t feel creative right now doesn’t mean you won’t be creative in the future. I believe in you and the potential you have to create something great.  Plus I don’t want you to dismantle it.”  If you have someone in your life that gives you that kind of encouragement you have to keep going. Therefore I keep going.  Thanks Jeff.

I don’t know what 2013 will bring. I know that I turn 40 next year, and I have mixed feelings about that. I know that I have almost 6 months left of my 30’s.  I know the things I want to accomplish and pursue. I don’t know how it’s all going to play out. But what I hope for an even better year next year.  I wish for health and happiness. I won’t say I wish for love, because I already have that.  That’s going with me into 2013.

To everyone that reads this, I wish you the happiest of holidays and a wonderful new year.

Rockstar and Fashionista

A Wealth of Compliments

Today’s Attire: Today I’m wearing a dress from the Pinup Girl Clothing boutique. And since they have very specific names on their dresses I will use the proper name. Today I’m wearing the Luscious dress in Navy with Octavio the Octopus on the shoulder (Pinup Girl Clothing aka PUG $61) I’m wearing a wide red belt (Ann Taylor Loft Outlet $6) burgundy heeled boots (Payless Shoe Source $9) and navy and light blue scarf tied around my neck.

Outfit Justification:  This is the only purchase I made during Black Friday weekend, and I did it online. I had been eyeing this dress in black with the “Tipsy Elephant” on it,  but ultimately I needed the blue dress.  I was very iffy about having an octopus on my dress, but the dress is so darn cute and I had to forget about the octopus and just go for it. I’ve been dying to wear this dress since it arrived at my apartment last week.  Today was the day. I wanted to go for cute. And I’ve received a bunch of compliments so I say I was successful in the looking cute department.

A Wealth of Compliments:

I’ve been sick for about a week or so.  As a result I’ve been feeling like crap about how I look and how I sound.  With this stupid cold, I don’t have all of my vocal range so I’ve been having a hard time singing. In most cases I’ve been only wanting to go to karaoke to watch and be entertained, but each time I end up singing.  Sometimes it goes well other times not so much.

However this past Saturday night, I went out to my local hangout in my snazzy new dress, and my hair in pin curls (in preparation for the upcoming holiday party at work) and opted to sing a little.  The response was kinda overwhelming.  I sang four songs through the entire night.  Old Time Rock n’ Roll by Bob Seger, Creep by Radiohead, Time is Running Out by Muse and Seven Nation Army by The White Stripes were my selections for the evening. They went over pretty well.   I posted the one comment from a girl noticing me as the girl who sings Metallica on Facebook Saturday night.   But here were some other comments that were made Saturday night:

“You are the best thing to ever grace the mic tonight….you are phenomenal”

“Everyone else made my ears bleed tonight, but you were so fantastic I forgot about all the other people “

“I just have to tell you that you sound amazing, but you look fantastic. Where did you get that dress”

“I have never hears a chick rock that hard. When are you going to sing your next song? Is there a way we can get you moved up on the list because you’re that good!”

“I heard you sing and I was wondering if you can sing a song for me and dedicate it to me because it’s my birthday and you’re obviously some kind of star with that voice”

“You are so amazing, I wish I knew people because I would build an entire band around you and that awesome voice of yours”

“That was one helluva performance! You woke this entire bar up with just one song and you can move too. Fantastic”

“You’re the angel with voice. The one that make the rest of us grateful that you’re here so we can forget about the people who can’t sing”

All this came from different people through out the night. It felt good to hear all that praise from these strangers.  There were a few people who said they’ve seen me sing here before and they’ve come back a few times in hopes they could hear me again.  This one dude told me he recognized me from 6 months ago when he heard the voice, before actually saw my face.  That totally tripped me out. But the girl who told me they videotaped me singing Enter Sandman by Metallica blew me away.  She said my friend who is totally obsessed with Metallica saw that video and was in love.  I blushed at that statement. But it made me feel good. I did the stupid thing of trying to negate all of this by saying I was sick and wished I could have sounded better instead of simply just saying “Thank you”. But I’m a weirdo and have to work on that.  But it’s nice to know that people appreciate something I do and let me know that.  You have to love unsolicited praise.

Family and Holiday Thoughts

Today’s Attire:  Cotton ¾ length sleeve black with white striped off the shoulder dress (White House Black Market $35) black leggings (Banana Republic $10) and knee length black leather boots (Torrid $65).

Outfit Justification: Honestly I just wanted to wear this dress. It’s a short day, and it’s comfortable. Horizontal stripes aren’t necessarily the most flattering thing one could wear that’s my size, but these seem to fall right on me.  And frankly I think I look cute.

Family and Holiday Thoughts:

So I’ve been kinda silent for a few weeks on the blog front.  The holidays aren’t really a great time for me. And my depression seems to deepen more at Thanksgiving.  As mentioned in a previous blog, the holiday blues set in a little early for me.  That was tougher to deal with.  I was overwhelmed with everything.  As I approach Thanksgiving I’m doing better than I have in awhile. 

This Sunday is the anniversary of my father’s death.  Hard to believe it will be 28 years on Sunday. For a 11 year old girl, who was daddy’s little girl, to lose her father is one of the most traumatic events one can expect an eleven year old to deal with.  This event still affects me to this day. This left an emotional scar on me that has affected my relationships with people in my life.  If we have to put a label on it, let’s call it abandonment issues.  I do not use this as excuse to not be functioning human being in society, but it does explain some of my issues and how I deal with things, particularly how people leave my life. 

Talking about this does hurt, but it’s a hurt that’s necessary to endure sometimes.  My dad died the Sunday after Thanksgiving, and for me this holiday is always associated with his death.  So you can imagine, why I’m not so overly jazzed when this time comes around every year.  I’m not in the family gathering mood.  I still do go to family gatherings, but it’s hard for me.  In some years it’s been even harder when there were already family issues to deal with. Sometimes I prefer to hide and not get out of bed the entire weekend.  As part of family obligation I will still press on and go eat.  But my preference is to give thanks, eat quickly, eat very little and get out of there as quickly as possible. The year my ex husband walked out on me, I slept through every meal, went to the gym and then went back to bed, and on the 4^th day I traded in my beloved Mustang for a new small SUV.  A rational person doesn’t sleep for four days then buy a new vehicle. Oh well that’s what I did.

A few days ago, I found a picture of me when I was 5 years old. It was taken on the patio of the apartment where I grew up.  My father took the picture of me. I posted the picture on Facebook.  Looking at this picture made me happy.  It was nice to see a true reflection of the younger me.  I was such a happy child.  And the smile in that picture truly exhibited my true feelings on that day.  The day that picture was taken was my 5^th birthday. My parents were throwing me a little party for me and my friends were invited.  There were two cakes. One store bought cake with like Snow White characters on a white frosted cake. The other was home made chocolate cake with pecans layered on top, made by my dad.  There were also chicken salad sandwiches made by my mom and dad that were cut into shapes of hearts and stars.  There were gifts already under the stairs for me. And I was just waiting for everyone to arrive.  My dad wanted to take a picture of me before the festivities started.  Outside on our patio near all his plants and flowers that he raised I posed for that picture.  My mother had clearly dressed me because I’m wearing pink.  My favorite color was blue even back then, but my mom thought it was most appropriate to put me in pink. I posed with my typical pose of putting my hands on my hips.  And I just beamed.  It was a great day.

Finding this picture filled my heart with such joy.  This wonderful early memory came flooding back like it was just yesterday. Even now as I type this, I can’t help smiling. I felt so loved. I was so happy.  The life of a child is so simple, and I would love to experience that type of uninhibited joy again. It helps that when I look at this picture, I think, “Wow, how cute was I at this age?”.  The picture is adorable.  Part of me can’t help but think how cute my child would be if I had one. And then I remember how incredibly spoiled I was at that age. Then I picture how much my husband spoils me now and how that would be increased towards our child.  I remember how I would look at my dad trying to convince him to give me my way, when something was clearly not going my way and I would give him the look and say “But Daddy I love you”. Worked like a charm. He couldn’t resist that.  And Jeff being the terribly sweet guy he is, could never resist our hypothetical daughter pulling the same thing on him.  He can’t resist me pulling that now.  And then that child would be a bear to deal with. She’d be a spoiled brat, like her mother, on occasion.

This memory has eased some of the pain of missing my father these past few days. I’m very thankful and grateful that I have this and so many other happy memories from our short time together.  I’m thankful and grateful that I still have my mother. And even though our relationship is sometimes so very strained, I’m so happy to have this wonderful woman who helped me grow up somewhat normal because she stepped up to be both parents.  She was the disciplinarian and the spoiler when my father passed on. She kept me grounded, yet elevated me in my successes through life.  My parents gave me all the love a child could have and did the best they could with me. I’m very blessed.

Now that I’m married again, I am blessed to have another set of parents, my in-laws.  I’m very fortunate to have a good relationship with my mother and father in law. They are very loving towards me, and have embraced me as their family. That was not always the case with in-laws. I’m so thankful and grateful to be a part of their family.  Having these additional people give their love to me just because I happen to marry their fantastic son feels like a miracle and a blessing.

Not all members of the family have embraced me, which makes me sad. My sister in law hates me does whatever she can to disrespect me no matter what the family event is. (Even at our wedding) As a result we can’t celebrate as a full family any more because she can’t pretend to act civil towards me. We now have to have separate celebrations because of this.  I’ve done my part to be civil to her in the past, but after an incident with meeting her child for the first time and she expressed very loudly that she wanted me nowhere near her child, I was done. You can only take the high road for so long. I did my part. She refuses to grow and try to act like a civil adult even after several attempts to reason with her. As a result, Jeff and I will never get the play the role of uncle and aunt to this child and the one that’s on the way.  Nor will we get to celebrate anything again as a full family.

Despite the last paragraph, I feel pretty good about going into this weekend. I’m armed with the loving memories I have of my childhood, the loving support and understanding of my husband who does whatever he can to help me through this very tough time.  And at this moment, I’m thankful and feel blessed for where I am.

To my Daddy:  I want you to know that I love you. I miss you everyday. I thank you for all the wonderful gifts you gave me from your time on this earth.  They physical ones like Juicy, the stuffed rabbit which I still have. To the intangible ones, like your love of music, and the fire in my personality that protects me when I feel threatened.  I know you watch me from afar. I don’t know if you’re proud of who I’ve become, but I hope that you are.  I look forward to the day that we meet again.  I love you forever.

Battling Issues

Today’s Attire: Pajamas

Justification for outfit: The attire is perfect for my mood. PJ’s are not meant to be worn outside the home. I wear them for comfort and for staying in.  Based on  the way I feel I don’t have any intentions of leaving the house.

Battling Issues:

Before I start this blog, I need to preface this with a few statements.  This might upsetting and I’m sorry for that.  This blog isn’t going to be a positive one. I’m not looking for advice at this moment in time. And I really don’t want people to make statements to try and give me perspective.  Meaning, please don’t say things like “at least you’re this”, or “or at least you have that” “or at least you’re employed”.  All this does is minimize my feelings and make me feel guilty for being unhappy despite the good things in my life. That doesn’t help me. I realize that other people in the world have bigger problems than me. And I don’t mean to sound like a spoiled brat, but the bottom line is that I’m having a rough time.  I write this blog to be informative, to be therapeutic, and when I’m doing well, to entertain.  At this beginning of this blog I said I was going to be real.  Here’s me being real.

This is usually a pretty dark time for me going into the holidays.  I don’t have that warm fuzzy feeling people get when the holidays approach.  But the holidays blues are settling in a bit earlier than normal for me.  I’m usually good through Halloween. And once Thanksgiving comes I start feeling really bad.  Thanksgiving is the anniversary of my father’s death. My father died in 1984, when I was 11.  This is something that happened almost 28 years ago, but it still affects me. His birthday is in December.  I love my father and I miss him very much.  Yes this was a long time ago, but that sadness is something  that I still deal with. The grief sorta haunts me through the good things. So I deal with this. Yes, I’ve seen a therapist about this, but nothing stops sadness or bad feelings. It’s hard to deal with.

Work has been particularly hectic.  The feeling of unproductiveness and the worry of a possible layoff plagues me. I really do the best that I can do when I’m there. Sometimes it gets to me. I care about things I shouldn’t care about. I’m not being paid to manage anyone. But I see things that aren’t right, and I do my best to correct or fix them, and then things happen and it’s upsetting. At work these things bother me more recently: 

People around me get rewarded for bad behavior

I get chastised for doing my job or trying to get it done despite other people goofing off 

People give me a hard time for being out for illness still

People aren’t reliable when I need them to do something

Or they give me attitude when I do ask them to do something that is their job

I’m constantly cleaning up after someone else’s mess

Office politics are really finally getting to me

Someone in my department acts like a child and it’s really annoying because the powers that be think it’s OK and cute.

I realize things could be a lot worse. I like my job a lot. I love the company I work for. But these issues along with my personal issues are really getting to me.

My health is something that I’m still struggling with. Despite all the things I went through leading up to my gallbladder surgery and the recovery I’m still not feeling well. I don’t have any real symptoms that I can head to the doctor for, but I’m not feeling well. And I don’t feel like spending the money to say “hey I don’t know what it is, but I’m just not feeling great”.  I’m not sleeping well again. I have nightmares.  I wake up feeling like I haven’t slept at all. I feel like my throat is hurts like every other day and sometimes my voice feels like it wants to be have and other times it doesn’t. I’m taking my vitamins, and my other daily medications every day. I do get some physical activity in my life, I’m sure it’s not enough, but it is better than nothing. I’m still going to my weekly Zumba class. I do eat well.  I watch what I’m eating, as well as portion size. But despite all that, I keep the weight on. I keep playing with the same 5 pounds since July.

The issue that has been affecting me the worse is poor body image. Despite all my efforts to lose weight, and dress the body that I have, I hate the way I look. I really hate the way I look. I hate mirrors. As I write this, I feel the emotion heating up from the hatred that I have for my body, face and hair. I am so angry with myself for looking the way that I do. When I lost the weight the first time I swore I would never get this big again. I screwed up. I gained it all back. I hate myself for letting this happen.  Now as I battle a low thyroid, and I’m facing down the gun of 40 years old and with all my efforts to lose the weight I fail.  I see a gross stomach, horrible arms, and thighs and a fat face. And no matter what cute dress or outfit I find, it doesn’t mask this truly ugly body that I have. My husband does his best to convince me that he sees me as beautiful. No matter what size I am. I think he’s nuts. I don’t see it. All I see is me putting on 15 different things in the morning or the evening and watching them not fit right. Putting on a costume that was custom made for me and looking at my fat belly despite wearing a waist cincher and body shaper make its appearance. Everyday I’m faced with an extremely ugly fat girl in the mirror. And my efforts to make her go away fail every time and it hurts me to the core of my being.

I know this all evidence of lingering depression. I’ve been off antidepressants for months. I don’t want to go back on them. When I went back on this last time, I never felt better on them. I never got any relief from my issues.  I just felt off. Sometimes numb. But not good. Never OK. When I went off the meds the last time and got through all the health issues in the spring and early summer I started to feel OK.  Never great. Just OK. And OK was good enough at the time. Now I feel lousy, but I feel like it’s seasonal.  But I don’t know.

And then there’s the music stuff. And thinking about this hurts my heart too. Pursuing the dream of being a singer has really not helped any of these situations.  I feel like all my efforts seem to fall flat with this.  I work hard at improving my skills. I practice, I work with vocal coach, I sing regularly at karaoke.  People hear me sing and they think I’m amazing. I go on auditions, I pass out business cards, I submit myself for things that might be a good fit for me, but nothing comes of it. Then I hear comments like “Why aren’t singing professionally? Why aren’t you in a band? You’re so much better than people we seen on the American Idol.  I hope you’re doing something with that voice!” But the sad there is nothing. I work with a project that seems to be on hold right now. My last audition got cancelled, not postponed they cancelled it. When I look through the ads for vocalist they specify “must not be heavy” “Must be hot” “Must sound like Beyonce, Rihanna”  “Must be under 25”  It’s so frustrating, because I’m not anything of these things. I’m just a girl, with a big voice, who likes to sing rock. I don’t want to be a jazz, gospel or R&B singer. Yes I can sing these styles but it’s not what I want to do or what I do best.  But I feel like I’m never going to get the opportunity to do what I want here.

Needless to say I’m feeling awful and low. And despite the good things in my life right now, the bad stuff is getting in the way. When I move forward in any direction, it feels like I can’t get beyond my obstacles. And I’m hurting in so many ways. The love and support I have from my husband isn’t helping right now. I do my best to put my “best face” on Facebook. Posting pictures, and random positive stuff, because that’s what I think Facebook should be about. But behind all of that and closed doors, there’s a very damaged human being out there trying to get through a really rough time.  So I apologize if I’m not there for you like a good friend should be if you’re going through something. My struggles are suffocating me right now and I’m doing the best that I can to just get out of bed and put one foot in front of the other in my life. All I ask is that you just you keep me in your thoughts and prayers as I deal with this.

My Love Affair With Karaoke

Today’s Attire:  To Be Determined.

Outfit Justification: I don’t have to justify my outfit because I’m still in bed and not dressed for the day yet.

My Love Affair With Karaoke:

Without sounds like boastful jerk, I have to say that I’m a decent singer.  I’m not saying I’m the best in the world. But singing is something that I’m good at. I would hope that I would be pretty good at it since it’s something I’ve been doing since I was 5 years old. (It would totally suck to do something this long and totally suck at it) It probably has something to do with the fact that I love it. It’s therapeutic for me. It’s my way of expression.  And when I do sing, people don’t run for the hills screaming “What is that God awful noise coming from that woman?” So this is a good thing.

When I sing I enjoy performing.  That means I don’t get up there and look dead behind the eyes when the song is coming out of me. I sing with emotion, passion and fire.  I dance around. I air guitar during musical breaks. I engage my audience with eye contact, smiles, and whatever else. As my friend Shane, a KJ at a local bar says, “You got a show to do”.  In my mind, karaoke is one big long variety show. And I’m a guest singer with little mini sets.  So I feel the need to put on the show.  Frankly I like to treat it that way. I know it’s weird. No one is coming to bar paying to hear me sing. But the way I see it, is they’re in the bar, they know it’s karaoke, so they don’t expect much from the singing, so I might as well entertain or amuse them some way. 

My approach to karaoke is that everyone deserves to feel like a rock star for the duration of a song.  My singing of karaoke is not to compete with anyone. I love when other singers get up there and really sing a song well and have fun doing it. I love singing along when it’s a song I love.   Although I do find that people try to compete with me for whatever reason. I hate that. With the rise of singing reality shows, I find that the need to compete with other singers at a karaoke bar is at an ultimate high.  People have a tendency to think there can only be one good singer for the night. I hate when someone gets up to sing a song and they’re really good, but their attitude stinks. They act all douchey towards everyone else because they think they’re the best.  It annoys me to see this. Because karaoke isn’t about that, it’s about having fun. If you’re that good, take your act on the road, go to an open mic night, audition for American Idol, X-Factor and The Voice. Go be a star some place else, and stop ruining everyone’s good time.

Last week, I went to a bar that’s close to where I live.  It’s close and it’s cheap.  It gets super crowded there, but it was a Friday night and I learn to expect this. I was having a reasonably good time until I found out one of the contestants from American Idol and The Voice was at the bar.  I’d seen her at the bar a few weeks back. When I saw her the previous time, she was with a group of friends. Her friends were kinda  nice and cool. She was kind of a bitch. Her friends were telling one of my friends that she was a former finalist/contestant. And were both like great looking forward to hearing her sing. I actually sang sometime before her, mid way through my song got up walked in front of me while I was singing. Ok that was rude. Then she was rude to the KJ, which I saw multiple times. When she got up to sing, she wasn’t that good.  I was disgusted by all of this.   So last week when I saw her again, I was hoping it was a freak incident and maybe she was just having a bad night and then her attitude would have changed. No such luck.  She was impatient with the KJ, trying to get him to move her up she kept trying to convince him by saying she was amazing. Her friends were also trying to convince him to move her up because she was so amazing. He told them, she would have to be patient like everyone else. Then she proceeded to cross other people’s names off the list and say that they left so she could take their place. Really chick? When she got up to sing she did the same song I saw her do last time, and she was still not amazing.  In fact just was just barely mediocre.  At one point during her song she locked eyes on me and it was quite obvious that she was expecting me to be impressed by her version of Amy Winehouse. I wasn’t impressed. Anyone who knows me, knows that I have quite expressive facial expressions.  You can tell what I’m thinking just by looking at me. I made sure that egotistical brat knew I wasn’t impressed by her Amy Winehouse by staring back her unimpressed, unamused, and unsmiling. She finally got the point and moved to sang to someone else.  I don’t respect that kind of behavior. As a singer, I don’t behave that way. No one should behave that way. But if you’ve been on television with some mild success you have even less reason to come to a karaoke bar and behave that way. I know this makes me sound like asshole, but if this was a competition I could sing circles around that idiot girl and show her what impressive is. It would be easy to fall into the trap of getting a big head from all the compliments I get about my singing. Then walk around like I’m God’s gift to singing and treat people like they don’t matter. But what does that get you? A bunch of people that think you’re a douchebag and don’t want to work with you because you have a terrible attitude.

I’m fortune it enough to have the ability to sing. I thank God everyday for my voice.  It’s a gift and he blessed me with it.  Not everyone has that ability and I’m humbled that I have it.  I do my best to not take it for granted. But I use it to the best of my ability. So when I go somewhere and I sing and someone compliments me, I don’t behave like I deserved that compliment. Because frankly no one has to say anything to you when they hear you sing at a bar. I’m grateful that someone took the time to come over to say something.  In the last few weeks several people have said the nicest things to me. Even now as I write this, I smile because their words warm my heart. A few nights ago, when I sang a guy came up and bought me a drink. He said “I wanted to buy you a drink because I feel like I should pay you in some way for that performance”.  I told him that was silly and we were all there to have a good time.  It was still a sweet gesture.  When we were in Vegas for our anniversary, I did karaoke in a casino lounge.  The casino wasn’t huge, but it was big enough.  I got up to sing and for a few minutes the lounge, the bar and part of the casino stopped to hear me sing. Scared the crap out of me.  When it was over it was the loudest applause I’ve heard for awhile.  We went walking to other places, and people in other casinos were stopping me to tell me how great my voice was, or how amazing the thought I was. Honestly I was shocked by that, but I was so grateful that I could have that kind of effect. Then the next day I was back home at a bar and some guy who was at the bar saw me sing and heard all 3 of my songs that night said “This might sound wrong or come off as weird. But I’ve never seen someone like you do so many different types of songs and nail all of them.  Why are you even in a karaoke bar?  You shouldn’t be singing karaoke.  Alicia Keys, Radiohead, Bon Jovi? And you have all this power. It sounds like you have too much power for this room and it needs to be contained, but there isn’t a stadium to contain that much power.  Frankly all I can say is ‘Wow’.  You are so talented and need to do something with this beyond a karaoke bar. I’m so glad I got to see this first hand.  You are fantastic”. It took me a while to process all of that because I wasn’t sure where he was going with all of that. It was a big compliment. A bit over the top, but still a nice compliment.  However I’ll never believe that I’m better than karaoke. Gospel is where I got my early training, school is where that training was refined, karaoke is where I got the ability to perform. And ultimately karaoke is where I discovered that I could do things I never expected with my voice. Karaoke showed me the possibilities of what could be. Karaoke will always hold a special place in my heart for all the good things that it brings, the lessons that I’ve learned, and the possibility of the singing career I could have.  Thank you karaoke.