T E X A R K A N A M A G A Z I N E
A pril is International Guitar Month which is something I never would have known had I never started playing guitar because it would not have interested me. How cool is it that there’s an entire month dedicated to an instrument? The Guitar & Accessories Marketing Association (GAMA) and the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) founded International Guitar Day in 1987 to promote guitar sales around the world. A plucked four-string instrument was named a guitar in the fourteenth century in Spain. When I was in middle school, I was often bullied for being different from a lot of the other guys in my school. I was, according to them, more “feminine” by nature and had absolutely zero interest in anything involving a ball. This made me an easy target for guys who felt like they had the right to box me in and label me because I wasn’t like them. Labeling others who are different from we are makes us feel more comfortable, and I got that, even then. That did not make things any easier, though. I have done a ton of growing since those difficult times, thanks to the power of finding my true identity in Christ, but also thanks to the healing power of music. I have always loved music, just as many others do. But for me, music started as just being something I did just for fun. It wasn’t too deep. Music was nothing I really had to think too hard about. It was just enjoyable. I would spend hours upon hours sitting in front of the computer watching music videos that I was FAR too young to be watching, obsessed with Britney Spears, Sean Kingston, Avril Lavigne, Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber. They were people whose music I LOVED but didn’t necessarily contain too much depth. The way I saw music completely changed one really bad day in seventh grade when I distinctly remember coming home from school super defeated from the name-calling and heavily churned rumor mill when I heard a song by P!nk entitled “Perfect.” The song is a big fat public service announcement that says your flaws, the little things others make you question about yourself, are ultimately what make you, as the song describes, “perfect!” This is the first moment I remember music actually making a palpable difference in my life. This was more than just a song about being at the club or being in love. It was speaking life into the darkness where, for me, light and hope did not exist. This newfound light fascinated me. A simple three- minute audio recording can literally be the words your friends may not know how to say to you when they are trying their best to comfort you. It can be the escape you desperately need when your reality feels like it is closing in on you. I’m being dramatic now and this is the part where my mom would say, “Okay honey, land your plane.” So, consider my plane landed here.
GOOD EVENING TXK COLUMN BY BAI LEY GRAVITT
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