cleaning up

For the last few years, I had said that when I turned 50, I was going to learn how to play the drums. After I filed for divorce, when I was still six or seven months away from my 50th birthday, I needed SOMETHING as a distraction. A very good friend, who happens to teach music in a local middle school, decided to help me by scouring the ads for an affordable set.
Well, before a couple of weeks had passed, he'd found me some: the Black Hawk kit shown here, complete with three cymbals (with neat names like "Crash" and "Ride" and "Hi-Hat"). No snare drum, but he found one of those for me the next week. The drums and cymbals had been sitting in a garage for some few years (since the guy was in high school; his dad told him they had to go NOW). I spent some time taking them apart and cleaning them up, removing and trashing the mildewy pillows inside the bass (to muffle the sound for the neighbors), removing tarnish from the cymbals and shining them back up, using a bit of Superglue to re-attach some of the hardware. it was a bonding experience for me and the drums. Every once in a while, I'd even put on some Robbie Robertson and try to drum along!
After I got them in a serviceable condition, I bought a "learn the drums" dvd and set about finding my beat. Well, that was sure easier said than done! I was expecting something that would teach me when to hit which drum, when to add a little crash or ride, what part of the drumstick. No. The tutorial assumed I would just pick up on that, I guess.
I even attended a workshop/concert at a local music store, at my friend's invitation. The event featured Will Calhoun, the drummer of the the former, and now again touring, band Living Colour. He gave an incredible performance, amazing to hear AND to watch. WOW! I even bought his CD, Native Lands, which I'm listening to as I write. The sounds that man could make! Not just with drums and cymbals, but with other objects he had incorporated into his repertoire and converted into musical instruments. What an inspiration!
I was definitely inspired and set myself a schedule for practicing on my drums. Unfortunately, my inspiration didn't persist. I was still very unsure of just WHAT I was supposed to be doing. How to know which drum to hit??? How often? How to coordinate with the foot pedals on the bass and the Hi-Hat?
How to coordinate, indeed. I'm a bit of a klutz, as most anyone will confirm. Trying to get my feet and my hands to work at different speeds, on different items, in some synchronized manner... well, it just wasn't happening. I didn't have the patience to try to teach myself nor the funds to take lessons. And so the Black Hawk kit found itself being used as furniture: an end table here, a luggage rack there, a nightstand. The cymbals met a worse fate, sitting closed up in a closet to keep them out of the way.
No more. I had found them on Craig's List, and back to there I went to seek a new home for them. The first two contacts were a bust, but the third, as they say, was the charm. A young man was wanting to take up the drums. He was already accomplished on the guitar and was wanting to start a band with a friend... who also played guitar. I sold him only the Black hawk set, just as I had bought it, albeit quite a bit cleaner. I even gave him the package of drumsticks, a few drumming books, and the instructional CD I had purchased for no extra charge. I imagine I could have asked for the same sum for which I had purchased them, but, as I told him, I knew I had gotten at least $50 worth of entertainment from them and was glad to have the drums go to someone who would use them.
(I'm not really sure why I held on to the snare drum. It came in a travel bag, so it stores quite nicely on a shelf, out of sight for now. Maybe I'll learn how to be a gypsy jazz drummer. That would certainly be more my speed: only one instrument to operate, with no need to coordinate my hands and feet!)
Since then, I've been selling off a few other items that have been collecting dust around here. I started with some books that Daddy had read, then some movies that I had watched and decided that I did not need to own. Then, I was going through my music collection and realized, with a start, that I hadn't listened to some of those artists for YEARS. On to the eBay marketplace they were posted... and many have since literally been posted off to new homes! To date, I have sold more than 47 items! That's right, at least FORTY-SEVEN "things" have left my abode! Actually, the total is even better than that, but I've had 47 "positive feedback" reports filed on me, so I know that many of the items were well-received by their new owners. Fly Lady would be so proud of me! And I'm pretty pleased with myself, too.