Doin' Work

Since I have about 4376795642356472139 things happening in my life right now, I thought it was a good time to add one more and dust off the ol' blog.

The title of this post has been my mantra for the last year or so.

When I took a music business course in grad school, the professor chose to focus on financial management rather than music business, and I've been a better person for it ever since. A book I read back in 2008 called The Richest Man in Babylon was one of the course materials, and for whatever reason, one phrase stuck out to me more in 2012 than it did back then: Make hard work your best friend.

The demands of the leave replacement job in Oregon forced me to learn to work better under pressure, react to unexpected situations, and become acclimated to a completely different way of music education. It ultimately instilled me with a tremendous amount of confidence in my ability to teach anywhere, at any level, under any circumstance. It was also the first professional experience in my specialty area. So, when I returned to New York, I had a much more impressive résumé, and interviews became cake for me, since I knew I could answer whatever questions were being thrown my way.

So last week I started my third leave replacement job since then, with previous stops in Westbury and Locust Valley. The current position is Orchestra Director of two elementary schools in Elmont. I'm much more optimistic about the long term prospects of this job, but I won't say more until there's more to say. It's been another baptism by fire, but I'm managing it quite well so far.

I also work at a music store, maintain a private studio, perform in an orchestra, play in a rock band called Make This Life, I'm training for a half marathon in May while fundraising for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, and I also try to have a social life.

Currently I'm looking for ways to simplify things. But the truth is, these are all things that make me happy and these are all things that were missing from my life until recently. Most importantly, they keep the gears turning. For whatever reason, idleness is poison to me.

My short term successes are nothing compared to my long term goals. But I can see the path to my long term goals more clearly now after putting in the work, one day at a time.

Liver Detox, or, the Idiotic Things Mike Will Do To Maintain A Healthy Lifestyle

***Post created in 2012***

So after some procrastination, I began a five day liver detox on Monday, September 17th. It involves drinking blended drinks with fruit juice, garlic, ginger, and olive oil, and drinking tea with all sorts of fun herbs and roots in it. I also elected to give up alcohol, meat, and dairy for the week. Here's the breakdown:

Day 1: After seeping the tea in water overnight, I blended my first juice drink. It recommends using fresh squeezed juice but I cheated a bit and used a 100% juice blend of apple, grape, and plant stuff. It wasn't pretty. Also, I had no garlic and ginger, but I didn't want to delay things any longer. After drinking the new concoction, I felt good, and it was actually pretty filling. Next came the tea, which was surprisingly good (having cinnamon, cardamom, and other spices in it doesn't hurt). I add formula to that and finally, take another formula which I tried to drop right into my mouth. This formula has habanero pepper in it. This was a bad idea. I decide to dilute the formula with water after the first time.

I repeat drinking the tea and the formula all day. In the meantime, I had two meals, one at lunch and one after class around 8:30 pm. I felt like I didn't eat enough but I also felt full all day.

Day 2: The preparation becomes a little more intuitive, and I'm starting to feel the effects of putting good, natural things in my body: more energy, more alertness, feeling more full even though I'm eating less. I eat out for lunch for the first time and I order a veggie burrito, no sour cream. I have no class this day so it's even easier to maintain a steady schedule with all of the healthy junk I'm shoving down my throat.

Day 3: Preparation now feels routine, and I'm adding more garlic and olive oil to the juice blend, as per instructions. About halfway through the juice blend, I get some serious nausea. I wait a few minutes and it goes away, I drink more juice blend and it comes back, I wait and it goes away. I play this game until the drink is gone, but I keep a close eye on my stomach for the rest of the day. Who would have thought my Italian stomach would react to garlic and oil that way?

The rest of the day goes well, if not totally on schedule.

Day 4: The nausea is still there, but more manageable. Maybe I've just learned to pace myself better.

Day 5: I feel "cleansed". I have more energy and I eat smaller portions and less often. My skin is clear for several weeks even after I stop taking the antibiotic I was on.

I highly recommend a liver detox, as long as your schedule allows you to do it correctly. I would also recommend doing a bowel detox/colon cleanse first, based on what I've read and my own experience.

Good luck, and stay healthy.

The Adventure Continues

This is my last post as MOA. I have indeed moved back to Long Island for the forseeable future. I'm very grateful to have had the teaching experience I had, but with the future of my position up in the air I chose to finish my Master's at Queens College and keep my teacher certification in New York State.

There are lots of things I missed about LI and NYC, namely the beach, the summer nights, and the delis. But more than anything I missed my family and friends. My family has been through an incredible amount of adversity over the past six months, and I'm glad to be able to be with them now, and yes, share in that adversity. My friends have demonstrated to me time and time again how much I mean to them, and in turn, demonstrate how much they mean to me.

I'm also savoring the opportunity to actually be able to play music again, since I didn't have any of my own instruments out West with me. I've got a fresh set of strings on my bass and she looks great. I'm planning to rejoin North Shore Symphony in the fall. I'm reacquainting myself with my guitar and building up rep so I can eventually go and play some open mics. And I'm looking for bands to join (once I get my chops back on bass guitar). All of these things have reconnected me, and reminded me why I love doing what I do.

I will miss, in no particular order: Dutch Bros. Coffee, my apartment in Keizer, Voodoo Doughnut, the general weirdness of Portland, downtown Salem, my bed, the Oregon Coast, all of the friends I made, local food and drink, and the students, parents, and staff who were so supportive through all of the craziness and uncertainty that was the past six months.

I will NOT miss teaching at 6:30 am on Monday mornings.

So this blog will continue, as a way to document and connect what's going on in my life at any given time. I'm glad for what I've done, and I know that the future is bright.

One More Time!

I'm making my way back to Oregon tomorrow to move my things back to New York. I'm also looking forward to seeing the sights one more time. Most of you know by now that I will be returning to New York for the time being to complete my Master's in Music Ed so I can finish that chapter in my life and move on to bigger and better things. A full update will follow when I return to the East Coast so stay tuned!

Month of May

It's been a while.

The weather has been absolutely incredible - sunny and 80 degrees with no humidity for the past week or so. I was able to drive out to the Coast on Saturday and hike over the Pacific Ocean. Afterwards, I wanted to go to a McMenamin's pub in nearby Lincoln City. For you East Coasters, McMenamin's owns fifty or so pubs in the Portland area and throughout the state of Oregon. Each pub has its own style and personality, and I was looking forward to going to the Lighthouse Brewpub in a seaside town. Unfortunately, it looked like a pretty standard restaurant from the outside and it was in a shopping center next to a Dollar Tree. So I drove home and cooked instead.

For the first time since I'm out here, I feel like I'm able to come home from work at a reasonable hour, get things done around the apartment, run errands, etc. and be able to spend time properly preparing for classes. It sounds basic, but for the first few months I would be at school from before sunrise until after sunset and be so busy teaching and involved with events outside of normal school hours that I would crash by the time I got home for the night. I'm hoping to build on some of the momentum I have until the end of the school year. The job hasn't gotten any easier, but I feel like I'm managing it a bit better. I would love the chance to spend a summer actually planning my classroom and curriculum before beginning next year. But, that's yet to be determined.

It's insane how fast time is going. In about a month classes will be finished for the year. But I'm feeling relatively at ease with the future amid the stress of concert season and year end stuff.

Post St. Patrick's Day

So I desperately needed a haircut, and after going to the mall last time, I decided it was time to find a decent barber in town. I went to two local shops and despite the fact that their signs said they were open until 3 pm (it was about 1:30) BOTH were closed. I guess trading hours don't mean much in Keizer barbershops. So the third place I went to looked super sketchy. The shop was decorated with all sorts of Americana from another era, there was free water and beer (neither of which I accepted), and the barber's mother came to visit at one point. The barber was a great guy, but not such a great barber. The search continues.

Anyway,

I went to a dive bar last night to see a couple of local bands play. A woman sat next to me, and through brief conversation I found out she grew up in Brentwood. Then, the singer of the second band announced that he was from Jersey. A small world indeed.

The bands were decent, but the crowd was lame. Mostly old Irish guys celebrating the holiday who had no idea bands were playing. But there were definitely enough characters to keep the night interesting.

Spring Concert

I had my first ever Orchestra concert tonight as host and conductor. I didn't know anyone in the audience. For the first time, I'm painfully aware of how alone I am out here.