I sometimes get tired of
hearing about the delights of “thinking outside the box.” This probably has to do with the fact that I
have trouble thinking inside boxes.
If I see a box, I run the other way.
For any given activity, I would rather invent my own method than read
the directions, or get advice as to how other people have proceeded. Maybe I’m just sensitive about being odd!
I noticed this sensitivity
creeping up to the surface the other day as I was clearing leaves from my
lawn. We have just finished the first
stage of the landscaping of our front yard.
The wonderful trees that we planted, four altogether, shade the lawn so
efficiently that any attempt to grow grass has ended in calamitous
failure. We had a retaining wall built
along the sidewalk, and the lawn filled in with black dirt and wood chips. In the spring we will have lots of new plants
installed, and the grass can just take a flying leap off a short pier!
However… as you know, with
every solution come new problems. The
multifold dead leaves that drop every day are now lying on a bed of mulch. You can’t rake them up because the mulch
would dislodge, too. I decided to try
the leaf blower. Huge success! The leaves blow away and the mulch, much
heavier, stays put.
In Minneapolis we’re now
using the biodegradable leaf bags. They
are really nothing but huge, heavy grocery bags made of brown paper. They stand up a little better than plastic
bags, but they sag, especially when you have a bunch of leaves you want to drop
in. Dropping leaves seems to offend my
OCD nature. Luckily some “out of the
box” mind invented a leaf funnel made of cardboard. It inserts into the bag, helping said bag to
stand rigidly. The funnel part allows
the leaves to flow down, where they can be packed into the bag.
I blew the leaves out onto
the sidewalk, and proceeded to gather them up with a leaf rake and a free
hand. The rake is wide, and gathers up
lots of leaves, but it was too wide for the funnel. The leaves continued to drop around the bag,
back onto the sidewalk. Now understand,
the sidewalk was an intermediary destination, and I had just a wee bit
of trouble allowing them to fall back onto the sidewalk after I picked them up
the first time. Now is where the story
gets interesting…
I went to my shed and got out
my snow shovel. The snow shovel gobbled
up a huge pile of leaves, and by turning it to the side, I was able to get the
leaves into the funnel with no spillage!
The shovel held more leaves than the rake, it scooped them up
efficiently from the sidewalk, and my problem birthed a bouncing new baby
solution. Yea!
Now, I know there were
probably neighbors on both sides of the street, peering out from behind
curtains, looking at the strange piano teacher, shoveling leaves. But, they’re really the same people that have
seen me leaf-blow the first light layers of snow from my walk. Who was it that said to use the “right tool
for the job?” He probably wasn’t
thinking of me.
I’m sure I’m not the first,
or the only, person to shovel leaves. I
really don’t care because I solved my problem in the most efficient manner I
could imagine. It made the mundane job
of removing leaves intellectually stimulating, and satisfying to the inner
efficiency-expert in me.
This, I told myself, is the
essence of practicing the piano. Yes! Find a problem. Determine the nature of the problem. Find a tool that addresses that problem
directly. This eliminates the mindless
repetition that many believe is piano practice.
If that were true I could understand those that don’t like to
practice. I wouldn’t either. But defining a problem, finding a solution,
and giggling at the amazing outcome… that is compelling!
I try to teach my students,
in every lesson, to think of practice as an Emergency Room experience. Assess and diagnose. Practice TRIAGE. Always do first-things first. The piano equivalent of “opening the airways,
stanching the flow of blood.” When they
learn to think and plan, set goals and take direct action, they start to play
music. That, of course if good, because
if they came to me merely playing notes, I would be bored silly! Practicing is nothing but defining problems
and finding elegant solutions.
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