Wallitner Weekly 23
Hello everyone!
A lot of productive things happened this past week.
I now have four minutes of music written for the song of hope. I am off to a great start considering the early deadline is thanksgiving and the actual deadline is the tenth of December. I am very happy with what I have so far and I hope I don’t change my mind about it haha. I thought about talking you guys through what I have so far and showing you pictures of the score, but I am still worried that I might wake up tomorrow and not like what I have, so I am going to wait a little while longer before I show it to you.
WallitPlays is ten followers away from reaching affiliate on twitch! For those of you who don’t know, I have been streaming on twitch the last two weeks to help limit my video game playing. The plan was if I turned it into a job, Id either stop, or make money. And it looks like we’re ten followers away from making money haha. Once I reach affiliate I will be able to run adds and people will be able to subscribe to the channel. I’m very excited!
I’ve got lots of plans for next week too!
Next week I hope to share the first few chapters of my textbook with you all. I’d love to have your feedback, especially from those of you who are not musicians. I am happy with what I have and I think it is very useful and interesting information. But I know that what I think is interesting isn’t always interesting. Id like to keep this book as thin as possible so you’ll have to let me know what you think I should let go.
I’m settling in to my role as a house-husband.
Growing up in my family, my dad was the one who went to work, and my mom stayed home and took care of us kids. In both of my brother’s families that is how it is. Though my sister’s law have worked from home on top of being stay at home moms. However, with me working from home and my fiancee being a school teacher, I am fated to be the one who stays home with the kids.
Because of this eventuality, I have started taking on a lot more of the household chores. What once was 50-50 is now more like 70-30 which is fitting because my fiancee makes more money than I do (for now), so this is an alternative way for me to contribute to our life together without trying to keep up financially.
Today I did my usual stream on twitch from 11 am to 3 pm. Then I continued working on my composition and theory work until around 4. Then I made dinner and did the dishes. I even poured a bottle of wine for us for when she got home.
For those of you who know me, you’ll know that caretaking is not really one of my strengths. I have been living as a broke college student since I was in middle school. The best meal I knew how to cook (up until about a week ago) was microwaved pizza rolls. Im not proud of my lack of adulting skills (yes adulting is a verb/adjective/…noun?) But it’s important that you know this behavior is not really in character for me, and I feel like Im doing really well here outside my comfort zone.
I think that the reason I am so happy to be outside of my comfort zone is this change has finally brought balance to my life. Im no longer battling my productive life and my personal life. Im no longer battling my work life from my home life. And I’m no longer battling for my own time. I think that’s important whether or not you think microwaved pizza rolls are a great meal.
However because of this new schedule, I have been taking naps in the evening. And I don’t mean sleeping through the night, I mean at around 7pm I take a nap until 8pm and then when I wake up I continue to work on theory and composition stuff. With the occasional marketing or editing for my twitch channel. I go to bed at around 3 am and do it all again Monday through Friday. This offset in my schedule lets me spend more time hanging out with my fiancee when she is home, and less time working while she is awake.
I’ve learned I really like to write music, especially this song of hope, after the world is quiet and everyone is asleep. Its easy to drop into an existential spiral though which may also be having an effect on my music. Time will tell.
All of this to say, I’m doing something I never thought I would be doing, and I am really enjoying it. I feel productive and I feel like a team player and Ive learned a lot about myself. I feel like I say this all the time, but I think that how we spend our time is something we should spend more time looking at. I realized I spent too much time working, to the point where my own happiness and my productivity were too intertwined. If I was sad I didn’t get anything done, and if I didn’t get anything done, I was sad. It was a vicious cycle. But breaking out of my comfort zone helped me break that cycle.
So if you’re in a rut, try something new. Who knows, maybe that thing will change your life. It could be some major change like dismantling the patriarchy, or something subtle like microwaving your pizza rolls for four minutes instead of three and a half. That way even though they're microwaved, they maintain a semblance of crispness. Either way, sometimes a little change can be good.