My Kind Of Weekend

Feels like it’s been a while since I had a four-day weekend I was happy with. The last few extended times off were decent, but in the end I felt I’d spent the majority of the time being busy as opposed to spending time doing things for myself. No down time, necessarily. No “me” time. This past Memorial Day weekend was a 4-day weekend spent gloriously plan-free, which meant I had plenty of time for myself. I painted, worked on music, listened to lots of music, and the wife and I got to just hang out.

These are the weekends I live for.

My wife and I both took last Friday off, so after I finished cleaning out the gutters and roof, then mowing and weeding by 12:30pm, we headed to Goshen. She wanted to go to the thrift store and see if she could find some black tops and pants/skirts for our middle kid. She needs some black clothes for her job at the spa, but doesn’t have much money to spend. This thrift store is pretty big and usually has a decent selection of womens clothes. I’m not much of a thrift store person, but I had no plans and it was nice that my wife and I could just get away for the afternoon.

Another reason I didn’t mind going was that we were going to stop and Ignition Music and take a look at their used turntables. Last week my local shop, Karma Records of Warsaw, posted three used turntables they were selling. These were tables that had been restored by a guy I know. I’ve worked with him for nearly 30 years, at two different orthopedic companies. He’s an IT guy, but is also a collector of vinyl and restores stereo equipment on the side.

So first off, I wasn’t looking for a new turntable. I’ve had my AT-PL120 for almost 16 years now and I love it. I’ve never had an issue with it, and since I traded out the cartridge for an Ortofon Red back in 2014 it’s sounded pretty amazing, even with the onboard built-in preamp. I figured I’d keep using this deck until it was dead.

But then I saw this old Fisher direct drive with Auto Return and I was smitten. It had a walnut deck and looked so incredibly cool and slick. If I were to ever replace my deck it would be with a vintage turntable, and this Fisher was from the late 70s. I saw it on Wednesday when John at Karma posted a pic of it on the store’s FB page. I asked him how much it was going for and he told me $225 which seemed pretty reasonable. He said he could put it back if I thought I wanted it. I said no, but if it was still around in a couple weeks I might grab it.

Well I told my wife about it and she said just get it and we’ll call it your Father’s Day gift. I was like “Seriously?” She said sure, so I messaged John Friday morning. Unfortunately someone called the night before and asked if he’d put it back and they’d come in the next day to pick it up.

Bummer.

Oh well, it wasn’t like I “needed” a vintage turntable. But I sure did want one.

So my wife suggested we go to Ignition and see what they had. Well that was a bust. What they had wasn’t very appealing looking, plus it was waaay over my budget.

Win some, lose some.

We still had a nice afternoon. We got hot pretzels at Jo Jo’s Pretzels and also found our daughter a lot of clothes she can choose from for work. That night we got home and I made a pizza and we watched some TV.

Saturday I got to work on some music. I’ve been writing/improvising on this little Arturia analog/digital synthesizer. I’ve been inspired by the soundtracks of Polish film composer Wojciech Golczewski, a guy that works in analog synths and has put out both solo and film score work for years. Love the simplicity and melody-driven work of his, so I set up a little spot in the bedroom by the window where I sit and come up with songs on the spot. I’m working on my 3rd song now. They’re all under the three minute mark. Going for short but sweet, but who knows the next one might be 5-6 minutes. You just never know.

Sunday I used this acrylic pen we bought about a month ago for the first time. Drawing isn’t a strong suit of mine, and painting “things” as opposed to shapes and colors didn’t seem in the cards for me. But I thought if I could at least use something I could draw with on canvas I might have a shot and creating some weird portraits in my own drawing style. Well in my eyes it was a success, as I did my first piece with the pen and it turned into a decent(for me) self portrait. I’m going to attempt to do one of everyone in the family. We could have a wall of these strange portraits of us and the kids(and maybe even the dog.)

It feels like a door was opened in that regard, and I’m excited to see where it takes me.

Sunday evening we took our middle kid out for her 21st birthday. Her birthday was actually the 20th, but we celebrated it proper on Sunday. Took her to one of our favorite Mexican restaurants in Fort Wayne, Tequila’s. One of our daughter’s best friends and her boyfriend met us as well(they actually got their first and got a table for us.) My son and his girlfriend came up as well once they got off work, so it was a very nice party of 7 that enjoyed food and margaritas(my son and his girlfriend didn’t since they’re not 21, and I didn’t because I was driving.)

I was happy we finally got to celebrate her birthday. It’s been a long year(if you’ve been keeping up then you know why), so to have a genuine moment of happiness and a feeling we’ve all turned a corner was a very good thing.

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Picked up a couple records over the weekend as well. A reissue of Joe Henderson’s excellent Power To The People, as well as DIIV’s newest album Frog In Boiling Water. I’m going to do a deep dive on the Henderson album, and there’s a review coming soon as well for the DIIV record. Both are excellent.

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So not every weekend can be an absolute winner. I know that as well as anyone. But when those few show up and it’s pretty amazing from start to finish you tend to relish them, and lock them into your memories. Those tiny moments you can relive when the world feels like it’s crumbling under your feet. The best ones are always when I get to do something creative and feel as if I accomplished something. Painting, recording music, and diving into a great record makes for a fantastic weekend. Also, being able to go somewhere with my wife, even if it’s just 30 miles north for a pretzel and some secondhand clothes shopping. And then going out for dinner with my kids as well is just a bonus for me.

You gotta savor those small victories.