And It All Comes Crashing Down

Hello again everyone, I've got some good news, and some bad news. Which would you like to hear first? Not that you can actually dictate what I'll end up picking first, seeing as how I'm typing up the blog right now, and you won't even realize what the good and bad news is until it's too late, but I figured I'd ask anyways. Y'know, the mannerism of it and whatnot.

Anyways, I'd rather not end this blog on a sour note, so I guess I'll start with the bad news. Well...

Y'know that "interested party" I've been referring to recently? Well, it turns out they aren't interested anymore. At least not in me. I'm not gonna go into detail as to what happened, or why that person lost interest (out of respect for their personal life), but I'll say this much: As glad as I am that that person finally made the decision and did what they truly felt was right, I'm left with a sense of...disappointment. I truly felt that something may have come out of this new found relationship, had it run it's course. I really felt happy and comfortable with this person; something I haven't felt for a person in a while. I thought she felt the same way, and I think she did too, for a time, but it just ended up not working out. She's been going through a great deal lately, and I didn't want to make her any more confused than she already was, so I felt it was necessary to just let her go. I'm not gonna lie, it stung. Sat in my room solemnly for a while last night thinking about it, but I'll get over it. I just hope that person finds happiness where she seeks it, and knows how much I care about her. She hasn't told me whether or not if she still wanted to go to prom with me, but...Ah, I dunno. It's just complicated. I understand though.

Anyways, in other, less disheartening news, the local talent show at our high school was last Thursday, and an amazing array of talent participated this year! I also participated, and did a cover of "We're Going To Be Friends" by The White Stripes, one of my favorite acoustic songs. I sang, while finger picking my acoustic guitar. I didn't expect to win or anything at the show; I just figured it would be fun to play for everyone. To my surprise, I won 3rd place! I snagged $50 and an amazing round of applause from everyone for my performance, and I gotta say, it felt incredible.

When I got to the show, I felt totally fine as I waited for my turn to perform. No nerves, no pre-show jitters. Not a thing. I was feeling pretty confident, despite the fact that I had recently caught a cold, and hoped all morning that it wasn't going to affect my singing. The vocals for that song are nuts, despite the chord progression of the song being pretty easy to pick up, so being able to sing over my illness was the biggest challenge. Finally, my time arrived for me to get on stage, and wow the crowd. The teacher running the whole show told me that I'd be playing in front of the curtain on stage, so that they could set up the next act while I was performing, as they were running a bit behind schedule. That didn't worry me so much, seeing as how when I stepped out from behind the curtain and sat down in my performing chair, people started cheering like crazy! I guess I had a lot more fans in school than I realized! What DID worry me, however, was when I plugged in my guitar to my amp, and it didn't want to project. A bolt of worry snapped through me while I talked to the crowd, in an attempt to buy some time and see what was wrong with my guitar. Shouts came from the crowd. I heard a few people say "Don't worry Tanner! Just play something!" as I struggled to figure out what went wrong. I came to the conclusion that the battery in my guitar was dead, and that was the reason why my amp wouldn't come on. After fully realizing this, I took a deep breath, and told myself that I wasn't gonna just NOT play because I had no amp. I looked confidently at the crowd and said "Well, it looks like my amp isn't working for me, so I'm just gonna play as loud as I can for you guys. How does that sound?"

Uproars. Total uproars. I don't think I could have fed them anything better than that, because they started going nuts. I couldn't believe the reaction! This instilled me with a new sense of confidence, and I took it away. Luckily for me, the microphone that I was using was actually a condenser mic, which did a good job of picking up my singing AND guitar picking, despite not having an amp. In what felt like a matter of seconds, the song was over, and I managed to hold my voice quite well with my cold, and I believe I only messed up the picking once near the end, but nobody noticed apparently! The second I finished, the entire crowd stood up and clapped with the sound of a thousand roaring suns. That's how awesome it was. I was blown away by the cheering, and nearly stumbled back behind the curtain as I walked back mumbling "thank you!" I didn't realize my stage presence was so awesome! I felt like I was on top of the world that night. Hearing the host tell me I placed in the talent show was an amazing experience. I didn't feel I deserved to place at all, but 3rd was a phenomenal for me. I'd like to post a video of my performance to show you guys, but I haven't gotten my hands on the footage yet. I'll get it up as soon as I can.

Going out to McDonald's afterwards with my buddies Drew and Stephen was an awesome way to top the night off. More awesome than the cherry topping the chocolate shake I got, even. They also performed with another girl from school named Jayme, and they performed "The Remedy" by Jason Mraz. If you'd like to read out Drew's experience, and see their performance on video, check out Boyd's World! It's not only an awesome blog, but is also run by an all around awesome individual who I'm proud to be friends with! Thanks for being who you are, Morg-Borg!

Lately, I've also been working on new finger picking songs, such as "Blackbird" by the Beatles, and I'll be working on one of my all time favorite songs "Temptation Of Adam" by Josh Ritter as soon as I can get my hands on a guitar capo. I swear, 99% of his songs are played with a capo. Dang folk guitarists....

Anyways, I'm gonna stop my ranting for the day, and leave you all with an inspirational quote that all should know, spoken by none other than the legendary Neil Patrick Harris:

"When I get sad, I stop being sad, and be awesome instead."