I started seriously playing music when I was fourteen years old. It was October and just starting to get cold. I had taken a twenty five foot fall off of a tire swing atop a North Carolina mountain, shattering my left ankle and right wrist, and leaving me bed ridden for upward of twelve weeks. Doctors said I was lucky not to be paralyzed, and luckier still that I would have motion in my wrist or hand at all. I had been learning basic guitar at the time, but I hadn't really invested myself in it yet.
Being unable to play made me realize how much it already meant to me, and I quickly figured out how I could strum despite my full arm cast. I wouldn't take that wrist motion for granted any more. The music helped me pass the time, but it also served as an outlet for all of the complications I had inside. Lord knows that every fourteen-year-old boy is like a balloon inflated with all manner of demons, seconds from blowing apart. Music started to become my way of purging some of that pressure.
When I recovered, I formed a band with some of my closest friends, and we learned how to play together. We experimented with chords…rhythms…melodies…this was something different than just playing guitar. This was more than just friendship. It was unity. In an innocent way it was almost intimate. We were terrible and we knew it, but we loved to play…and we got better. Through all of this I came to realize something: music was my passion, it was what I want to do with my life, and it would be buried with me when I died.
At the time, I felt this meant that I should shirk my plans for the future. I didn't want a white-collar job, I wanted to create music and have it support me. I wanted to break the mold, and to prove every naysayer wrong. Somehow, it seemed like no one else had thought of this idea…
Ten years, countless band members and even more friends, one botched college education, a ridiculous amount of growing (up) later…here I am; and my God, the dreams really have come true. I've played hundreds of shows; toured all around the country, made so many good and gracious friends (good for befriending me, gracious for staying my friends despite me). I cannot count them. I've learned lessons, I've made mistakes, and I've discovered even more of my potential as a human being.
And now, after the show this Friday I'm leaving the band I've spent so much time building. Yeah, in a lot of ways I do feel like a hypocrite. Many who know me have heard my opinions on living your dreams. I believe that if you have a passion, you should pursue it no matter what. I still believe in that approach to life. I've learned something else though; it's easy to mix stubbornness and pride with passion. If I were to stay in this band, I'm afraid it would be out of stubbornness and persistence more than anything else.
It's time for me to move on to other dreams. I'll miss seeing all of you, and I'm sorry if any of you are saddened by this news. You have no idea how positively some of you have affected me, whether you meant to or not. I'll miss playing shows with Nathan, Jeremy and Robbie. Our times on stage count as some of the happiest moments in my life. I won't lie; this whole thing makes me extremely sad. However, that does nothing to detract from how certain I am that it's right.
Don't worry, music is still my passion, it is still one of the many things I now want to do with my life, and it will still be buried with me when I die. I'm still as idealistic as ever. It's just time to work on some of the other stuff.
In January I'm moving to Atlanta to begin interning in Matt Goldman's studio. I plan to learn the studio ropes and move into producing bands myself. In the mean time I should be doing some engineering on a few records in the coming year. There's talk of me writing movie soundtracks in the near future (something I have always wanted to try my hand at), as well as plenty more opportunities at live music up there (though nothing as involved as the Mile has been touring-wise). I'll also be completing the education degree that I delayed years back.
Like I said, I have plenty of dreams to live out. This has been one of them, and no matter how I had everything planned; this is how my part in it ends. A Denver Mile is in good hands, and I'm honestly excited to be outside of it to see where Nathan, Robbie and Jeremy carry this thing. Keep me in your prayers, keep being incredible people, and if you ever did learn anything from my long-winded posts let it be this: Life is, contrary to my initial musings, a series of dreams rather than a wisely chosen singular one. And the thing that strings these dreams together? Ah, couldn't we all guess by now? They are strung together by Hope.
Thank you all sincerely for everything,
Jimmie
p.s. If you'd like to keep up with the other things I'll be working on, or just plain keep in touch, please add me on my personal myspace
here. Do try to message me so I know you're not a myspace floozy, and I apologize in advance: I'm not the best at maintaining the thing. I still far prefer my social networks to be tangible.