Sore Hands and Mountains to Climb

In just a few weeks I fly to Finland to begin my second tour as a stagehand for Lindsey Stirling. As the time passes I can’t help but reflect on the amount of work that I have done to get to this point. My hands have provided the dexterity necessary to tie knots, pull ropes, and plug cables. They are 34 years old and each and every day they are sore beyond belief.

Every joint, tendon, muscle, and bone inside my hands hurts almost every moment of every day. I try to give them rest as often as possible but the truth is our hands are the most used tools in our lives. From typing, to eating, to drumming, to working our hands are always working for us. Having a background in drums and percussion I have an intense respect for stretching before and after any given activity. The factor I can’t control that has the largest impact on the pain level experienced in my joints is the weather. The pain comes rolling in with each passing storm as the barometric pressure changes.

Just like the weather, when changes happen too fast it is difficult to keep up, causing excess pain. My goal in the next three months is to keep the chaos in order amongst a multitude of massive changes. In three weeks I leave for tour, leaving my girlfriend behind in a city neither of us enjoy for six weeks. I return just in time for Thanksgiving through which I will be working, driving carriages. But then we both quickly need to pack our apartment to move the first week of December to Orlando. Mainly so she can work through the holiday season at Disney to make some decent money. But once I get her moved in it will be time for me to return to Indianapolis to finish out the remainder of my work with Yellow Rose Carriages through the end of the holiday season, of which I’m told is insanely busy. All, for the hope of having a little bit of savings and relocating, semi-permanently, to Orlando, Florida. 

After all of that I will fly back to Orlando just in time to catch New Year’s Eve with my girlfriend. Then it’s off to find work once again. Like I said, trying to manage the chaos inherent in a multitude of changes in a short amount of time. From percussing, to stagehanding, to carriage driving I’ve got my bases covered. I have no idea what I’ll be doing, but I guarantee I’ll be doing something I enjoy and with any luck I’ll be able to do what I love for a living. Mountains to climb one step at a time.