OK I need to stop listening to Soft Cell's 'Sex Dwarf'. I dunno what my problem is but I have it on repeat. It's just so catchy and ridiculous. I think that's exactly what I need right now.

Today was interesting to say the least. Unannounced to me, I was elected to play in an improvisation masterclass this evening. At least I ran into someone in the hallway who told me this a bit before hand, lol. Hm. I was quite nervous because of this, BUT after I played with a group (it was a nice group, too, flute bass, cello and electric guitar ) I seemed to get a profuse amount of compliments from the artists in residence. It made me a little uncomfortable; I don't know why. I guess I felt like who was I to be getting these compliments when I have only been improvising for 3 years. I don't feel like I have as much experience as others in my group, yet I always get complimented on various aspects of my playing (and hardly any criticism- which I would really like at this point). So I said 'thank you' politely and sat in disbelief for the rest of the class.

I suppose I should be proud of myself. I decided to branch out from my normal fare and try improvising, and by that I mean that I dove head in and joined a free improv 'big band' (kinda like Sun Ra, lol) with little experience and learned from some really amazing people. Hm. I hope that maybe, just maybe I can get some jobs improvising or doing free jazz sometime in the future. I know there are a lot of venues here for that so... *crosses fingers* I just need to find the right group of people that I click with here to form a good group. Goodness knows that has been a struggle so far!

Perhaps part of my struggle with accepting my success is that I have not worked half as hard at improvising as I have with written musics. I mean, I have studied flute for 14 years now. So, that's 14 years of work on written music versus 3 years of work on improvised music- I suppose I think I am being complimented on something that I have hardly even worked for. Now, I know I would be no good at improvising if I had not studied flute technique at all; I am just trying to reason my odd thoughts in my head. I must think about this issue more, it bothers me that I was so upset by the compliments.

Side note- Pele smells good. Very good. I don't know why I swapped away my original bottle of it. I just bought a new bottle and it came the other day; I'm wearing now and feel very happy indeed. It's definitely a 'tropical happy place' scent. I need a tropical happy place, by the way. It would definitely include lots of gardens and mojitos and sitting on fluffy pillows. Other than that, I'm open to suggestions.

I am quite exhausted. Tomorrow is my "day off" so to speak. I don't have to go to school, but have a lot of work to do from home. These are my favorite days, I must say. I prefer the little studio area that I have made for myself at home to the cold sterile practice rooms at school. I think it might also be a good day to catch up on my French grammar work .