kamalanilk:

this is my dad. he’s a musician and most of what i know about music comes from him. two of his guitars now belong to me and the one he’s holding in the picture is his prized 12 string takamine which will also become mine.

the way he plays is unlike anything you’ve ever heard. a slack key master as well as an upbeat improviser.

sometimes i’ll be sitting upstairs while he’s down in his room and i’ll hear him start to play. i just drop whatever it is that i’m doing and listen. more so now than ever.

i play along with him and he’ll just laugh at me. he tells me it’s not because i’m playing funny kine, but because i’m playing just like he does.

he’s trying to teach me as much as he can before…no can.

i’m trying to savor every note he strums and the patterns of his picking for i know that the days of hearing those things and learning how they’re done are slowly but surely dwindling down.

it brings an ache to my heart to come to this realization, and even now as i type these words, tears are blurring my view and streaming down my face. 

it is a bitter sweet thought…that i will someday lose my father, but he and his music will live on through me. 

I wish I had this with my father. He played Trumpet. The only reason I started playing was because I thought it could keep him alive in my heart. And it does, but sadly I never got to hear him play. I wish I could say I have his style but I don’t. His love for music and his memory still lives on through me though. Other than a Jim Croce album and a wallet full of tickets and court dates, it’s all I have left of him.