A Musician’s Creative Journey
If you missed it, you can read Week Sixteen of my Musician’s Creative Journey, where I explore symbols, memory, and what endures.
This post is the latest installment of my ongoing series, A Musician’s Creative Journey — a weekly practice of reflection through music, writing, and daily life.
In Week 17, I find myself reflecting on who I am and what events in life helped make me the person I am today. These reflections feed my soul, keep me present, and provide a roadmap for reflection.
I’m learning to see the world around me with greater depth — as always, the lens breaks through the liminal space that surrounds me. With each snap, I capture a moment in time. To quote Thomas Merton — “Today will never come again.”
Thank you for being part of this creative journey.
— k
— k
Day One
April 22nd, 2026
Volunteer day—playing my weekly hospice gig in Blue Ash. Grateful to be part of the CAA Arts in Healing program. 💙
Some gigs you play for a crowd. This one you play for something far more sacred.
Every Tuesday I bring my handpan to Hospice of Cincinnati in Blue Ash — playing for families and friends gathered in their final days, sometimes their final hours, with the people they love most. I’m part of the CAA Arts in Healing program, and I am grateful beyond words. 💙
After a lifetime immersed in loud rock ‘n’ roll, I now find myself drawn into something quieter, deeper, and more intentional. My life has changed — but my music hasn’t diminished. It has expanded. My writing flows from that same place: reflection, honesty, and vulnerability.
Growing up, I was fueled by raw energy and rebellion. In my early teens, I dreamed of being a comedian. By my late teens, I wanted to be a rock star. Throughout every season, I’ve been a preacher — whether or not anyone asked. My Southern Baptist roots, shaped by my Uncle Bob’s sermons and softened by my grandmother’s love, created the mold from which I was formed.
I’ve often said that my grandmother gave me my heart, my mother kept it alive, and my father prepared me for the world I was destined to face. But what does destination really mean?
Life happens — and our destination is shaped by how we respond. Our response reflects our values. Life can be messy. Lessons can be hard. Sometimes things break. And the friendships that survive those fractures reveal exactly who you are.
I truly believe Jimi Hendrix would have stopped dead in his tracks — no pun intended — had he ever discovered a handpan. It’s a real, live spaceship. When I close my eyes to play, he shows up to listen — just like when I play guitar, his presence guides something in me. Jimi and Janis both appear in that space. Once Janis emptied her bottle, I got sober. Jimi still visits every time I design a new pedalboard. And God? God is always there.
Life is a time capsule — a place where reality bends and calls us to dream. It’s called me to wake up, grow up, dust myself off, and keep moving forward.
Today, my calendar read: Hospice of Cincinnati, Blue Ash, 2pm–4pm. One of my weekly handpan gigs. I’ve been playing here every week for five years. I know the staff. They know me. They love the handpan.
This gig has quietly prepared me for the loss of my father — and now, the ongoing journey with my mom.
I still remember setting up to play just a few months before my father passed. I watched a family and staff form “the walk” — moving in reverence as their father’s body was carried out. It felt like a dress rehearsal for something I knew was coming.
There’s Ester — 75, wise, old school, and she knows how to pray. She’d always ask, “How’s dad doing?” or “How’s your mom?” Some weeks she’d rest her hand on my head mid-song and pray right there. She always said, “You’re strong! God’s got this!” And as she walked away, she’d look back and say, “I love ya, sis!”
Then there’s Levi — also in his 70s, old school, and he prays too. We talk about life, people, politics, and God. And Patti, the social worker, who always stops, looks me in the eyes, and asks, “How are things going?”
One week I told her my mom was hospitalized in Lexington, at Baptist Health — the hospital where I was born, and where my grandmother died. Patti mentioned her daughter was a nurse there. We laughed as I said, “Wouldn’t it be something if she had my mom?” I played early that morning so I could drive to Lexington by afternoon. And her daughter had my mom. You cannot make this s**t up. Baptist Health has 434 staffed beds.
Ester, Levi, Patti, her daughter, Jimi and Janis — just to name a few.
This photo represents my spaceship, my story, and the smile on my face.
The music rising from my handpan creates space for silence to be heard — an open door to reflection, and to the deepest questions: Is God real? What comes next? What does any of this mean?
Maybe the strangest part of all — this is exactly what I dreamed of doing for years. Playing ambient music in spaces where people could listen more deeply, feel a genuine connection. I had no idea what it would look like. I’ve since learned that dreams never turn out the way we dream them — it’s our job to dream, and dreams have a way of manifesting in ways far more powerful than we can imagine.
It’s what lies beyond the Purple Haze.
Day Two
April 23rd, 2026
Never underestimate the power of light in the darkness.
For years, I drove the stretch from Lexington to Cincinnati to play gigs — and every time, I loved the moment the Cincinnati skyline came into view as I passed Florence Y’all and began the long descent toward the river.
Tonight I had dinner at the Lytle with my cousin Jeff and his wife Susan, who came in from St. Louis to visit my mom. We talked for hours — reflecting on childhood, on Trinity Baptist Church, the place where we grew up, and the lives we’ve each built on the other side of all of it.
Before leaving, I grabbed my camera and hit the Cincinnati streets — ground level this time. Standing there, I thought about how enormous the city once looked through the windshield of my van on that downhill approach along I-75. From the street, it looks smaller.
Funny — my life seemed much longer, more colorful, more mysterious, and more normal than I remembered it to be.
Day Three
April 24th, 2026
I watched the sun paint the sky as it melted into the trees.
I’ve always loved to draw. In high school, I walked the halls with a guitar in one hand and a drawing pad in the other — soft lead pencils, a pack of cigarettes in the back pocket of my faded Levi jeans, colorful patches stitched across the fabric from hours spent turning cloth into art.
I tried watercolor for a while. I was drawn to paintings that looked like cotton candy — the kind I got as a kid at the Bluegrass Fair. No matter how hard I worked at it, I always ended up with a spreading puddle of water in the center of the page, soaking through to everything below. I gave up on watercolor and leaned back into my sketches — abstract doodles that probably would have served beautifully as a psychological evaluation for my guidance counselor, back before I.E.P.s and special programs existed. That never happened. Probably just as well.
Today, I chase that cotton candy sky — the one that appears just before the sun drops below the horizon.
I check my weather app, note the sunset time, and set two timers — one as a heads-up, one as a reminder for my reminder. The joys of ADHD are real.
I’ve already got my spot picked out: a shortcut off the lower deck of my studio, through my neighbor’s backyard — the one who grows tulips in her front lawn. My deck would be perfect, but the trees get in the way. I keep threatening to build scaffolding, like a hunter’s perch in the forest, just to capture each sunset from above. Stay tuned — it might actually happen. Though I seriously doubt it’s listed in our HOA.
Day Four
April 25th, 2026
The colors of Northside before the sun goes down.
I’m deep in the process of learning street photography — and wow. Who knew it could be this challenging? You’d think snapping photos of strangers and unexpected moments would come naturally. It’s a bit like golf — the concept sounds simple until you’re standing there holding the club.
I pulled up some photos I shot in Northside back in 2021 with my first Sony a6600. Looking at them now, my work has grown significantly — more interesting, more focused, more alive with color.
I’m not chasing perfection. I’m chasing real. You have to go through the real to earn any chance at being good.
Onward.
Day Five
April 26th, 2026
We are all destined to bloom.
Just like photography. And writing. And handpan. And — when you really think about it — life itself. It is all a process. Stay the course, and you will bloom.
Some flowers are fragile — built for a single season. Others return year after year. No matter the variety, every single one is a tiny miracle, a random act of magic, and beautiful in its own distinct way.
Day Six
April 27th, 2026
Still holding the torch — a plastic Statue of Liberty, through a window in Northside.
I could write a thousand pages on the Statue of Liberty I found sitting in a funky little storefront in Northside as I was wrapping up my walk — I’ll save that exploration for the coming weeks.
I will say this — this statue represents something very special, extremely fragile, and serves as a reminder of the critical importance for each one of us to be the light we wish to see.
Day Seven
April 28th, 2026
Bricks and flowers. Sometimes we find beauty in unexpected places.
As I reflect on this image, I’m struck by how the vibrant colors of that enormous painted hand leap off the brick wall. It’s holding a daisy. She/He loves me… She/He loves me not…
The image cuts through the wires hanging from the telephone pole like a knife — rising above the city street, the traffic light, the busy intersection.
Funny — I still call it a telephone pole.
Times change. But one thing remains the same — there’s beauty all around us.
Wrap Up
This concludes Week 17. I remain committed to this creative journey, taking it one day at a time. I’ve had breakthroughs in my creative process, continued to take photos, and looked at the world around me for what speaks.
Each image I share serves as a thumbnail — a steady reminder to pause, reflect, and stay the course.
Bye for now… Week Eighteen coming soon.
— k
An Invitation to Write
Set a timer for ten minutes. Write without stopping. Don’t edit, don’t second-guess — just let it come.
Writing Prompts: Take a minute and make a list of your top ten values. Pick one and write about what it means, why it’s important to you, and how it impacts the decisions and choices you make in your life.
Resources: I’m starting Adam Smith’s A Wealth of Nations — this will take some time. Adam Smith is often considered the father of Capitalism, but I seldom hear people reflect on the fact that he wrote more on ethics than on economics. This will be an interesting journey — I invite you to come along.
Here is a featured track — Run Like Hell — from my catalogue:
Seek out something new this week — and let it surprise you.
— k
P.S. My Substack is growing. It’s a space to go deeper beyond the weekly posts into the thoughts and questions that don’t fit neatly into a caption. I’d love for you to join me there.
