A Musician’s Creative Journey
If you missed it, you can read Week Nineteen 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 20 of my creative journey, I find myself reflecting on what’s realistic when it comes to time — where to draw the line between my goals and my convictions throughout the creative process. I have a keen ability to hyperfocus, and an equally strong tendency toward avoidance. But for me, there is a fine line between avoidance and waiting for clarity to appear — the clarity that arises from the often elusive and seductive inspiration that fuels the creative process.
It’s a fine line, living within the liminal space woven throughout creative work. Making friends with my Muse. Learning to dance and strike a balance between perfection and imperfection can be hard. I can sit and practice for hours on end, but practicing requires discipline — so when inspiration strikes, I’m ready. The artist must be both the adult in the room and the child who still believes in magic.
There’s little distinction between music and writing — the various modalities draw from the same recipe. Commitment is necessary, but so is flexibility. It’s never a good idea to send your Muse to boot camp!
As I write this blog, today is the 166th day of the year. I’ve posted 155 photos. This is the 23rd week of the year, and I’m just now sitting down to write my 20th blog. Dammit. Pushing through imperfection is hard. Setting goals is how we grow — yet learning to be fluid rather than rigid is equally essential if we want to avoid burnout, and it’s the journey, not the destination, that matters most. It’s a slippery slope.
But at the end of the day, who actually notices but me? I’ve yet to run into the “blog police” outside the walls I construct in my head. So I will proceed. But this is a profound reflection for me. After over three decades packed with over 4,000 shows, roughly a million miles traveled, and 16 CDs, burnout was inevitable — and it showed.
My biggest takeaway from this week is to hold true to my commitment while remaining true to my Muse — all while continuing to carry the weight of caring for my mother. With each day, I’m reminded that it’s through the heaviest of loads that we often find our greatest treasures.
Thank you for being part of this creative journey series.
— k
Day One
May 13th, 2026
A quiet reminder —
Life is simpler than we make it.
As I look at this image, I see past the rust. The wear and tear shows its value. At first, I thought this had been abandoned along the path at the Cincinnati Nature Center — but then I realized it wasn’t. The wheelbarrow, the watering can, the spigot from the water pump. It has a handle like the one in my grandmother’s backyard in Burlington, Kentucky. I wasn’t big enough to reach the handle on my own — just as well. I’m sure I would’ve flooded the backyard.
I’ve never owned a wheelbarrow — news flash — but I do have a watering can in my garage. I use a mason jar to water the four succulent plants in the picture window of my living room. I was so proud of myself when I repotted them! And then there’s the friendship plant, exploding from the largest contemporary pot I could find on Amazon. This friendship plant had appeared outside my door during Covid — a few days after I had reconnected with my friend Andree via Zoom. It had been over a decade since we last spoke.
I met Andrée when she first moved to Cincinnati after earning her Master of Arts in Arts Administration from Columbia University, sometime in the mid-to-late 90s. She was working at the Contemporary Arts Center — she would go on to serve as deputy and interim director, leading the institution through the completion of its landmark Zaha Hadid-designed building. Some friends you can go a decade without speaking to and pick right back up where you left off. She’s one of those friends.
During our conversation, she shared her love for gardening and cooking, and I wondered how she found the time. I mentioned that every plant I’d ever had had died — weeks unwatered while I was constantly on tour. She told me she had confidence I could keep a plant alive. I laughed.
A few days later, I found a friendship plant — often called a peace plant — on my front doorstep. I opened the card. It said, Love, Andree. She had mentioned during our conversation that this plant would tell you when it needed water, because its leaves would droop — and the moment you watered it, they would begin to come alive.
Skeptical, I made my way to Home Depot and had to ask for help finding the right size pot and potting soil. It seemed complicated, but it represented the journey of an enduring friendship — one that I cherished — so I proceeded with my scavenger hunt and made my way home.
I remember making quite a mess — but soon it was repotted, and it became a reminder that friendship, creativity, and the everyday journey through life all require a watering can, sometimes a wheelbarrow, and a spigot connected to water. All of it serving as a metaphor for the things that matter most.
Leaves that wilt become a call to action. And the beauty that comes alive reminds us — it’s the simple things. It’s not complicated.
Day Two
May 14th, 2026
Love is a rose…
There is a rose in many gardens, along many pathways, and on many tables.
There are sounds that fill the background. Noise. Nature. Music.
Only we can control what we choose to look at, tune into, or notice.
I like this image. The rose reaches out from the swirls of the background — offering its beauty, welcoming all strangers, and doing what nature does best: serving as a reminder that miracles are waiting for us all.
Day Three
May 15th, 2026
A peony
my mother’s favorite flower.
There is a season for all things.
I know very little about flowers. They’re beautiful. The first arrivals of early spring.
I always thought these were called “pennies” — and it must be a Kentucky accent that made some people pronounce things differently. I was wrong. These really are peonies, and they’re beautiful.
Besides magnolias, peonies are the flower I most associate with my mother. Her excitement each year when the bushes she and dad planted bloomed along the side of our house rings through my memory still — as I reflect.
I didn’t notice flowers very often as a teen.
I notice them now.
Day Four
May 16th, 2026
Hands on wood.
Heart on steel.
Experimentation!
Shortly after I got my camera, I read Patti Smith’s book; you can read the pdf by clicking on the link – Just Kids. I was fascinated by her creative journey and her relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe.
Living in Cincinnati, the Mapplethorpe exhibition at the Contemporary Arts Center is a historical mile marker — a common reference point, an event that defined an era. It was around that time that the Klan marched in protest. I didn’t live here then. I didn’t know who he was then. So, when I read the book, pieces began to fall into place. Comments and recounts of that time finally made sense.
One thing that stands out from reading that book was Robert’s self-portraits. Not just what they represented, but the painstaking process he went through to capture those images — the lighting, the black-and-white, the remote shutter release connected to the camera by a wire. And through the book, I discovered his body of work photographing flowers.
I’m only scratching the surface. But just like when I was 15 years old and got my first guitar — dragging my guitar and amp to school, plugging in at the door we called “Freak Hall,” and playing on the front lawn — I’m learning the same way now. I stood on my amp, playing clips of Led Zeppelin and Jimi Hendrix, things I was learning in real time.
It’s how I learned. I had skin in the game. I knew if I stayed in my bedroom, I’d never get out. I overcame my fear by placing my skills on display. Over time, I learned to play. That’s my process with photography. Just like I learned from Jimi Hendrix, I’m learning from Robert Mapplethorpe — not that this photo is a masterpiece, but it does represent the fact that I figured out how to use a wireless remote to snap a photo with my guitar, in my studio.
I took a bunch of photos that night and sent several to two close friends. They said I looked sad. So I selected this picture — it serves as a bridge between sad and happy, between limited experience and sheer determination.
By the end of this project, December 31, 2026, I hope to graduate — the way I once graduated from the front lawn of my high school, standing on top of my amp with the guitar behind my head. Only God knows what it must’ve sounded like. But it was real. And as an artist, I’ve learned that that’s what matters most. It’s what keeps me going. And my goal is to capture a smile.
¹ “The Perfect Moment,” a Mapplethorpe retrospective, opened at the Contemporary Arts Center in Cincinnati on April 7, 1990. Within hours, the CAC and its director, Dennis Barrie, were indicted on obscenity charges — the first time in U.S. history that a museum and its director faced criminal prosecution over an art exhibition. The case became a landmark First Amendment battle. The KKK did march in downtown Cincinnati during this period of controversy; the precise occasion and date of that march remain difficult to pin down with certainty. Both the CAC and Barrie were acquitted in October 1990.
Day Five
May 17th, 2026
Beauty Emerging from the Dark.
I continue to experiment with vintage lenses for my Sony camera. My favorite of the lenses I’ve purchased continues to be the Helios 44-2 f2/58mm KMZ lens with adapter for Sony E-mount — a lens known for its swirly bokeh background.
When I snapped this shot, these flowers were almost lost in the foliage of the tree. So I experimented with black-and-white. I increased the brilliance of the white flowers and turned the shadows and branches into a backdrop that allowed the flowers to bloom again — this time, in the image.
I wonder what it would have been like to shoot black-and-white film with only 12 or 24 chances to get it right. Then wait. Wait for all the photos to be developed. Grabbing a magnifying loupe to see which images were worth printing and navigating by hand the process I can now accomplish with the touch of a button and a slider moved from dark to light, manipulating the picture.
With each edit, I hit save. I create a folder of options.
I just purchased two 20TB hard drives. I’m embarrassed to say how many terabytes of images, songs, recordings, things I’ve written, duplicates of things I want to make sure not to lose — I need digital intervention! Sifting through dozens and dozens of options, I think Robert Mapplethorpe probably learned more from each individual image he captured. Many of which, I imagine, were the only shot that turned out — and yet worth keeping. Several rolls of film. Looking for that perfect shot. Not because it lacked imperfection — not because everything was in perfect focus, everything in place — but rather because it captured something real. Something that made you think. Something that made you stop.
Any single image from Mapplethorpe’s collection holds a brilliance captured and recorded on a sheet of photo paper — something that, for me, will require the distillation of 20 terabytes of creative journey, all the trial and error, as I seek to capture a glimpse that holds meaning.
Owed to the artists — Mapplethorpe, Georgia O’Keeffe, Ansel Adams…
Day Six
May 19th, 2026
Peaceful. Reflection.
The symmetry feels sacred.
The things that often go unnoticed are stunning. It’s these tiny miracles that remind us why we’re here.
As I sat on the dock, staring out at the water, I remember thinking: I could’ve washed my car yesterday. Our weather app said it was supposed to rain — but it didn’t.
So here I sit, looking out at a peaceful lake. Perfectly still waters — like a mirror lying on the ground, capturing the image of the trees. Like a camera with a wide-angle lens.
My mind is not as calm as these waters. But in this moment, I witnessed what peace and serenity look like, feel like — and the power that they hold.
I took a deep breath. Let out a heavy sigh.
I felt comfort in knowing — everything is connected.
Day Seven
May 20th, 2026
My favorite acoustic guitar —
Ed Sheeran’s Limited Edition by Martin Guitars
I love Ed Sheeran. I think he’s brilliant. I also love parlor-sized guitars — so when I saw Martin had a signature series with his name on it, I ordered one.
I’ve grown to love small-body guitars with a narrow neck they almost feel like a toy! The smaller body means you’ve got to work hard to pull out the sound, and it also means you don’t have to work hard at all for the quiet parts the subtlety cuts right through.
Country, blues, rock, or folk — I learned a long time ago, if you play hard enough, you can drown out anything that rattles or hums. And if you play soft enough, you can make a person feel.
Guitar students often ask what the best acoustic guitar is for a beginner. I often suggest a smaller body. Recently, three of my students each purchased one. Each was concerned it didn’t have a big sound. So one by one, I said, “May I see your guitar?” They handed it over. I started to play. When I was done, I said, “Did it sound small?” Their eyes went wide. They said, “No!”
I smiled.
Each guitar has its own sound, and every guitar has its own player. How we play it has more to do with showing up — imperfect, yet willing, and ready to try.
Wrap Up
Week 20 is a wrap. I remain fully committed to this creative journey — taking it one day at a time, one image at a time, one honest reflection at a time.
Every image I share provides a thumbnail view of the world around me. This journey creates a deliberate pause and continues to serve as a reminder to slow down, look closer, and stay the course. Steady on.
Bye for now — see you in Week 21 of a Musician’s Creative Journey.
— k
An Invitation to Write
Set a timer for ten minutes. Write without stopping. Stay ahead of your editor — just let whatever flows onto the page unfold.
Writing Prompt: Take a few minutes and write about something that speaks to you this week. Something that might go unnoticed or forgotten — had you not picked up a pen, found a piece of paper, and taken ten minutes to write. Just like capturing video of my parents, capturing moments that stand out and moments that matter are profound treasures. They remind us who we are, what we’ve seen, and more than anything, what has made us feel.
Resources: I’d like to reshare this link in case you missed it. This is one of my favorite YouTube channels — Samaneri Jayasāra – Wisdom of the Masters. Check it out and see what you think — it always calms my mind and helps me center my thoughts.
Here is a featured track — Leaving It All Behind — 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.
