The Classical Guitarist

His hands moved beautifully: his left dancing like a tarantula on the fretboard, his right picking and strumming intricate patterns without looking like he was working at all.

It was beautiful... the whole situation.

I must have sat there for a good hour while he played. He held his head awkwardly turned to his left, it seemed he was avoiding eye contact with his fans. He was playing on the small stage in the lobby bar. There was usually some sort of jazz/classical musician playing in the evenings and I had the pleasure of seeing him again later in the week.

I couldn't really decide what was so beautiful about it at first. I had imbibed 2 or 3 white russians by the time he closed up shop when it hit me. The music, of course, was enjoyable, but the real beauty lied in the ability of a man to create. The classical guitarist (along with the bartender) created an experience for me that didn't just make me smile, but impacted my soul. I felt like the world was ok for a while, that things were good, right in the midst (and being myself a part of) ridiculous affluence and consumerism.

It was costing my parents multiple thousands of dollars for me to be there. What was I thinking by condoning this? While I spoke openly against it I was willing to taste its sweet fruits. I had to be there for my cousin's wedding right? I mean, it would be rude not to go... right?

At the same time I was happy, content, I had hope, I believed in beauty. Something about his creativity and skill helped me realize that I didn't always have to focus on the darkness. In fact my focus shouldn't be at all on the darkness, or even ridding the world of darkness. My focus should be on creating light. The light itself will eradicate the darkness.

So much of my life for the past year (really all of my life) has been focused on darkness. I think the guitarist's "tarantula hand," yes, something that ridiculous, has brought real and lasting change to my life.

When we create beauty we are beautiful ourselves. Its crazy to think that in the midst of the beauty of the rainforest, and the beauty of hispanic culture I found myself most captivated by something as simple as a hand on a fretboard.

On that day that guitarist was beautiful. It wasn't his strong spanish-looking face, or his awesome facial hair, it was his hand dancing between strings. It was the sounds that he so fluidly coaxed from his collection of wire and wood. It was the fact that he was created in the image of the beautiful creator, and therefore created beauty himself.

The world needs a few more dancing tarantulas, or at least it needs some of us beautiful creators to wake up from our unimaginative sleep and start creating beauty, and use our creativity to redeem the world.