Chapter Text
‘This is the story of how I met my first love..‘
♫ ♪ ♫
"Mom! I'm going to go watch some tv now."
I say throwing my bag into my room coming home from school. It was a hot summer day so I went to go grab a popsicle from the freezer. It was just like every other day, I didn't have many friends so I kinda stayed home in my free time watching tv or playing games. Most 4th graders were jerks anyway so I tried to steer clear of them, it's not like I needed them anyways I had mom, dad and my little sister Mai.
"Eita you really need to make some friends or get a hobby, too much tv can be bad for you."
My mom was always worried about things like this trying to push me to make friends or to join a sport but she doesn't get it.. I like being alone. Dad was never around much but when he was we would always have game nights or movie nights. My favorite times were when he was home because then life felt so happy. My parents were always there for me and so was my sister. I felt happy with the family I had even if I always made mom worry. I was scrolling through channels on tv not knowing what to watch when suddenly I saw a band come on tv. All of a sudden I stopped scrolling through channels and I was just lost in the music. It was one of the best things I've ever seen or heard and that's when I knew, that's who I want to be. I want to make music people fall in love with, I want to make music where people will stop what they are doing just to hear me play. That was the day I fell in love with music, August 18, 2003, popsicle in hand as I watched RadioHead play on the tv with their hit song at the time, 'There There'.
"Eita! The popsicle is melting all over the floor!"
I gave no response. I was too into the music to hear my mom yelling at me. A shame too that was the last popsicle.
"Eita!!"
"Huh.. oh, yeah?"
Snapping back into reality I look at my mom, I then look down seeing the popsicle dripping. Now everything is going to be sticky.
"Sorry mom, I'll get up and clean it right away!"
As I clean up my mess I begin to tell my mom what she's been dying to hear since forever now, something that may ease her worries just a bit.
"Mom…. I think I want to play the guitar"
My mom looks over at me with joy in her eyes as she comes up and hugs me.
"That's wonderful Eita! We can get you a guitar and some lessons! Maybe you'll meet friends at these lessons!"
"I want to teach myself.."
"That's fine too, you do what makes you comfortable. I'm just glad you finally found something to interest you!"
♫ ♪ ♫
4 months later it was Christmas time, my love for music hasn't gone away in fact it grew stronger. I still didn't have a guitar though, and at this point I now wanted to learn the acoustic and electric. Christmas morning I am opening my presents and finally I get to a really big gift, it was a weirdly shaped box. My last present, my mom hands it to me smiling. As I begin to unwrap the gift I see the word 'acoustic' on it. I was in shock. I thought I was dreaming. As I take off the rest of the wrapping paper I begin to tear up and try not to smile too big. Finally a guitar after months, I get up to hug my parents as joy is rushing through me. I turn around and look at the box, a Lakewood M-14 guitar.. comes with a tuner, pick, strap and carrier. The same guitar Thom Yorke played when I saw him on tv that summer day.
Later that same day I was in my room after my dad and I learned how to tune the guitar. I turned on a YouTube video explaining basic chords for beginners and how to learn the guitar. I sat in my room for hours just learning when I was then called to dinner. I sat at the table looking at my fingers and they were red and they hurt really bad, but the sounds coming from the guitar made it worth it. If it meant that someday I could play like Thom Yorke I would endure any amount of pain. After dinner I went back to my room and went right back to playing. Putting my fingers back on the strings was extremely painful after a break, but nonetheless I continued. Every day after school for 2 years I would learn for hours not going to bed until 2 am. During this time I fell in love with more bands like Blink-182, The Pillows, Weezer and many more doing research on them and just listening to their music. The night before my first day of middle school I finally learned a song with no mistakes, 'There There' the same song that I saw Thom Yorke play on this same exact guitar model. Music was my first love.
♫ ♪ ♫
~chapter 1 fin~