Hobby Hub: Guitar

Shower, skincare, toast, teeth… I start the day just like everyone else. With one key exception: playing guitar. My mornings are not complete without at least a ten-minute run-through of some of the pieces I know; it’s a non-negotiable. I love it and it makes me excited to get out of bed.

If you truly enjoyed guitar then you wouldn’t need to make it part of your morning routine, you might be thinking. But playing guitar is the kind of hobby that only gets fun when you’re moderately good at it. In order to get to this stage you have to be consistent, which for me means making it compulsory.

I have actually played guitar on-and-off for about ten years, with some major months- or years-long hiatuses. It was only about a year ago, mid-way through my year abroad, that I picked it up properly. Moving countries brings with it an onslaught of sorely missing friends, words getting crushed in your mouth and being surrounded by strange new buildings and customs and people. To ground myself and clear my head, I asked to borrow a friend’s old guitar. It was severely out of tune and I had to brave the German cashier in the music shop to buy a new string. Seeing it in the corner of my room, dusted and tuned and restrung, I decided: I will play guitar every day.

And I did. Not always much, but always something. I started with some pieces that I’d learned before, horrified at how little I could remember. But bit by bit, it came back. I played more and more, found fun new tabs online, winced as my fingertips stung and my wrist joints ached. I marvelled as I mastered 7^th-fret harmonics, spent hours scrolling through inspiration on YouTube, recorded myself on my phone and realised it sounded pretty damn good.

Back in the UK, nothing’s really changed. I love the satisfaction of building up a piece bit-by-bit, I love the feeling of my fingers flying along the fretboard, I love making music that sounds really, really cool. Knowing I can get this feeling gives me motivation to tackle the other stuff of the day.

Last week it was beautifully sunny. My flatmates and I dragged chairs into our front garden. We sat, chatted, sipped tea. I pulled out my guitar, face full of sun, played my favourite pieces. I think I have reached peak life.