Talent

Last night I went to the Leo Kottke concert in Norman, and I was absolutely dumbstruck by his talent. You must understand, however, that I am not the person who could tell you whether or not he is one of the most technically correct guitar players or not, but I certainly was amazed at how much music this one guy got out of one guitar.

One thing that I thought was odd was Leo himself. Here was this undisputed master of the guitar playing in an outdoor venue, alone on a concrete stage, in front of a large ampitheater filled with a menagerie of people. Out in front of young hip musician types wearing pony tails, clean cut middle aged yuppies in birkenstocks, and fringe types wearing almost anything you can imagine strolled Kottke sporting a modest haircut, wearing a white button up shirt, untucked, with blue jeans and saucony jogging shoes.

But when he sat down, I saw the thing that surprised me. I looked around to see if anyone noticed. Apparently they did not. They all had their eyes glued to the 12 string guitar that Leo was playing. Not one person seemed to notice, not the tattooed people on the front row, not the bluegrass musicians to my left, not the middle aged people behind me, no one noticed that Leo Kottke was wearing black crew socks with his jogging shoes.

Last year at Falls Creek where I supervise the ropes course, I tried wearing black socks with my Merrels. My socks weren't crew socks; they were cool ankle socks that were supposed to be sporty. But in spite of this I still caught a lot of grief because of my sock color. Eventually, I gave in, and went back to white socks.

As I sat watching Leo play while wearing his black socks I started thinking about how much I wished that I had talent.