My first drum lesson. 11 yrs old. A store-front music lesson shop. My instructor, Pete, had a moustache, an overbite, and a cool calm collected nature.

From that day on I was hooked.

• singles
• doubles
• paradiddles

Fast-forward 40+ years. I wonder why I ever stopped. So glad I continued for all those years through high school. Sure, I could have studied music in college and worked in music in some way. But that wasn’t my path.

I was not meant to play drums for a living. I was meant to struggle, to wander, to meander and take the slow road.

So now, I look back and smile at those early drumming years, and how the lessons learned outside of drumming perhaps provided the blueprint for Bambam Drumfun and all the good things that have sprung from it.

Drumming has always been there for me. And now it has opened up some wonderful doors. And I’m so grateful for the journey I’ve taken. The ups, the downs, the roads less traveled. Like so many others, I’ve learned the most from hard times. Lots of them, but they taught me well.

GET BACK UP QUICK SO YOU REMEMBER WHAT KNOCKED YOU DOWN

Falling down and getting back in the game is something I am accustomed to. Yes, as an Uncle once said, life is a game. And too often the rules are suspended. It’s you vs the world.

Get knocked down, get back up. Again and again, you get up, brush yourself off and go forward. Hopefully, you learn a thing or two about this and that. That’s life. You learn from your mistakes, try it again, and move on to the next challenge.

Back in the game.

Here I am, demonstrating basic stick-position technique with a senior group at Seaside Retirement of Hallandale Beach.