When I was assessing how my actual life fell short of my ideal life, one of the most obvious shortcomings was that my life had far less music infusing it than I would like.
Some of this was a function of how my brain works - I can't concentrate with music playing in the background - it immediately goes to the foreground and makes me forget what I was concentrating on accomplishing.
That means I can only enjoy music in moments of leisure, and let's face it - medicine and parenting young children do not lend themselves to moments of leisure.
This is not to say that there are not medical role models who can integrate music into their lives. A close friend from residency that I was lucky enough to end up working alongside for over a decade lives and breathes music.
He took me crowdsurfing for the first time in Hollywood. He would drop off mix CDs in the days where I was barely holding things together shuttling my school-aged kids around (his kids were even younger!) and seemed to squeeze in a new concert every other week.
Point being, it can be done - just not by me.
I tried a few remedies - maybe if I got a really unusual instrument and learned to play it, I could bring music back into my life.
I began with an Aztec Tongue Drum - no, I'd never heard of it before I found it listed online, but it seemed niche, and there were not a lot of notes, so I thought I'd give it a try.
It was a bust - fortunately, my son's friend with musically eclectic taste was more than happy to accept it as a gift.
My second attempt was via the Jumbie Jam, a small steel drum (think Caribbean busker) with few enough notes to be a quick study. It retails for around $200, but of course my setup (stand, mallets, drum) was under $50 through shopgoodwill.com.
That instrument continues to be a work in progress, as my interest and level of engagement waxes and wanes depending on the week. That means I will learn one catchy song one week, forget it the next, and proceed to relearn it. Rinse and repeat.
The greatest success to date has been the one I didn't plan. You may have read about how the Chase Sapphire Reserve is now charging an extraordinarily high annual fee effective this past October.
I was not thrilled to learn about it, but with a half million Ultimate Rewards Points in the bank that retain their 1.5x purchasing power via the Chase travel portal, the benefits of staying outweighed the costs (at least until those points are spent down booking international flights).
The new, absurdly expensive card came with a subscription to Apple Music. So I added it to my phone, and I have to admit, it's an indulgence I never would have spent on for myself, and one I've enjoyed immensely.
I'm listening to music I haven't enjoyed in years, and I play it all the time on my phone. Having more free days than work days per week certainly helps. I take naps to music warmed by sunshine streaming onto the couch (reading this, it's apparent that I live the life of a pampered cat.)
So maybe there's a lesson here - I need to spend first (knowing that I'll feel compelled to get my money's worth) in order to give myself permission to live my ideal life.
I'd elaborate on the songs I'm listening to now, but instead I think I'll relearn that one song on the Jumbie Jam.