It is, as they say, a Difficult Time in my life, as regular readers will know. I also find it somewhat unfortunate that said Difficult Time in my life is coming, as with the previous Difficult Time back in 2010, shortly prior to my heading off to something that should be fun, exciting and pure escapism: my trip to Boston for PAX East. (I hasten to add that this Difficult Time is for different reasons to the 2010 Difficult Time, thankfully; I’m not sure I could go through another 2010.)

But, as difficult as it is to stay positive sometimes — and believe me, it is extremely difficult to stay positive right now — I need to focus on the things that I’m doing that are worthwhile, and that could potentially (hopefully!) lead to future happiness.

I have a real piano in my own house for the first time since I left home, for one thing. That’s pretty cool, and as I suspected I vastly prefer playing it to my electric piano. The electric, though awesome and great-sounding, simply doesn’t “feel” right thanks to being on a somewhat wobbly keyboard stand, and the sound of it coming out of an amplifier isn’t the same as the real thing at all.

Said piano is hopefully going to be the centrepiece of at least some of my future work, and I’m making all the efforts possible to make the music teaching happen. I’m getting business cards printed, I have a listing on one of the biggest online music teacher directories in the country, I have my own website and, once the business cards arrive, I’ll be giving them out to local music shops and other establishments in the hope of drumming up some business.

I’m also going to be doing some work for the local Music Service. I only have a couple of hours of this secured so far, but hopefully that will lead to more regular future things. While a couple of hours certainly isn’t going to pay the bills, it’s a foot in the door, which is good.

Then there’s a few writing-related possibilities in the pipeline. I don’t know if any of these will come to anything just yet, but hopefully they will.

And then there’s a few other potential means of making some money out there, too, all of which I’m exploring in the hope of finding something that will allow me to support myself and remain at least reasonably happy for some of the time. In practical, realistic terms, it’s probably more likely I will end up mixing and matching lots of different things, which maybe isn’t ideal from a “stability” perspective, but will certainly keep things interesting and exciting — and more importantly, allow me to work on my own terms, which is something that I’ve come to crave.

I am trying to remain positive. I really am. There are good days, and there are bad days, and there are days that are sort of in the middle that can go either way. Today has been one of the latter kinds; let’s hope tomorrow is a good day. Only one way to find out though, huh.