Over the past month and a half, Richard has been kind enough to show me the ropes when it comes to playing guitar. I’ve also been lucky to have my uncle’s old guitar (which is older than I) to learn on.

Tony’s (my uncle, sadly long deceased) old guitar is an acoustic Yamaha FG-75 and hardly top-of-the-range, but it seems that “everyone” has learned on this guitar so it’s an honour for it to be sitting in our lounge room just waiting to be called into action.

I have learned the C, A, G, E, and D chords, as well as some variations thereof (Am, A7, etc) and can even play a couple of songs; not well, and hardly keeping good time (there a lot of “hang on” moments while my fingers struggle to position themselves) which is encouraging.

I was amazed at not only the amount of pressure involved to get the guitar to play a sound correctly, but the amount of pain that is involved. Luckily, after playing for a few weeks, callouses began to build up on the tips of my fingers and it hurts a lot less than before — still a little pain but I can play for a while without even noticing now.

That is, until Richard showed me Barre Chords. The pain has started all over again — all be it in a different place — and makes me feel like I’m back at the beginning. I can see the value of using Barre Chords (if you’re not familiar with playing a guitar, a Barre Chords basically allows you to retune on the fly — at least in the most basic terms — by placing one finger over all the strings).

There’s a hell of a lot more to learn, but I thought I’d thank Richard publicly for his help so far not only because it’s the right thing to do, but because I am grateful!