When I first announced my DeQuervain's scale length experiment, I thought I'd be conducting a series of experiments over a few weeks. But, as usually happens with me, things didn't turn out exactly as I had planned.
I did what I said I was going to do and put down the Fenders and picked up the Les Paul for a few days. Late last week, I was sitting on the floor in my computer/guitar room strumming chords while my wife was going through her online school orientation when I thought, "I'm already strumming chords, I may as well strum barre chords." So I started abusing barre chords and, sure enough, my DeQuervain's pain came back.
So what does this prove? Well, it proves that scale length don't mean shit. This is good and bad. It's good because it means I can keep playing my beloved Fenders without wondering if I'm causing major damage. It's bad because it means I have to really work at my wrists to try to mitigate my condition as best as I can.
I try to look at the positives, though, and in celebration of the results of this experiment, I picked up my Strat - still my favorite guitar despite the sheer awesomeness of my Telecaster - and had one of the best BS sessions I've had in a while. Sure, it was only 20 minutes worth of improvisation while my wife ran on the treadmill, but it felt good. I missed my Strat and I don't know what I would've done if I couldn't play it anymore.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have some wrist stretches to do.
No comments:
Post a Comment