The Mandolin – My Way of Going Off the Grid

How searching for growth can be about searching for something real and lasting

Photo by Beth Macdonald on Unsplash

Recently, I bought a mandolin. Very recently, as, at the moment of writing, I got it by mail yesterday, having ordered it the day before. That recently.

I didn’t go for a long time wondering if I should, or saving up enough money to buy it. I just did it out of a momentary inspiration, an hour or so of consideration, and then simply a quick choice of model and place to buy it.

Very irrational. Chances are that I could have done better, bought a better model at a better price. Or I could have joined a mandolin class, having the teacher guide me to buy the perfect instrument for me, according to my way of being, my skills and physiology, my experience.

Actually, I don’t know if there are different constructions for people with small hands, big hands, long fingers, or any other such details that could possibly affect the value you can get out of a musical instrument. I could imagine that, but I don’t know. I haven’t seen any signs of it by browsing the Internet.

So, my no-name model will do. It has a name, actually, which is the name of the shop where I bought it. No mention of who really made the instrument.

If I would ever show up at a mandolin class or at a jam session with such an instrument, it would no doubt lead to lifted eyebrows and some negative comments. Because it isn’t a known brand, therefore cannot be good. At least half of the people who will ever see this instrument will consider it – and me, because I have bought it – to be inferior.

People think that way.

During my life, I have experienced how colleagues were talking about their hobbies, for instance photography or bicycling. They never talked about actually photographing, but about the equipment they had just bought, plus the equipment they were dreaming about buying. Prices were always mentioned, and it was all very expensive! If I tried to bid in with something, such as how nice it was to be out on a Saturday morning to try capturing some great shots during the rising sun, they just looked down on me, asking me what equipment I had – and when I told them, they were frowning and quickly turning the dialog into what it had been before my interruption.

They had a photography hobby, but it was not about photographing, it was about brands and models, and buying. And talking about what they had bought.

Same things for bicycling, which cannot be done, nowadays, on just any bicycle. It has to be a special brand that has special gears and special everything else, and costs at least $10,000, and that’s even for a cheap model bought on sale. And you must wear the same clothes as the professionals, with all the same commercials on it.

I studied guitar playing a long time ago, and luckily, the others in the class didn’t talk much about their instruments or the price of them, as these people were actually there to play music and learn how to get better. The teacher, though, did mention the $10,000 his guitar had costed him, and he explained how they could easily be much more expensive. Luckily, he had a friend who had a music shop, so he could get us a good guitar for less than normal price. Well, tough luck, I had already bought one before I began the class. A good one, bought in a shop, but with a brand I don’t even remember. And it wasn’t expensive.

Now I have this shop-branded mandolin, and I like it a lot. It is a beautiful instrument, well-made, with no holes or cracks or anything that could be expected from a cheaper-than-branded model. And I have started studying how to play it, because this was the purpose of getting it. To do something completely offline, off the grid, manually, something that might survive the complete breakdown of the world, in a dystopia without Internet. Where all that mattered would be what you could do without electricity, and where entertainment would be something people had to arrange for themselves, not by switching on Netflix or Spotify or social media.

But, still, I am a slave of my time, as I have found a course on Udemy, which is definitely on-grid, and I am looking for additional courses, communities, and other ways of being active with this new toy, all online.

I know nobody who plays the mandolin, who I could’ve visited for a chat and a jam session. I know nobody, to be frank, who actively plays anything. Nobody nearby, at least. People I know, who identify themselves as musicians, amateurs or otherwise, are far away, in other countries.

So, the dystopia is already here, through the internet, in that I must use the grid to get off it.

Hopefully, I can get far fast, so that I can go out in the world with my mandolin in the hand, singing serenades and being something that I can be happy about, without the Internet, without electricity, without brands and buying-hobbies. Just me and other people, joined by the joy of music.