There are barely a dozen of these types of shops on Earth: places that carry a wide offering of Eurorack synthesizer modules. This one in Portland, Oregon, called Control Voltage, is one of seven on the West Coast that I know of. There’s also one in Detroit, New York City, and Berlin which covers all the major players and a couple of the minors ones, too. Unfortunately, none of them carry everything available as many modules are made in limited runs, and some units never even make it to retail as manufacturing operations can be so small that the creator only sells their modules directly to end-users. To be frank, I find most of the shops to be difficult places to visit, not only because I want to buy everything, but mainly because I’m not a regular, I’m not in their target age group, and maybe because as fellow artists, they too are awkward. If you are persistent and go in with specific questions while not being too shy, most of the time, the people in these shops are full of a vast body of knowledge after you get past the heavy hipster vibes.

What Caroline was doing while I was making my pilgrimage is beyond my recollection, as this temple requires my full attention. From here, we returned to the airport for our flight back to Phoenix in time for dinner.

While waiting on our flight, I took time to write the following, which closes out my writing exercise for this adventure:

The Fibers of Creativity:

You discover a clump of long animal hair or crimped strands of fiber but it will require a leap genius to get to the point where you can create clothing from it. Because learning is inherent in what humans do, we rarely, if ever, recognize the incredible leaps of intellect at work on a day-to-day basis as we go about our lives of constant discovery. Once the process has begun in our first months of life and without our explicit awareness that it is happening, we are being programmed by those around us to pick up fragments of information that are going to be brought together in the tapestry that will form our character and help shape our future.

This process is similar to the discovery of that strand of hair I just spoke of. Without another hair and another and so on, we will never accumulate enough of them to begin the process of spinning them together in the fundamental building block that will create a piece of yarn. Only after many steps will we finally be able to start weaving together our yarn to create cloth, rugs, blankets, or any of the many other things we can use to help us survive our exposure to the elements.

Knowledge of a process such as those found in the fiber arts extends to all things in life. But what happens when we are lazy and don’t continue adding to our fabric? We outgrow our clothes, they wear out, and ultimately, they will fall back to dust and no longer serve us. What happens when we no longer tend to the accumulation of knowledge? We outgrow our immature thoughts; they no longer fit with those around us, and they will ultimately fail us as we humans are always moving forward with the demands of work and play that require ever-greater skills that can only be achieved by constant learning.

Out of the tapestry, a picture begins to emerge, but what if the tapestry never grows beyond a few inches, or as it gets older, it frays, and its image can no longer be clearly seen? This is the perfect metaphor for our own knowledge. It doesn’t matter what we add next, as it is the randomness of impressions that leave traces and etch strong memories that will forever shape the person we are becoming. So why should this ever stop? Essentially, it probably never really does, although people can put themselves on a personal treadmill of repetition and habit that effectively stops the incoming world from offering more from its cornucopia of never-ending knowledge.

So, I would like to suggest that it is a personal imperative that all of us understand our place in the weaving of our own stories. If you’ve been laying down too much nondescript beige in your cloth for the past years, it’s time to break out the lime green and fluorescent orange. This will require you to learn and do something new and out of your ordinary. Stop reinforcing negative attitudes by repeating that you don’t like something you may have never tried or experienced a decade or more before. Stop listening to the same music just because it makes you feel nostalgic for a time you believe was better; it probably was because you were still hungry for new experiences.

Do something you thought you’d never do, go somewhere you can’t believe you are making the effort to go to, and read up on a subject in-depth that you thought you had no interest in. I’m always meeting people in Arizona who’ve lived in Phoenix for 20 years and have never been to the Grand Canyon: go. Don’t know what to read? Try Swerve, Salt, Horseshoe Crabs and Velvet Worms, or Moby Dick – it’s long but is way better the older we get! Maybe it’s time to eat some haggis, heart, turnips, raw fish, curry, or whatever food items you’ve been afraid of or convinced yourself you don’t and will never like. Stop whining about this or that music giving you a headache; listen intently a few times to some classic examples of what others have considered the greatest hits of a genre. You may have to try any of the above a few times; they say that anything can be brought in to be enjoyed if we only give a chance a few times.

Give your mind a chance. Understand that you are a learning machine that is constantly adding to your own tapestry. Keep on weaving your personal story; it should be as long as your life.