I am a Thinker

Who is Daniel Shorb the Thinker?

I am a thinker. I’m always thinking. I can’t turn it off. I have often been accused of ignoring someone that I simply didn’t see, because I was thinking. And I think differently. I see things most others don’t see. I see inconsistencies. I see that one thing that is different from the rest. I see typos. I see misspellings and un-parallels on menus. I see an extra space  between words. Did you see that one? I notice things. I read signs. When I travel, I read signs aloud. It drives my wife crazy. I notice when a name in a different font was added later to an office sign. I notice people’s unusual names and spellings. I notice what shoes you are wearing. I notice if you are left-handed. I notice if your glasses are crooked. I notice seemingly random patterns on floors and walls, and study them to determine where the pattern repeats. I notice when a sign or picture is not level. I notice when a band member is marching out of step. When I walk into a new place, I immediately spot things that are wrong or inconsistent. When I see an error or discrepancy on TV, I spontaneously speak about it—out loud. I answer questions that are asked in commercials. My wife says I talk to the TV. 

I’m an expert at finding things wrong. And I’m still looking for someone who will pay me for finding things wrong. Haha! But I am uniquely qualified to be a proofreader. 

An overbearing part of my musical thinking world is my subconscious mind. When I am idle or quiet, there are endless melodies with harmonizations going through my mind. I wake up with them, and they go with me everywhere I go, whether driving or riding in the car or sitting at home. Sometimes they are in my dreams. Anytime I’m not using my brain to do something in particular, I can have this problem. I call it a problem, because I can’t consciously turn it off. We all occasionally find ourselves humming a tune that we may not realize we just heard, but this is different. Quite often I find myself fingering the music on an imaginary trumpet or the piano. Sometimes I realize I’ve been subconsciously arranging a reharmonization, or changing the meter of the song. Sometimes it’s just a harmonic progression loop. It keeps going and going. And I can’t stop it. If this happens at a time when I cannot start doing an engaging activity, I am stuck with it. I continue to “play” even while I am consciously telling myself to stop. When this happens, the only way I can eradicate the music (and quite often it’s something I’m not particularly fond of, or something I am extremely tired of) is to substitute another composition that is less nerve-wracking. If you read this far I will give you a gift card to the restaurant of your choice. Over a period of a few months, I made a list of some songs that were playing in my mind when I woke up. It is quite an eclectic collection of music heard or learned during my entire lifetime. Face to Face, No Not One in 6/4, What Kind of Fool Am I, Rolled Away Rolled Away Rolled Away, South Pacific (HS arrangement), We Are the Mustangs Mighty Mighty Mustangs, Chopin Prelude in B Minor, Secret Agent Man, Bewitched Theme, Jesse’s Girl, Columbia the Gem of the Ocean, Only a Sinner Saved by Grace, Revive Us Again, Where Could I Go but to the Lord, Jubilation T. Cornpone (Music Man), There Is No Greater Love (Peterson), All That She Wants Is Another Baby, What Will We Do with a Drunken Sailor, Old Man River, Skip to My Lou, The Chapel in the Moonlight, Good King Wenceslas, No One Ever Cared for Me Like Jesus, Detroit City, Wounded for Me, Let’s Go Boys Let’s Get on the Ball (HS cheer), Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing, A Shelter in the Time of Storm, Silent Night (in June), Yankee Doodle, The Love of God, In the Sweet By and By, The Holy City, Found a Peanut Found a Peanut, Judy’s Turn to Cry, Break Thou the Bread of Life, The End of the World, To the Work to the Work, I’m Not Alone, O I Wish I Were an Oscar Mayer Weiner, At Last, Battle Hymn of the Republic (Wilhousky), My Three Sons Theme, Give My Regards to Broadway, On the Street Where You Live, Dogs barking Jingle Bells (in September), In the Cross of Christ I Glory, Wonderful Copenhagen, Hello Muddah Hello Fadduh, This Is a Day of New Beginnings, Nothing Between (in 4/4), In the Stone, No Night There, Let the Sunshine In, Strangers in the Night, Landslide, You’ve Got the Magic Touch, Look at the World (Rutter), I’d Rather Have Jesus, Jesus Is Coming Again, Tu lo sai (Italian art song), He Lives, Cinnamon and Clove, My Baby Does the Hanky-Panky, I Swear, Eine kleine Nachtmusik, Ricky Don’t Lose That Number, Smile, Chapel in the Moonlight, Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam, I’m Almost Over You, London Bridge, When They Ring Those Golden Bells, The Ecumenical Movement, Near the Cross, Deep River Woman, There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood, Tea for Two, Red Roses for a Blue Lady, When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again, The Man in the Flying Trapeze, You Only Live Twice, Old-Time Power, For Your Eyes Only, In Times Like These, Drinking at the Springs of Living Water, Happy Birthday, and Like a Bridge Over Troubled Water. You can’t make this stuff up. 

In spite of my thinking quirks, some of my students told me they would be interested in reading my blogs. They were just trying to be nice, but with this website I am pleased to finally share some of my thinking ideas with anyone who wants to read them.

Photo by Dwight Walters Photography