I have never felt that I made a wrong decision choosing to pursue a career in music and pro audio. I’ve been surprisingly successful for a professional with no formal education who is less than 2 years into their full-time audio career. I’ve been able to earn enough to keep my bills paid, feed my kids, and continue to grow my business, and continuing to do that even during a pandemic is something I take great pride in. I still believe I’m capable of so much more, and I’m extremely optimistic about the future of this studio and the opportunities we are pursuing.
But I have made sacrifices, and sometimes I wonder if I’ve sacrificed too much. My old life is gone, and I spent many years building that life. I telecommuted full-time as a data analyst and was available for my kids at almost any time. I had a stable income that provided my family with a stable home. I originally thought that a career switch would give me more time with my family, but truthfully now I have less. I guess I should have expected that running a business would take more than 40 hours a week. At least until recently I still had a stable home for my family, but now I’ve sacrificed that home to this business.
I never intended to make it our forever house. I bought it years ago when I lived there as a rental, and when the owners decided to sell I found that renting somewhere else would have cost significantly more than just buying the house. I always intended to sell for maximum profit, and that’s what I did. Mission accomplished right? Not exactly.
The new owners offered to let me rent the house back after the sale until I found a place to move – then they retracted that offer 2 weeks before a month-to-month lease would execute. Failing to find a rental in time, I was forced to move back in with my parents temporarily. Now not only do I not have a home to call my own, but I‘ve lost my ability to generate income until my new studio is operational.
So I must invest maximum effort into this studio remodel. That’s what I sold this home to do, and every day I’m not open is a day I can’t generate revenue. Fortunately, I’m capable of doing much of the remodel work myself, but I have had to depend on others to do some things, and what an overall disappointment that has been. Seems like most people get a whiff of money and sacrifice their integrity. It used to be so easy to trust without watching the ones closest to me for the time they decide the money is more important than loyalty, but I can’t trust like that anymore and I miss the innocence of then.
It has to all be worth it. We have to make amazing recordings here. We have to bring something special to our community. I can’t fail to live up to the expectations of the people who have supported me and enabled me to get to this point.
So to those who are watching us: will open soon. For the last few weeks, the target has been March 15, but setbacks out of my control have forced me to push the open date out to March 22 or even March 29, depending on how much of this work I will have to do myself. At any rate, we will be opening soon, and when we do we won’t let any of you down.
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