Laughed at!

rreffner

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For the past year or so, I have been trying to learn ukulele on my own. I practice at the kitchen table for a couple of hours a day in the early morning. Additionally, I pick up my uke whenever I have some free time. Finger picking (Ken Middleton style) is my primary course of study and gradual progress is being made.


Admittedly, I don’t sing particularly well but understand voice will improve with practice. Being Christmastime, I decided to include some simple strumming/singing tunes so my grandson and granddaughter would be able to sing along. We sang together at my home and had a good time. They were songs familiar to them; Frosty the Snowman, Jingle Bells, etc.


Anyway, the wife and 2 grandkids and I went to visit family 3 states away. While there, I broke out the uke, made sure it was in tune, and began strumming and singing Christmas songs with the grandkids. We were having a good time, however; some of the adults (relatives) walked about behind us howling while making rude comments and gestures. We finished singing and I put the uke away for the remainder of the visit. I decided not to respond to their actions.


Well, I’m back home, at the kitchen table with 12 Hymn Tunes for The Ukulele in front of me while my Bassett Hound is on the floor next to me listening to me practice. No howling from her (maybe she’s sleeping?).

I’m not sure why I am writing this. Maybe in case something similar has happened to others and by reading this they will see their experience was not unique. I will continue to practice because of the enjoyment I get and play tunes and sing along with the kids while letting the adults work on their own issues.


Aloha,
Rich
 
Families! No your experience is not unique. However ask my nieces which is the "fun" or favorite aunt and I guess the last laugh is on them.

Roxhum
 
Rich,
I am SO sorry this happened to you! You are not alone. My own family has laughed at my singing.. yes really. So now I play in my house alone, and when they are home, I wont sing. It does take some of the enjoyment out of it..

I hope that you will just keep going. It's so hard to just keep singing. I even feel insecure to sing in the shower now... usually when I shower there is no one home..

I have come to the conclusion that people can be cruel.. but I am going to keep working at it and hope my singing will get better.

As for your grandkids. Keep playing and singing with them.. My daughter will sing with me... it's so much fun!
 
A cheap attempt at humor like that just points out how inadequate the one laughing is
 
Sorry to hear about that, Rich, especially at this time of year and that you were just trying to entertain the kids. Maybe they're just not used to seeing ukulele's? A lot of folk can still have the impression that they're 'comical' or 'toys' so maybe found it amusing.

I wouldn't let it dishearten you though, not that it seems to have done so. :cool:
 
Good on you for just doing it. Don't stop. You where having fun the kids I'm sure enjoyed it, the adults where just jealous.
 
While there, I broke out the uke, made sure it was in tune, and began strumming and singing Christmas songs with the grandkids. We were having a good time, however; some of the adults (relatives) walked about behind us howling while making rude comments and gestures. We finished singing and I put the uke away for the remainder of the visit. I decided not to respond to their actions.

I'm going to go out on a limb here. Your adult relatives may have been joking and making fun of you to cover up some jealousy. I think it's awesome that you and your grandkids have such a good time singing and playing together. Music has always been in my house and my relatives know better than to make fun of me. Not all families are like that. Some families treat the musical family members like they're weirdos. I think it secretly has to be because they're jealous they don't have the guts to sing, play, or dance in front of each other! At any rate, it was really stupid of them to make fun especially when the kids were having a good time. That's a sure way to make kids self-conscious about what they're doing. I'm glad you chose not to acknowledge it.

Now that you're back home, enjoy a much kinder audience (your Basset hound). :)
 
IMO it's jealousy and a toxic need to get their sense of self empowerment by sh*tting on other people. Very very common dysfunctional behavior from unelightened, unkind, uncompassionate and really really insecure people with no solid inner sense of self worth. I feel sorry for people like that. They are damaged goods. Have compassion for them but disregard their behavior, they are on some level still in kindergarten, and probably the class bullies. If it comes up again you can ask them point blank why they would laugh at little kids having good clean innocent fun (your inner kid included)? Who shamed them when they were little to such an extent that they would feel the need to act out instead of setting a good example for children?

People like you on the other hand are the flip side, and the points of light within the human species. Keep up the good work!
 
however; some of the adults (relatives) walked about behind us howling while making rude comments and gestures. We finished singing and I put the uke away for the remainder of the visit. I decided not to respond to their actions.


Rich

Adults making rude comments and gestures? Where's the Christmas spirit of these people? And to think that you've crossed three states just to visit them...
 
They don't understand the magic of the uke, some adults are too old, jaded and wrapped up in their own insecurities and selfish petty jealousies. These things hurt the most when coming from the ones who are suppose to support and care about you. I know you are probably playing right now, so good for you. Give your girl a pet for me. Don't stop pick'n!
DAP
 
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I play several instruments with varying degrees of skill but I am primarily a guitar/ uke guy I'd say...
I didnt start till after I had gone away to college and my parents had never heard me play. After I was married and my first child was born, they came to visit and I was playing a guitar someone gave me. My mom made a skunky face and remarked that she was glad I didnt start playing while I was still a kid...ie, she's glad she never had to hear it.

bah, she's also the lady that said I shouldnt quit my day job when it came to singing...granted, it takes me a while to acclimate to some songs, but I made a living playing and singing in church lol. she's also the one that crapped on me about needing to go to graduate school...despite being the most "put together" of all her kids.

I think her criticism is her inept way of complimenting me...but knowing that doesnt make me like her any more lol
 
WEll there are jerks then there are REAL jerks. They are the latter. Hard to not feel bad and let them get to you, but maybe you just should have ignored them and gone right on enjoying what obviously your little ones were enjoying. You also could maybe just smiled, and reached out and offered your uke to them, and said "want to try it, lots of fun and maybe your better than I am""? Anyway put it behind you and keep on strummin and hummin with those kids!!! Lozark
 
That happens at my family gatherings all the time. Not only to me, but by me when my sisters, neices, nephews or whoever starts singing. It's our family dynamic, and it's always our ways of showing we love each other. My family has always been a bunch of nuts, coming from both sides. My grand mother on my mom's side was quite the charictor, as was my grand father on my dad's side, and all of us have been practical jokers coming down from generations of genetics. We have always heckled each other, but don't let a non family member start, or THEY tend to be the target, hahhah.. It just has always been gestures of endurment with all of us. That said, I am also from a very musical, singing family, and most my family has awesome singing voices, BUT that never stops the rest of us from heckling, or howling at the others when they are on their stages.. hahah.. If it didn't happen, we just don't feel loved.. ;)

that said, I hear all sorts of cracks because I play a soprano Uke, and it being such a small instrument, and I am such a HUGE guy. Since I been playing the Uke, that has been the root of many family "fat guy with a little instrument" jokes, lol.. So, feel loved.. that's what it's about..
 
Wow- that is truly messed up, especially that it has happened to more than one of you.
Adult relatives even- sounds like you have some serious buzz-kills in your family.
You are cordially invited to come do your thing at our house next year. Between me and dad. there must be 100 instruments laying around, and we thrust them upon our guests without so much as a waiver in our voices..."you are in the band".

Everyone laughs, but for the right reasons and not the wrong.
 
Wow! Sounds like the "adults" have some problems. I think you handled it well. Just keep uking and try to keep the kids interested in it when you see them. I wouldn't stop because of some insecure rude people.
 
Sorry to hear. I had a similar experience at a birthday party, trying to play guitar and uke while little kids were running around playing. It was hard for me to concentrate with screaming kids and some adults didn't really get what I was doing.

Sometimes when I pull out the soprano's I have people start laughing. Then I play I'm Yours by Jason Mraz and the laughing stops. I use that song as a joke stopper as it is a happy song that just suits the uke. People instantly recognize it and are amazed a little "toy like" instrument can pull that off.
 
Amazing how some people dont grow out their old bullying habbits. Its ok to crack a friendly joke as long as you both know its a friendly joke. But to purposley make another feel ashamed thats just cruel. I feel sorry for you but keep jammin.
 
So, the REAL audience is the young 'uns. Sorry, but you have to keep playing and singing for their sakes lest they turn out like the adults. You owe it to the kids to give them the opportunity to hear you play uke and sing so that they might catch the music thing from you. You're just gonna have to cowboy up and do it again next Christmas, and infect them with your good nature.

Hope I don't sound too negative, but it sounds like some parts of your family are in desperate need of music an laughter and you're the one who can bring it to them. Just think of yourself as the Santa Claus of Uke.
 
I find that when my uke comes out and all the grandchildren start having a great time, the rest of the adults - including my own kids - get very jealous that all the fun in the room centers around me for that moment. They are all mature, intelligent, successful grown-ups, so it's not one of those typical dysfunctional family scenarios; it's just one of those situations where anybody without an instrument in their hand and without any kind of musical ability doesn't know where to put themselves. Instinctively, to try and be part of the fun, they often begin to mock the ukulele and the guy playing it. Ignore it. They probably feel as badly afterwards as you do.
 
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