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STEVEN IVORY: Save Yourself
To most people, that isn't a big deal. For me, however, wearing something new so soon was an achievement.
You see, I'd buy clothes I loved--and promptly find space for them in my closet, where, unless I bought them for a specific occasion, they'd hang for weeks. Even months. I was "SAVING" them.
My "saving" went beyond clothes. I'd fill my kitchen cabinets with food and not touch some of it. It wasn't about being frugal; I'd spend good money on quality items.
But I seemed more content to own the food than actually enjoy it. Vegetables would spoil; with gallons of bottled water on hand, I'd dehydrate.
This thing extended to professional activities. I'd postpone promising projects; sit on great ideas, "saving" them for the "right time."
Obviously, some things SHOULD be saved. Money, for example. The preservation of one's health; any beneficial resource that will serve you in the future.
However, to be in immediate want/need of the very thing you are saving--there's something infinitely wrong with that.
I'd heard other stories of "saving." Tales of folk with small fortunes in the bank while their basic needs go unmet; polyethylene-covered furniture in meticulously appointed living rooms reserved for "special occasions" that never arrive.
"Saving" could cause you to miss the very thing for which you are "saving."
Songwriter/producer Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds once told me that in 1988 he and Antonio "L.A." Reid had already contributed several potential hits to what would become singer Bobby Brown's second album, when then MCA Black Music President Jheryl Busby heard a demo tape of yet another Babyface song Busby thought would be perfect for Brown.
Babyface's answer was an emphatic no. "I was saving it for my own album," he explained. Busby, undaunted, pleaded with 'Face to at least let him play the song for Brown. Cautiously,'Face relented: Bobby could HEAR it. That's all.
Brown, Busby would report, loved the tune and wanted to record it. "No way," 'Face said. "It's for me. Plus, Bobby wouldn't do it justice. It's not his style."
"Well," persisted Busby, "how about going into the studio with Bobby. Put his voice on the track--not to release, but just for the hell of it?"
After considerable trepidation, 'Face agreed--and got a surprise. "Bobby performed the hell out of it," he conceded. "He made it HIS."
The song, the dynamic, buoyant, "Every Little Step," reached #3 on the pop charts. Its success helped push Brown's smash 1989 album, "Don't Be Cruel," way past the six million mark--in the process teaching Babyface, then a fledgling hit-meister, a million-dollar lesson.
"It's about recognizing opportunity," said 'Face, who was so sure his song was a hit--yet so focused on singing it himself--that he nearly missed a wonderful windfall. "I learned it's not about 'saving' a tune from an artist who can make it a hit."
My own "saving" was a bit different from 'Face's. Mine, I discovered, was rooted in self denial. "Saving" can be the result of insecurity, a fear of loss: If you never use it, goes the surreal logic, you don't have to be concerned with attaining it again.
Watch enough fruit spoil on your kitchen counter; find yourself trying to be cute in new clothes suddenly out of style, and if you're honest with yourself, you put two and two together. You admit your perturbations. And you work on them.
Alas, bananas ripen faster than old habits die. I can still catch myself "saving" stuff and staving off potentially rewarding circumstances. However, mostly I'm busy saving myself. From me.
Steven Ivory's book, FOOL IN LOVE (Touchstone/Simon & Schuster) is in stores now or at Amazon.com (www.Amazon.com) Respond to him via STEVRIVORY@AOL.COM or MYfeedback@eurweb.com
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