Topic: Sore Fingers
A week ago I returned from a trip out west with 3 friends. We visited several National Parks and spent 6 days in our rafts floating and fishing the John Day River in Oregon. A day or so after I got home I picked up one of my guitars and after about 20 minutes noticed how sore my fingers were. Three weeks without playing and constant immersion of my hands in water for six days had softened all the callouses I'd developed over time. To compound things, the bottoms of my feet were developing cracks from being wet for so long so for several days I applied a salve used for heel cracks which softens the skin and helps it heal, not thinking it would also soften the skin on the fingers that were applying it ............. Duh!
I changed out the strings on one of my acoustics and put on the lightest set I had, tuned down a half-step to loosen string tension and played at a local music store jam yesterday for two hours and then went to a nearby campground and played for another two hours with some of my old pickin' friends. This morning my fingers are so sore it even hurts to type this. I feel like a beginner again, but hope if I play enough over the next couple weeks the callouses will return. Anyone else ever go through this? Any suggestions to hasten the process?
DE
