The Really Real: 2 of 12

Waiting For Life

We were talking about how prolific we became during COVID, when suddenly we had to learn how to play bass and navigate Pro Tools, arrange our own songs, produce and mix, over and over, just try.

Each an island. There was a freedom in this.

You didn't have to show up for anyone, because you couldn't. You were given permission to absorb yourself in your own work, and take your time in doing it.

This is when you felt at the peak of your artistry.

And solitude is good for a peaceful confident mind.

That is, until you realize you haven't been living in much of a reality. Is your own head a great place to reside inside permanently? I think of the old quote: "Your mind is the most dangerous playground."

But what I wonder.. is... in this world of social media, and texting and never phoning and sometimes never seeing people.. are we in a holding pattern?

Loneliness could be the wake up call.

I realized I had spent most of my time making lists, and then living by them. If I accomplished everything on paper, I could sleep, knowing that my life was worth something. It gave me a way out, too, in terms of ever feeling the need to contact anyone. What needs to be accomplished?

Yet for all I had written, checked off, what had changed in me? I stayed within my four walls, elbows on the table, head in my hands, lying on a sofa. In fact, when I thought of what I needed to accomplish, I was forever behind. I had so much to do! I was never through.

Until it hit me that I was not unlike Eleanor Rigby. One thought folded into another, one hand drawing the other hand. I could bury myself alive in my own thinking, yet it was here, sitting, for hours, at a desk, or in front of a computer, or holding an instrument, that I entertained myself with myself, ultimately too tired to want to go anywhere, by the end of the day.

This was a Covid reality that extended past the Covid years. Folded over by excuses and reasons not to leave, not to speak, not to engage anyone.

Until I had a sharp feeling in my side and then in my heart . I was just waiting for life to happen.

I had deep frozen myself. I felt nothing. I wasn't happy. I wasn't miserable.

And I wondered if there were any like me? Living but not feeling like living. Just going on. Just getting the day done. Somewhere watching others have fun.

This was a real way of living that became a trap, not a haven.

An emotional straitjacket which I suppose ultimately links to anxiety or fear. But whose fear?

How did I come to wear this and accept it? I think that's a pretty good question.

My song has a ticking time bomb, even though it is sweet, and everything sounds fine.

That's the current weird danger of an existential life. KNowing when it is ok, and then when it really is not.