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Weeds

Nov 25, 2008 sojourn

I haven’t had a day like today in some time. My wife had a partial knee replacement in the morning, painful, exhausting and totally uncomfortable for her… nerve-racking for me because all I could do was wait. During which time I worked (till the battery on my laptop ran out of juice — yep, I left the power supply at home), started reading “The Last Lecture”, surfed the net on my iPod Touch, and read some more.

The hospital we were at is fairly small, well run, and very accommodating. I spent time in the waiting room, lobby, cafeteria, etc., and overheard some very interesting topics of conversation, from the current mainstay theme of economy to the ongoing deer hunting season. We got to the hospital around 8:30, by about 1:30 I was done. Information overload. So I grabbed lunch in the cafeteria and pulled out the November/December issue of American Songwriter.

I skimmed several articles and ads until I got to an interview with Rodney Crowell. I need to re-read the content over coffee and digest more of the tone and mindset, but it was really cool to learn more about this veteran of Music Row and beyond. One piece of the interview that blew me away is Rodney’s account of how he wrote, tracked, and produced what was to be his most current record, then scrapped it because it wasn’t worthy of release.

He (Rodney) determined he had to let go of playing and producing in order to make his next record real to him, stating “… self consciousness is the enemy of art”. Great article, definitely worth checking out, but the point I’m getting to is that Rodney talked of his early days in Nashville, about cutting songs with live vocals to capture raw emotion, and about not settling for a lyric that’s only puddle deep.

There are so many distractions these days, it’s hard [for me] to unplug often enough to squeeze the creative fruit in my being and write meaningful songs. There’s no excuse, and this ramble is meant to be a reminder that writing for any other reason than to reveal what’s important to me is meaningful as watering a rock garden.

Newsflash — Life isn’t likely to get easier anytime soon.

My wife is tough, seeing her down today wasn’t easy, tomorrow [Lord willing] we’ll get to bring her home. In 3-4 months she has to do it all again, her other knee needs the same operation. I’ll need to keep it simple, be patient, and just be there as she gets her wheels back under her.

Tomorrow’s also another opportunity be a better writer. I can use my day job (as I’ve done in the past) as a smoke screen for not digging deep, but the truth is I need to spend more time in the weeds with my own pain and disappointments, relishing dreams fulfilled, pondering hopes that faith keep alive, and love that couldn’t be budged by a tornado… even the most simple song should take the listener somewhere, provoke, inspire.

Tags: crowell, songwriting, weeds