The Trembling Sigh
Dear reader:
Tonight is a night of solemn November sanctuary. It's a night of finding the verbal vibe. Recovering the lyrical laminar flow that Gord Downie spoke so passionately about in the 1995 Heksenketel vhs video that my brother owned. I hope you can forgive me, reader.
I've been vacant for a while in the department of detonative words. My word-wick has been trimmed, snuffed, shortened and even dampened by life circumstances.
In short, I just simply haven't had the fucking time. I worked all summer. All fall. With maybe two/three days off scattered here and there (and that's being generous), I scoured. I burned the midnight oil. I dug deep.
Since early May, my life has been on a beautiful collision course of change, joy, panic, bewilderment, elation and ultimate thankfulness. I don't know where the sleeps have gone. Road-rubber-trails burned between Ottawa and Haliburton. Sleepy kisses. Morning americanos. Sticky cups in cup holders. Fumbling for change. Grunty drives with a car full of sticky kegs. Bread. Product pitches. Lead-boots on the pedal down Mitch Owens towards Boundary Road. One car down and one gained. Crazy backwoods Quebec festivals with metal-meathook pierced humans in the heat of midsummer. Veggie chilli. Late night lugtreads. But before I get into that...
In early May, I scored a cool, unique job with a local craft beer company. This was right around the time I trucked across the country in the Blue Butte with Ali McCormick (as her traveling sideshow guitarist) and her uber-unique partner Will (master of the roadwitch). And about 7 months prior, I had found new love with someone who, at the time, was a partner I had come to deeply admire. Now, though, many moons away from that strange and fateful early summer month, she is my only partner. My only world. A spoken understanding at Christmas in a dark, upstairs night in the pine-woods-laden dwelling of her parents cemented the everything of us. My partner for life. Or at least, we hope and dream and plan towards the idea of that being the case! And many events have led us to believe that is the case. As the glorious lady of light and I were living in a strange Manotick apartment, and I was running ragged all over the Ottawa valley region to set up counters and serve beer for this company to the pandering wherewithal of thirsty oglers, another opportunity surfaced for me to get deeper into the beer company. The distribution side presented itself to me, and I placed a hook in an acquaintance, and I took the line to the boat and jumped in. But it didn't work out.
It's not my deal.
And that's really alright. It is. As I move further to background, I see the beauty of Beau's for what it is, now - a young, burgeoning, green company with a lot of excited employees who are passionate about community and their solid, organic products that are pretty damned tasty and bring people together. Make no mistake - I will continue to promote and consume their products.
But I've taken on a new opportunity - here in my hometown of the Otown. The cradle of the 613. One that uses my skills and seems to be the right fit.
Yes. Another opportunity, yet again. The shifting sands of the job-life of Matthew McKechnie have altered yet a-fucking-gain. Life doesn't get easier at 40, folks. You truck on. But this one is close to home - close to family, and just maybe, it's one that I avoided for a long time. And one that I feared out of finality and longevity.
And that's that.
And though the road will wind itself through thickets of regret, sadness, and even embitterment, it's easy to get pulled down those safe and enticing pathways. Sure - I've got some bones to pick, as we all do - but in the end, bones end up in a graveyard. And anyone picking through graveyards has to have a few screws loose!
In a comedy special last year, Bill Burr talked about his religious background and touched on the notion of 'walking away' and 'letting go' of religion. He spoke fiery words of hellfire into a microphone, mimicking an amalgam of pastors - as he made the motion of the microphone getting further away, and the speaker becoming more muffled and distant.
He did this to illustrate the concept of letting religion go to find the better part of himself.
I'm letting go. I'm moving on.
Yet again. It's a pattern that I'm getting used to, and sometimes worried about - but it's a pattern that has saved and rejuvenated me many times, nonetheless.
When we settle, we settle with the dust. Settling looks different for everyone - there is no key. No navigational tool. No legend on the map. May you find what your settlement looks like, and avoid it at all costs.
I'm excited to be closer to my family, and to crack open the sky of this coming dawn.
