Deep In It
"What do you love about playing music?"
"For starters - everything."
*(post below pics)*
The road is an animal - an unrequited, untamed beast of burden that fills our souls and bellies with fire and longing and fear and joy all at once. When you decide to hit the tour-trail and play shows with someone you haven't spent much time with before, there is always the risk that it will go terribly - but Megan Nash, of rural Sask, proved to be an easy going, quickly familial pro and passenger - almost like a distant cousin - and a powerhouse of song. The shows were warm, busy, intimate and engaging - and filled with kind and receptive souls. It's hard to put fingers to keys and make sense of the whirlwind of multi-town activity that took so many months to finalize and actualize - and that is now freshly in the rearview mirror of memories. From a small but warm-sounding room in Montreal at Le Cagibi with the cool, hip-Hawaiian tropical tunecats of Yitzy - to the historic and classic tavern-style McCloskeys that Dan has really spruced up in Chesterville - the Legendary parkay checker floor and supersonic sound-vortex of the magnificent Black Sheep - the few hundred feet up wildly urban view of the Horseshoe and Rivoli from Lee and Stephen's super-intimate Penthouse condo house concert space - and finally, to the warm, familiar, hippie, pierogi-powered and picturesque Wilno Tavern set in the rock-cut hills of Hwy 62 - I am thankful. I am thankful for the songs I haven't written yet. I am thankful for the beautiful, blue-sky weather we had every day of every drive - and I am thankful for my amazing, beautiful, love-exploding family that I have to come home to and move forward with through the coming spring and summer months.
This life is a lot of looking forward and looking back - it's difficult to be fully in the present. But on a tour, your focus becomes laser-like - you are locked into every song - and every set - and every room - and every new listener, supporter and road family member. You get the lay of the land and you take some mental notes and you stand up and sing and leave it all out there.
The road is our guide - our beacon that tells us that there are places that we can still push ourselves. No matter what age or life-stage we are at - we can learn.
We may be done with the road, but it is never truly done with us.
Peace and love. May we never stop learning.
