Day “Off” - The Endless Walk

As much as I like days “off”, they are always some kind of a double-edged sword for me, as the second I’m slowing down a little, I start to physically feel off-synch before totally crashing a few days later. So when Leonard woke me up at 6 am – thank you boy, not! – I promised myself to try getting some real rest this time. So if I couldn’t convince Leonard of the virtue of relaxation, nor could I sleep everywhere all the time (maybe I should try), I figured I would have to find a more recharging type of inner rhythm to pace myself for once because if the last 2 weeks-ish were incredibly intense emotionally for me, I knew it was only the initial phase of the album… One out of three. If we now have a phenomenally heartfelt kind of foundation to build upon, I wasn’t remotely close to comprehending the most profound nature of its journey. I would need more extensive in-depth diving explorations to do so, especially as I only began to foresee its spiritual outlines after listening to the record’s overview a few days ago. After losing MacKaye, my uncle, and seeing my best friend and accomplice Stephanie being seriously ill while dealing with my own health issues, I knew the journey was far from being over for me and that it would “cost” me everything, even what I don’t realize that I have, in order to be able to process to the other side of that long internal expedition. That state of heart and soul is a “place” that remains out of reach and is impossible for my spirit to define. It might sound like the finish line, but it stood as the true starting point of the voyage. Right now, the overall challenge, besides the multitude of single specific ones, remains to avoid looping my mind in a self-doubting process. I need to press on, to conquer every inch of ground the high-wind blizzard facing my worn-out self is trying to deprive me of, and I have to do so without projecting my pain and exhaustion into an imaginary safe place. It’s an all-in peregrination, otherwise, it will be the polished product of empty words emotionlessly sung over standardized sounds carrying nothing more than background noise embellishments. I didn’t go through death and back to embrace life’s inconsequentiality… I’m too far to go back there.

Oh yes, my day off… Mikko, who’s an avid hiker, invited us to have a “short” walk together by the riverside where we had very personal conversations about our different life experiences. It’s a blessing for me to discover Mikko the “person”, and to have an insight into who he is beyond his producer role or whatever details I might have read about him. He’s way more spiritual of an individual than you might think at first sight, which is even more singular for me considering the profound nature of the album we are giving life to. It will also be particularly significant to share with him when it will be time for me to reflect on the record’s upcoming lyrical essence as well. It’s fascinating to realize just how perfectly aligned all the “components” are presently dedicating a soulful piece of their existence to the whole exploration crew. I couldn’t have envisioned a more defining assemblage. “Death” takes what we never want to let go of, but “life” always offers us a completely new perspective on the inner light we have to guide us through the darkness of our utmost moments of confusion and discouragement. And when you suddenly acknowledge the clarity you might have found along the way, you’re dazzled to witness the number of “lights” that were surrounding you all the way down and back. We’re never a lost cause, no matter the reasons we ended up believing we were…
That being said, I was nonetheless very happy to get back home, 2 hours later… Not necessarily the slowest rhythmic start of a day off I was imagining 😉