You may have noticed a radio silence on my end since spring. I lost a brilliant friend who co-directed the music video for Still Taste Fire in March. His name was Kyle Gibby. He passed away unexpectedly the day before we were supposed to meet about a music video idea for "Call It What You Want To" and when I found out, everything stopped. Up to that point, I had been creating a newfound momentum around the EP (and in my life) from a baseline feeling of "this is about to be The Thing!" I was taking risks to be more open and connected in the process, but I was still treating everything as a means to some invisible end. Kyle was such a genius and I really thought that I knew what this video was going to do for both of us. All we had to do was make it and it would be The Thing.
kyle gibby (self portrait)
That sort of thinking broke all the way down for me on March 19. Losing such a creative and special human showed me new depths of how little I know. I lost any drive I had to force anything to happen and instead chose to just let myself be still.I spent most of my free time sitting under a walnut tree in my backyard and what started out as a two-week break unfolded into 6 months of letting my mind and heart get quiet. I found myself being a lot more present during the process of whatever came up during the day; dishes, laundry, playing with my daughter, creating a path of stone pavers in the backyard, taking odd jobs (including the occasional show.) Every movement I made from this space felt like the point in and of itself. I'm trying to see if I can bring that feeling of presence into the process of trying to build and sustain a career as an independent musician. I'll be honest, I don't know. But it feels like the only way to create anything real.
(keep going.)
