(Ladies and gentleman, welcome aboard this vessel)
(Please listen very carefully to the following safety announcement)
I know I'm not going to be doing myself any favors with this comparison
But, Leonard Cohen wrote eighty verses to Hallelujah before he settled on the final five
Sometimes, the results of our labor justify the lengths that we go to get there
This is not one of those times
I'm so tired of this song cluttering up the worktable in my mind
But I am not, yet, ready for it to be gone
It was meant to be for my dad, in case that wasn't obvious
And that's how the problem began
Ever eager as I am to fling every egg I can find into the closest basket I have to hand
I decided
That this song, was The Song
Capital T, capital S, that it would be where I digest all of those
Undesirable emotions all at once and it felt healthy
Even at the time, to have somewhere to put them, somewhere they could be herded together
And ring fenced and I
Dove into that process, like I always do, smug and confident
That I would be able to hold my breath and reach the bottom and bring something beautiful back to show everyone
And then it would be done and I wouldn't have to think about this anymore and I wouldn't have to
Feel like this anymore
But it's been two years now and I don't feel like I've come up for air, once
Since the first demo
Which was written and recorded on my phone the morning before the funeral
And I was rewriting it, in my head, less than two hours later
During the funeral service
There's a theory for this, or a term, rather
It's called dissociation, it's a coping mechanism
It's something that we do when we can't bring ourselves to look directly at the monster
Barreling out of the dark towards us
Here's another theory, actually, if, if
If emotions, can be boiled down to, electrical signals, bouncing around in the brain
Then it follows that they are a part of the natural world
And therefore have to obey the same laws as the natural world
And the first law of thermodynamics states that energy cannot be created
Or destroyed, it can only be transformed and I barely, fucking, cried when my father died
Where, are, all of those emotions, if they have not been destroyed
Then where have they gone
Receiver Of Wreck, is not, just
A song, I think
It's an external hard-drive, for the feelings that I can't bear to have close to me
And it will be effective, for as long as I keep working on it, I believe
As long as I keep coming back every few months to push my grief
Another metaphor, deep until eventually, even I start to forget
What I walked up into the field that January morning to bury
This is something I have to decide
That I can write, and rewrite
And re-re-re-rewrite
But the song is never gonna feel complete
One day I'm just gonna have to stop
But even then I can't just, put my guitar down and walk away
I'm in, far too deep for that
I don't think I get to feel like it's done, truly
Until this song, and everything locked inside it has been released
And maybe then, maybe
I can start the actual process of
Gathering up those emotions and finding a place for them
In me, this time
Where they belong