Songs 1995

8 Months is a song about how our expectations can deceive us so easily.   After I graduated high school, I had all of these grand ideas in my head about how things would be and how exciting my life would start getting.  Boy was I wrong!   I found college to be as unchallenging as High School, my friends were falling away from me, and I myself had succumb to a rash of self-doubt.  Depression found me quick prey and I fell victim to it, wallowing in a misty haze of loneliness and emptiness; I was lost.  The song is meant to be performed acappela, the lone voice stripped of the protection of music and left to hold its own, raw with pure emotion.

Even after his return to Australia, Adam had a hold of me.  I literally used his memory for everything from songs to poems and short stories.  I was obsessed, or near to obsession.  So much so that I couldn't see that I was pushing him away, the last thing I wanted to do.  I still love him and I still believe he loves me, but in such a different way.  It was poor timing.  Maybe it will click for us again, no one really knows.  I've gained a friend I trust and respect, I've made a very deep connection with him that I don't think I would have had we dated.  That will not be lost over time or distance.  And for that I am grateful.  With him I am blessed.

When a longtime friend of the family's son, Todd, told me that he was thinking about joining a gang my heart sank.  Sure he was just an acquaintance, but the fact that I knew him at all made a reality for danger in my mind.  Within one years time, Todd was shot.  I wrote Todd (Your Gang) shortly after the incident.  The entire time before he was initiated, he asked himself whether he was doing the right thing.  I know this decided that for him.   I hope it helps others with the decision as well.

I was a victim of Small Town Delusions.  I lived in a small town in Southern Colorado where the neighbors all knew each other and gossiped about it.  That town, that momentous steel truck barreling along after, threatened to devour all that I had hoped and dreamed in its stagnating bed.  Up until recently, there had been no avenue for escape.  I ran before the hulking vehicle, never slowing, never stopping, praying it wouldn't swallow me and my big ideas.  Hoping it wouldn't devour this gift and my wish to share it with the world.

Try was penned after my best friend Marisa and I has spent the night at Denny's taking over six pots of coffee.  I obviously couldn't sleep that night.  We talked about Adam.  There were tears and laughter and rage, the full pendulum of emotion.  We finally broke ground and, eventually, broke down.  It was one of the most productive nights of my life.  I regained my friendship, even if still a bit shaky, it was better than not having her in my life.

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