A songwriter whose work I respect very much, and who has hosted numerous workshops online and in real time, is teaming up with another songwriter to offer a songwriting retreat in — sit down — France.
I’ve been looking back on my many years of songwriting and struggle and triumph lately. It’s hard not to do that when you’ve only recently understood that you’ve lived your whole life with a different brain, and that all your “normal”struggles were, in fact, compounded by that different brain and the culture’s lack of consideration for it.
Add to that my penchant for being a bit of a class warrior inside the beltways of privilege and, well, you get an angry little outburst now and then.
I’ve spent twenty-five years honing my craft, often while juggling day jobs and chronic illnesses. Never had I had the opportunity to get away and devote myself to my craft during an extended holiday from the rest of my life. What is that even like?
Never had I had an opportunity to collaborate in a mentoring partnership with another musician so that each of us can learn and grow. Either such opportunities did not exist at the time, or I didn’t qualify to apply for them. (See: lack of roots, etc.)
Sure, there’s a lot of sour grapes here. It’s not pretty, but neither is the gnawing realization of just how much I’ve missed out on — and how hard I’ve had to work on this craft, mostly alone — because of so many things beyond my control.
While I greatly admire and respect this songwriter’s work, I’m lately tempted to snooze her posts on social media for awhile. I’m considering the same thing for several other musical friends in the Jewish scene. They’re all operating from places of privilege that I have never experienced, and I have grown tired of the struggle to keep up. I don’t think I can keep up. It’s possible that I began this journey several miles behind, and could never catch up.
Which begs the question: what am I trying to keep up with now?
I’m not certain I know anymore.
I’ve spent most of my life cultivating an attitude of optimism, grace and gratitude. And while I remain grateful for the gifts my life has presented to me, I’ve also come to realize just how isolation and pain I’ve waded through along the way, and right now it really hurts. I want to feel some grace towards my songwriting peers, but lately I cannot, because of how much of my struggle has become so clear to me, how much of my struggle I’ve spent a lifetime denying and can no longer outrun.
I’m tired. I can’t outrun anything right now. And i need to be able to say all that clearly and out loud without worrying about consequences or others’ opinions of me.
Gratitude can be hard to sustain when you open the Pandora’s box of history and sadness. Sometimes, you just need to take a day off from gratitude and look the pain in the eye. That’s what I’m doing for now. I can’t promise that a song will come from it, and that’s not the point. Sometimes you just have to look in the rear view mirror for a few minutes, or days, and call things as they really were. It’s a backhanded way of giving myself some credit for having survived, and of reminding me how much I’ve done in spite of my challenges.
I’m not arriving at any significant decisions regarding the future of my public music-making today; there are medical issues still to be worked out as well as social and emotional. But I definitely feel a widening of the space between me and everything I used to chase after so earnestly. I’m paying attention to that space, and will see what it has to tell me in the coming weeks and months.
https://bethhamon.bandcamp.com/track/how-will-i-know
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