the harrow & the harvest
notes on settling myself down
A couple of weeks ago, I stopped in South Austin for an iced coffee and to browse records at End of Ear. This has become one of my favorite, quiet ways to spend a Sunday morning.
I impulse purchased Gillian Welch’s 2011 record The Harrow & the Harvest, based entirely on the cover art, which is something I never do because God knows I have enough fucking records and nowhere to store them.
Anyway, let me just say, I haven’t taken it off the turntable since I bought it. Maybe I am leaving my Stevie Nicks era and entering my Gillian Welch era.
As I was poking around in some music reviews, I stumbled on this quote from Gillian Welch about the torturous eight-year period it took to eventually create this record.
"The sad truth is we never liked anything enough to put it out, which is not a pleasant place to be," she says. "Our songcraft slipped and I really don't know why. It's not uncommon. It's something that happens to writers. It's the deepest frustration we have come through, hence the album title."
Harrowing: acutely distressing
Harvesting: the gathering of a ripe crop
I didn’t write much last year. Instead, I got into the habit of long walks. I tried to cool my nervous system down. I found myself enjoying slow songs for the first time in my life after years of skipping anything with less than 2,000 BPM.
It was the first time that I found myself, as an adult, with the desire to feel calm. The first time I recognized myself — my baseline — as something agitated, something uncertain, something I can’t quite articulate but which was categorically not calm.
And now I think that perhaps something new is rushing in to fill that formerly hectic space. A different kind of self-knowledge maybe? A better ability to articulate my internal experience? I don’t feel quite so trapped inside of myself anymore, so far away from everyone else. Maybe I’ve finally stabilized myself enough to be honest.
I may try to write more here this spring. We’ll see.
For now, I am home with Sam on a Tuesday morning, enjoying the heavy Texas air. It’s raining and warm here today. We are listening to Gillian Welch. When the record ends, we’ll listen again.