People are so confusing. I like to think I'm a happy-go-lucky and generally fun person to have around. But I feel as if I overcompensate lately trying to be what I used to be, trying to get back to what I used to be. I don't want to be out of control of myself or seem as if I have changed or that my soul has been influenced by anyone else. I just want to be me naturally, before all that. I realized last night that lately, I've tried to fake myself into thinking I'm happy by hanging out with people often. I am never alone, which we tend to associate with loneliness. Therefore, I think to myself that if I am constantly surrounding myself with people that I love and that I always laughed with, I eventually will look up and realize that I am no longer lonely. And that I'm closer to myself and my friends than I have ever been. But the other side of me says, "Isn't it ok to be lonely? Isn't it ok to be real with yourself?" It's the struggle between trying to look perfect to myself and others and the general well being and growth of me. But I fear me being lonely. Not the fear of loneliness. But the fear of me.
The bottom line is, everyone (when pushed) will do more than they ever thought they would do. Human nature- it sucks sometimes. But I'm hanging on right now- a lot better than I have over the past few months. I'm not sure if I should mess with it. Or if now is the time for recovery and our ridiculous resolutions for "improvement" after a breakup. :) But it is a good thing, isn't it? Cliche, but only healthy.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!IMPORTANT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!On another note, me and my friend Toups (who is my bud from Slidell- I love him to death) pulled an all-nighter writing a song. That night, there were multiple people at my house. About eight boys huddled in our small living room, subconsciously taking rotations for cigarette breaks so that everyone could have a seat or a bench or some form of table to sit on. One of the boys was wearing a beard strapped around his head, carefully and clumsily trying to sip his how-many-th? beer through the crack underneath the limp mustache, yelling at everyone to watch him. He was full to the brim and somehow he kept pouring. But the night was good. No one was annoyed although, looking back, I see there was a great deal of potential to be. The song idea started off with me joking that if some day Toups' wife were barren, I would birth their children for her. After this statement was made, I decided that I really did mean that statement. I'm not even sure if I want kids, but I would do that for Toups. We shook hands on it. Everyone laughed. The conversation shifted to probably Bob Dylan or how the Eagles really were a pretty good band. But I kept thinking about what I had just promised and what it meant. Me and Toups walked to the kitchen and he asked me a hypothetical situation- "If that actually happened- a girl became a surrogate mother for her friend's child- what if the wife died?.... How would the surrogate mother feel?" We literally discussed all the emotions that probably went through her head. She would feel sadness for her friend for losing his wife, sadness for the child in losing his mother. But what would she feel? After all, the only difference between her calling that baby her own or someone else's is that it was already fertilized at the time that it came into her body. I think she would still feel all the same feelings and emotions as a mother would towards this child, but these feelings would have been originally prefaced with her subconscious assurance that this baby is not mine. Think about birthing a baby and then having it taking away from you- someone else calling it theirs. It would be a very hard thing to do. But I'm sure that this mother would push back the feelings of attachment. She doesn't want to seem selfish. She wants to act as if it was just a favor that she did a few years ago for a friend. Not a big deal- we're still friends and now 'closer than ever'. :) But after this baby's real mom dies... you're the closest thing to a part of him. Would you feel a sense of responsibility to him? Would you (in the back of your mind, because we ARE girls) think that for some reason, you will end up with the father in the long run? Would you tell the child?..... And what would the child feel?....
We literally went in my room at midnight and wrote til seven o'clock the next morning. It is a duet between a guy (the son) and a girl (the surrogate mother). The son has his own melody, the girl has her own melody. And at the end they sing together. It starts at the birth scene with slow chords and a beautiful flowy melody for the boy. The girl's melody sounds like she misses something, but there's still joy:
The boy's part: "I scratched inside but you didn't feel like my mother. But the laugh that I hear, that song in my ear, it's another. A tunnel of white, my first of shared sights was my mothers. And as he held this boy, the doctor sounded coy when he asked in whose arms should I hide."
The girl's part: "Bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh. You're somebody's own, but I still feel your beat in my chest. You're such a beautiful baby. But I won't look too long because you'll soon be gone from me."
Every time I hear it, I almost cry. We've played it for two people. One liked it, one thought it was cheesy. :/ But it's still a beautiful song that I am very excited about. It calls every maternal instinct you have into play. We picked every emotion that we think they would feel out and focused on picking the perfect line to describe it, the perfect word to describe it. It is the best lyrical writing that he and I have ever done. I usually hate collaborating, but this is one of the most beautiful, emotional, and special songs to me. And his voice is a mixture of Manchester Orchestra and Billie Holiday. It's ridiculously good. I can't wait to record it. :)
eat until there is free food somewhere. It usually pans out all right. However, at this point I was very hungry and hadn't eaten in a couple days. I had roughly $4 cash left for the rest of the tour that I had been saving for emergency food. But the bakery in Hattiesburg had this wonderful looking fruit tart. I'd never had a fruit tart, but all of a sudden (I guess I thought of Alice in Wonderland or some other movie from my childhood), I HAD to have that fruit tart! Spent the whole $4 on one tart and was poor and starving for the rest of the tour. But the fruit tart was worth it. :) We took our Family Fun Tour picture at this same train station. I miss tour. :)
