I’m back home now, and after all my travels, I’ve started getting a bit of a sore throat. I’ve found that whenever I try to “fight” a cold, I feel worse. When I give up and let it have it’s way with me, I usually feel better. Continue reading
Thanks to 2 inches of snow, Atlanta is shut down, and I’ve found myself spending another day in the Bay Area. Delta’s switchboards were so overwhelmed, I used up all of my cell phone minutes, but at least I got a direct flight home tomorrow. Also, I was warm and indoors.
I was thinking about Pete Seeger (who died yesterday) as I was writing this song. One of my personal highlights playing with Girlyman was getting to share the stage with him and many others (Kris Kristofferson and Sarah Lee Guthrie, among them) to sing “This Land is Your Land” in Ann Arbor in 2009. It always struck me how he wanted people to sing along, rather than just listen to him sing. It wasn’t just modesty – it’s like he wanted to help people tap into the energy (and fun) of singing with each other.
http://nateborofsky.com/assets/mp3/no%20need%20to%20try.mp3
I’m spending a couple of days in Davis, CA before I head home. My friend Lis and I were talking today about her struggles and fears raising her son. We realized that many of the really deep lessons we learned from our parents were ones that they probably hadn’t even intended to teach us – we learned how to treat ourselves by seeing how they treated themselves.
http://nateborofsky.com/assets/mp3/Nothing%20Left%20to%20Be.mp3
I was talking last night with my friend Ary about the Old Testament God. In the ten commandments, he famously says he is “a jealous God,” which to me indicates a pretty insecure God.
I started trying to write from such a God’s perspective, and I quickly realized the song was about a parent longing for the time when their (presumably rebellious) child had basically worshipped them. When the child no longer thinks the sun rises and sets by you, who have you become?
http://nateborofsky.com/assets/mp3/Where’s%20the%20Fun.mp3
I was thinking this morning about how angry people in relationships sometimes get at each other when they break up. It’s often an all-consuming rage. Yet years later, they usually look back with an attitude of, “Whew! I dodged a bullet there.”
I’ve been noticing in my own life how attached I am to blame. It doesn’t matter if I’m blaming someone else or myself – it has to be someone’s fault.
I was talking to my friend Ary last night, and she reminded me of when Girlyman (my old band) was touring in the UK. We visited Stonehenge, and while everyone else went out to look at it, I stayed in the van and read a book. It’s not that I didn’t want to see Stonehenge, it’s just that I wanted some time to myself. That seems to have come out in this song.
Greetings from California! I managed to write this one with a borrowed ukelele (thanks to Erika) on the couch I’m staying on. It was 17 degrees when I left Atlanta yesterday and 70 when I landed here, so there’s a bit of longing for leaving in this song.
This song came out pretty quickly today. I’m getting ready to head out of town for a few days to do a Django Jones photo shoot, and I had to get ready to catch my flight. Sometimes I like how songs come out when I don’t give myself much time to write them. It gives me less time to second guess myself. And for whatever reason, I seem to prefer my first guesses.
I’m curious to see how it will be, trying to continue my song a day project when I’m staying on friends’ couches. Whatever recording I do will probably be on my phone. We’ll see how it goes.