Singing Sad Songs in the Closet

Davey has started going back to the office. I’ve gotten used to him working from home since we’ve been in COVID quarantine. Now, suddenly alone at home in the middle of the day I am remembering these sweet hours of solitude. The music is starting to flow again, like a shy winter stream coming back to life in spring. The first dribbles of water are trickling through my soul and out my fingers.

This new song came from a moment of tears. I felt so panicky. My nervous system was shaking with anxious attachment style being triggered and some sexual complex trauma. I had been blended with my anxious lonely sad parts for days now. Thankfully when I pick up a guitar and start singing into a microphone with lots of reverb in the headphones I magically fall back into myself. Ahhh…there I am. This is who I am and what I’m meant to be doing. So much better. It wakes up inside me.

I write the super sad pathetic song first. I just say it like it is and pray nobody is nearby to hear me through the walls. It’s so raw and kinda ugly in a twisted overly emotional way. I surprise myself in these times when I’m like “woah I can’t believe I sound sad depressing!” But the singing of it drains the depressingness from my body and I feel lighter. The words start to cheer up, a sweet melody marches in behind the dry monotone sentences I’d been previously mentioning.

Singing the sad songs feels shitty, kinda like scrubbing a dirty pan. But…but…the glorious but…. Keep scrubbing and soon the sponge starts sliding smoothly across the surface. The music starts flowing through the body and the rusty gritty gunk in the emotional system is cleared. The music is like drain-o. It’s cleansing the system. Just like breathwork. Just like movement. It’s just stuck energy that needs to flow the fuck out! So sing the sad songs. I’m embarrassed to hear myself making those sounds but considering how much better I feel afterwards, I do it.

Same goes for the primal scream, yah? We are animals that need to make noise sometimes, ugly noises. Looking and sounding pretty all the time is what’s killing us slowly. Life blooms from the compost pile.

Love,
CHA WILDE