Tag: concerts

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Embrace Your Freedom

In the weeks after Mary’s death I wrote about how music had lost its power over me.

I was living a robotic existence. It was too too risky to feel anything at all. I had intuitions about the importance of love, but I wasn’t ready to experience it.

The road trip we embarked on started with a weekend of music that would break me out of the armor I had built.

As Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band tore through “Lay Your Burden Down,” I had my son on my shoulders, my feet in the mud, and tears framing the smile on my face. Mary and I had danced in front of them on a special date weekend. All the emotions I hadn’t let myself feel poured forth. I let myself be free to feel.

Music touches me even deeper now. Everything does. Freedom means being able to explore further, especially within.

God bless and thank you for reading,

Jason

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Looking for a Sign

Tonight I’m going to my first concert without my sons since my wife passed away. I’m feeling strangely ambivalent and wonder if I’m so worn out from emotional purges that I don’t have much left in the tank. 

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Or maybe it’s the calm. Having recently gone through some seismic psychological shifts, I’m feeling ready for a new chapter. While moving piles around I found Get Well cards that Mary never got to read, funeral home to-dos I’ve yet to do, and the looming stack of condolences that might demand my attention. But none of it controls me today. It’s just stuff.

Among the stuff I also found a Time Out Chicago from when Mary and I went to Lollapalooza in 2008. A quiet sign and reminder of how much music meant to us individually and as a couple. An unbroken thread stretching back through my memories to well before I met Mary. One that continues on with my sons and on for me as I find my new way in the world.

God bless,
Jason