Taking a break.

I’ve decided to take a one week break from all social media—deleted Facebook and IG from my phone and the works. This moment, as it appears we are approaching resuming something like normal activities, seems like a good opportunity to experience something like a modern, hermetic existence. Since I’ll be in my house for all but daily walks and I think one excursion out to listen to W8ing for UFOs play in Susan and Brian’s back yard, I’ll be truly cut off from outside contact with the exception of phone calls and text messages. Honestly, not many of those have been incoming during this, which fits with the pattern of life overall—I don’t know whether I communicate a desire for solitude (real, but not so real that the occasional “how you holding up?” call or text is unwelcome) or if people get quite enough of me over other channels or if actually everyone prefers the hermetic existence of screens, consumerism and anonymity. Who knows?

Work on my album is coming along pretty well, though this past week hasn’t been as productive as I would have hoped. I find myself in one of those periods where I’m sleeping more than normal. It’s like my body somehow perceives the opportunity and then just gorges on makeup sleep—but that tendency is slowing me down a bit. Still, steady progress. Part of the social media pause is in the hope of having an extra-productive final week before my Memorial Day goal.

Which was probably not attainable with the album in the form that it took when I began, but seems maybe in reach as I conceive of it now. There is one really big piece that will just need a lot of time and breathing room to come into being, I think, and I’m going to work on it separately from this, and later. Besides which I suddenly realized one night recently that it would be badly out of place in this collection tonally. I really thought I was going to make a goth record, but I’m really not. There’s just too much humor and sunlight—not that goth doesn’t have those things, but—well, you’ll see.