January Blues and Saving Grace

I tend to hate these dark cold mornings in January.  Living on the damp fringes of Europe here in Wales, it can be particularly miserable. Getting up for work can seem like a never ending rounding of prising yourself out of a warm bed, getting up, applying makeup, straightening hair and gulping down coffee before rushing to get to work on time.  Once there you find yourself dashing to the loos to sort out wind blown hair and tidy yourself up.  Outside, it is gloomy still.  I find myself desperately clinging on to memories of summers in France or Belgium, sitting at a cafe table opposite someone really nice, warm sunshine and kinder days.  I have the January Blues big time.

This year too, I have also the enormous task of clearing and sorting out my late father's house.  He had been ill for a long while. Things had got chaotically untidy.  Over two months after his death his painfully cold house keeps reproaching me from two counties away that it needs sorting out before the spring arrives, the garden turns to an uncared for wilderness and the dust looks even worse in the sunshine through the dirty windows.  Out there on the Isle of Angelsey, it has been left to fend for itself until I can summon up the courage to go there again, preferably with a friend.

A fire awareness sign which I pass every day at work keeps encouraging me to plan out my escape! It always makes me smile. I desperately need an escape route at this time of year though it's not the one envisaged by the sign (a green stick person looking thoughtfully at another one escaping though an open door). Romantic novels and exquisitely elaborate fantasies used to do it for me, especially when I was younger. These days I'm a bit more doubtful about whether I'll ever meet that George Clooney or Mark Harmon.  No, I've not given up hope but let's say 'I know guys too well by now'. I'm not too optimistic after coming to realize what sort of men do seem to be attracted to me. In any case, I hated the come down when I reached the last chapter of a novel or lovely fantasy.  It was such a downer to come back to 'real' life. 

These days writing music ends up being my Saving Grace.  Now I get thoroughly lost in writing lyrics, musical arrangements and recording what I've composed.  Ironically I find myself writing about what made me unhappy in the first place and then finding that I feel better.  The lyric writing helps me cope with shattered dreams, unkind words and nice men who turn out to be the wrong sort of guys :) Okay, so it was really hard getting used to hearing my low pitched vocals on the recordings and not fulfilling the urge to give up completely as a result. I still struggle with that.  Writing the music is intensely absorbing, mainly because it's so hard and never came easy.  Why do I do it then? I suppose because it does let me escape and at the end of it, I get to keep the song and sing it again whenever I want. It has been nice too to have unexpected comments from people who listen to songs that I never set out meaning to share.

My music's not for everyone, I'm well aware of that. 

If I haven't already talked you out of listening, check out my songs on Reverbnation: http://bit.ly/nKZeaW My latest song is 'noT your GirL'.  A couple more tracks need their vocals recording (I dread doing that bit).  How much more music gets posted up there pretty well depends on how rough the days ahead are!

Robyn-Jane xx