One song glory

Right now I’m sitting on the floor of my new bedroom, drinking a rootbeer and trying to process all the magic that I feel in my heart at this current moment. Last Tuesday I had coffee with my friend Lance. Lance is one of those people who can walk into a room and just bring it to life. I don’t care what class we are in or what topic we are discussing, when I am with him I feel totally at ease and yet completely inspired. My deep talks with Lance usually revolve around art and songs and purpose and one of us ends up crying because we just get each other so well. During this Starbucks trip we ended up musing about gratitude and had to stop ourselves mid convo to just laugh because we sounded like one of ‘those’ kind of people- the hippy kind, maybe a bit overzealous and cheesy, you know, just high on life. I take my gratitude pretty seriously though, because even though I know how truly blessed I am, I always get nervous I’m not doing enough to celebrate it, and honor it, and make sure everyone I know and love knows how much I love them. The past few weeks have only magnified how much my cup runneth over.
About 3 weeks ago I moved into a new house with some of my very dearest friends, Natalie, Alex and Christian. We live in a 2 story, 4 bedroom/2bathroom house with a garage and a pool in North Hollywood. It also has a washer/dryer (although the dryer is on the fritz), and blocks of street parking and I pay significantly less here than I did in my 2 bedroom apartment. (Max, I love you forever) My new roommates are not only some of my favorite people, they are also all musicians too (ridiculously talented ones) and actually play with me in my band on top of their own projects. Our garage is currently packed with a drum kit, keyboards, cables- all kinds of gear in the hopes of one day turning it into a real practice space. There is music happening all the time- whether someone is picking the guitar or playing the piano or writing a song or just listening to their favorite record. The first few nights we were here before school started, we made big family dinners and drank way too much wine and talked and laughed and talked for hours. It felt like family.
And then there was last night. Yesterday morning after a very annoying and troublesome wild goose chase with my friends from UPS, the first box of CDs arrived at our front door. They looked beautiful. I knew what they were going to look like of course, but just being able to actually hold one in my hands, I could hardly believe it had my name on it. My room/bandmates spent the afternoon packing up gear and getting dressed- Natalie so graciously did my hair and make up as she has begun to do for all important events now because she has magical beautician powers that I don’t think I’ll ever have. At about 5:45 we all met in the kitchen to toast the night and then we set off to the CD release show. It was a night of glory. So many people came out to support and it just meant the world to me. My darling friend Allie from home came down for the night, as did Danny’s mom, teachers, family, work buddies, school buddies- I was just so thankful every moment on stage to have them all there. And on top of all this, I got to share the stage with my beautiful band who remind me every time we play why I love music so much. What else can I say but thank you, thank you, thank you.
The CD will be available on itunes and CD Baby and Amazon in a matter of days. I feel like I can hardly wrap my mind around it. There are a lot of business details I’m still working out and it gets really overwhelming trying to do it on my own and do it right. But when I start to get stressed I just stop for a second and think about the past few weeks. I don’t reallllly know what I’m doing, but I’m doing the best I can and just trying to follow my heart. Haha. And there I go again being one of those people.
But really, there’s nowhere else in life I’d rather be.
Thank you to everyone I know and love for all the magic you bring to my life.
I would like to say a few specific thanks for last night:

Thank you Allison and Joanne (and Britt) for all your emotional and technical support :)
Thank you Christopher Dallman. You inspire me more than you’ll ever know.
Thank you John Mattingly and Craig and Tara Rossi
Thank you Natalie, for letting me lean on you and yet still making me feel like I am strong
Thank you to everyone who sent me texts and emails and messages of excitement!! I love you all to the max and wish you were there too!!
So that’s that. I am one big ball of mushy gratitude.