I Heart Fred

Last night, I went to a Fred Eaglesmith concert hosted by friends of ours who were celebrating their 20th wedding anniversary in fine style.

I admire Fred, not only for his fine songwriting and compelling performances, but the fact that he took control of his life and built his music career from the ground up. He's done it the old-fashioned way: going on the road and playing hundreds of shows a year.

There's a part of me that envies him.

He has a song called "I Want To Buy Your Truck". It goes "I wanna buy your truck/I don't like what I'm doing/I wanna give it up/I wanna do something else... I like the way that it shines/hey I'm really stuck/in this life of mine/I wanna buy your truck."

Seems strange, doesn't it, that I'd even think of comparing my life to his. He's a man, I'm a woman...he's rural, I'm urban... His children are mostly grown, mine are not (and he's the dad). And yet at the heart of things, we're songwriters. That's what makes us tick. As songwriters, we want to reach people with our songs.

There's a part of me that's definitely a homebody...a milk-and-cookies kind of mother like my mother before me. I stick close to home.

And sometimes I feel stuck...like the cookies stuck to the pan because I never pay enough attention to them.

I wanna do something else...

Last night, as Fred signed a CD and a t-shirt for me, I mentioned my subway busking...and later I wondered if he thought it was a good idea or a bad one. Deliberately playing in a place where hundreds of people are ignoring me every day, playing for small change? Why not get on the phone and book some gigs?

I wanna buy your truck...

Well, I don't have a truck.

Right now I don't even have a car.

I don't have the ability to tour constantly right now. I don't have the energy, the wherewithal, the heart, the guts or, truly, the desire.

What I do have is the hunger to write songs and sing them for people. Any people. Anywhere.

That's the heart of this songwriting calling, no matter in which direction you take it.

So I put on my new autographed "I Heart Fred" t-shirt and headed downtown.