Nor'Easter

A couple of weeks ago I sang in church for the coming of age service. In the Unitarian Universalist tradition, coming of age is a teenage rite of passage. Young people get up in front of the congregation and present their own personal credo before signing the membership book. At my own coming of age, I presented a credo statement that still lives in my Google Drive titled "Credo...Written Very Late at Night." It's full of the self-importance of youth, but in some ways it still rings true.

I'm supposed to be telling you what I believe, and I believe a lot of things...I could have stood up here and talked to you about nature or music...Those are two very spiritual things for me...but I chose to talk about imagination...I wish that people would value imagination more...We're not meant to be regimented and scheduled. We're not meant to be caged behind desks and computers. We're supposed to be free to express and support ourselves.

I know, I'm a regular Oscar Wilde over here. Still, I am moved by my younger self's confidence and self-assurance, his devotion to living in the moment and celebrating his creativity, and his capacity to deeply enjoy being immersed in the present and in the natural world.

When I was little, I used to love playing out in the rain and snow. I would climb up on the snow banks and pretend they were castle walls crumbling around me. When we used to live in Arlington, my parents tell me that I knew the spot at the bottom of the hill where the rainwater would pool into a giant puddle (full of all sorts of nastiness I'm sure). I'd splash and splash until I was soaked through.

I've still got that impulse in me. Back in the winter of 2020, I spent a whole afternoon tracking deer through the woods. I was out in two feet of snow following this giant buck through the brambles and rushes, finding the spots where it bed down and crossing logs over the stream. I still like to step outside during a rainstorm or a blizzard. Every New Year's Day I try to swim in Walden Pond. Being out in the elements is a healing practice.

Knots and Burls is my fourth and final single. It's about reconnecting with that kid inside me who wants to get out into the slush and mud and muck and get a little messy. It's also about having people in my life who will love and accept me for that part of myself.

I hope you've enjoyed the singles so far. If you haven't noticed yet, they've been a little trip through the changing of the seasons. Beaver Brook Waltz welcomed in the spring rain, Highway Life took you on a drive with the windows down in the summer, Falling Leaves greeted the autumn wind, and Knots and Burls brought you outside into the elements during a winter nor'easter. The album comes out on June 6th, and I hope you enjoy it.

Like all of these songs, Knots and Burls was a labor of love that was recorded primarily at my apartment in Brighton, the apartment that Edward Glen and Sam Eastman shared in Cambridge, and in North Adams, MA. I owe a great deal to the two of them for being there throughout the whole recording process. On Knots and Burls, Sam also played the pedal steel. I played the drums on this one with engineering help from Alasdair MacKenzie. Thank you as always to our mixing and mastering engineer, Ian van Opijnen, for making this little DIY project into something polished and professional. 

Knots and Burls

I’ve been quaking like the quaking aspens askin’ after you

Tryna heal my heart with willow bark and sarsaparilla root

Meet me in the meadow mushing mud between my toes

And follow me where brush and briars grow

Now I’ve been away for so long that my memory starts to fade

It’s frosted ‘round the edges like a winter window pane

I want to come back to New England, I’m tryna feel your arms again

I’d follow you on every escapade

And I’m glad that you’ll put up

With all the mud stains and the muck

I’ll go fill me up a tub

And I’ll scrub myself clean

There’s a nor’easter bearing down hard, inches of snow and freezing rain

And I’m out in it ‘til my clothes are all soaked through

And you wait for me inside, hang my clothes up to dry

And I hope you know I’d do the same for you

I know you’d rather that my elbows and my fingernails stayed clean

But my hands are twice as rough as any others that you’ve seen

I’d have my fingers be as calloused as the bottoms of my feet

As well-worn as my favorite, my favorite pair of jeans

And honey I’m glad that you’ll put up

With all the mud stains and the muck

I’ll go fill me up a tub

And I’ll scrub myself clean

When God made me, She made me out of wood

She whittled out my features from my head down to my boots

And burned the shavings up as incense down to ashes, dust, and soot

And planted me on Earth right next to you

Now I’m weathered like the driftwood we collect on Second Beach

My scars are all smoothed over, all my cracks are sprouting weeds

You run your thumb over my body, and brush the salt off of my cheeks

And say “I love you knots and burls and all just as long as you love me”

Say “I love you knots and burls and all just as long as you love me”

Written by Isaiah Johnson Spring 2022 Arranged by Isaiah Johnson Recorded by Isaiah Johnson, Ian Downie, Sam Eastman, and Alasdair MacKenzie Mixed and Mastered by Ian van Opijnen at Echoroom Media Isaiah Johnson: Vocals, Acoustic Guitar, Electric Guitar, Drums, Bass Sam Eastman: Pedal Steel