My favorite singer-songwriter, the “chick with a piano” that I come back to again and again, Vienna Teng, has a new album. It’s called Inland Territory, and I already adore it.

I’ve been waiting and worrying about this one for a long time. I love her first two albums. Over a period of years, I kept finding little parallels between my life and her songs. Maybe a better way of putting it is that I kept finding ways to map her music onto my life. I think I’ve heard it said before that people finding their own meaning in art is something that artists strive for. That almost never happens with me. I’m much too literal. I either can’t get past what I know or assume to be the artist’s literal meaning, or the poetry/imagery/etc. is abstract enough that I can’t make head or tail of it. Many of Vienna Teng’s songs fall somewhere in between for me. I mentioned my found meaning behind her song “Harbor” in another post here. I actually got to speak with her very briefly at a concert in Birmingham. During the show, she had described the song very differently than my interpretation, and I ended up telling her about mine. When she autographed my copy of Warm Strangers, she signed it, “Hi Jeff – the real ‘Harbor’ :)” (complete with smiley face).

Naturally I was excited about her third album, Dreaming Through the Noise, but I just didn’t feel the connection with it that I felt with the first two. It’s full of music that I objectively know to be beautiful, but it just didn’t grab me. I actually did map one of the songs onto some times from my past, but most of the songs just kinda went over my head (especially musically). I felt she had quite appropriately moved on, but I hadn’t kept up.

So, I was anxious when my pre-ordered copy of Inland Territory arrived. I needn’t have been. I’ll say right now that I haven’t quite digested the lyrics fully enough to know whether there is any personal meaning to be extracted (that takes a while), but I at least understand where the music is coming from. Better than that, she has totally hooked me musically with several of the songs. I won’t talk about them all right now, but my runaway favorite so far is named “Stray Italian Greyhound,” and now we finally get to the reason behind this post’s title.

The song has a groove. Teng always had a knack for using syncopation, and the “bridge” (or maybe “break”) sections in this song are full of it. The lyric she sings during that section condenses to “What do I do with a love that won’t sit still?” I love that lyric anyway (especially in the context of the song’s full meaning), but I almost can’t help myself from grooving to the syncopation. Thus, my mind ended up morphing the line into, “What do I do with a butt that won’t sit still?” 

That and many other moments in the album just put a smile on my face. Either I caught up with her on this album, or she slowed down and let me catch up. I’m not sure which, but either way I love it. I’d hug her for it if I could. 

In recent months, I’ve had a number of old friends, high school classmates, etc. find me on Facebook. If anything, the trend seems to be accelerating. It’s pretty cool chatting with people I haven’t talked to much (or at all) in about 15 years. Some of the people most supportive of my attempt at weight loss have been high school classmates. I’ve gotten some of the most flattering and encouraging comments about my writing here on my web log from old friends who knew me then.

I have to admit, though, that I’ve been a bit anxious as well. A lot of time has passed since then. There are things that I believed very strongly as a teenager that I have very different thoughts about now. The things I find important in my life now are not all the same things I thought were important then. To be honest, I’ve come to think differently about a lot of things over the last 5 years, forget the last 15.

A lot of these things that have changed in my life are not things that I typically talk about in casual conversation. I don’t define myself by these changes, and so they’re not the kinds of things that just “come up.” I see no need to change that. However, I realize that it’s quite easy to form impressions around assumptions. The assumptions I’m most concerned about old friends making are actually quite reasonable ones. I don’t feel the least bit upset or offended about people making those assumptions, but I also don’t wish for people to feel like they’ve been misled in some way.

In short, if you haven’t had a recent conversation with me about my beliefs and priorities, it’s very likely that you’re going to be surprised if the subject comes up. This isn’t just for my high school friends. As I said, a lot of things have slotted in place for me in just the last few years.

I’ve thought for quite a while about how I wanted to say this. As late as last night, I was thinking seriously about trying to lay out in detail many of the changes I’m hinting at here. Today I realized, though, that I’m talking about things that are not for public consumption. I firmly believe it’s impossible to understand where I am now without knowing a lot about how I got here. That involves talking about a lot of internal struggle and self-learning and years of slowly becoming more comfortable with who I am. I don’t have any problem sharing that with people who care about me, but it’s none of the general public’s business.

I’m putting all of this out here because from time to time I feel strongly enough about something that I want to write about it. It’s inevitable that some of these changes I’m talking about will be evident in that writing. From time to time, my reaction to something I’m sent might be quite surprising. So, please don’t make assumptions. I am always open (as time allows) to honest, open-minded questions and curiosity from friends, one-on-one. Just please be prepared for my answers to be nothing like you expect.