it's time for Heidi's Pies and for a Late Nite Drive

This is maybe going to be one of the most intimate and personal things I've ever written or shared, and I am actually nervous about sharing it.

Musicians have different ways of seeing different eras of their lives. We miss out on many seminal, dare I even say, sacramental life moments, instead chronicling our lives in terms of record cycles. I remember the last 15 years of my life (hahaha, seriously, wtf) in terms of release cycles.

Boy, was this an era.

I used to work for this horrible company in Downtown San Mateo. I was there for 2 years, and the job almost killed me. I had worked for both cafes and Starbucks, and I thought those were some of the worst jobs I had ever has, but I could at least have a backroom to cry in at those.

Despite this, I still fondly consider Downtown San Mateo some of my old stomping grounds.

Especially at night, being in this whole area just does something to my heart. 

In fact, I wrote a whole song about it...

The years of 2012 and 2013 in which I worked for the Evil Place are a blur. Not that my memory is failing me, but the fact that I have pushed it out of my mind. I had two seminal deaths in my life back to back. It was so hard, because I couldn't believe that of everything I had trained for and wanted to do with my life, that THIS was the place I was working at.

I didn't know it at the time, but I was falling in love with someone. I would think of them all of the time, and not realize that's what was happening. That whole era would come to remind me of them, of falling in love with this person and not realizing that that's what was happening. For years being in Downtown San Mateo, or even remotely along that bus or train route would make my heart ache and I would feel lost. Helpless.

Every time I would hit certain stations, I would feel this pit in my stomach. I never told anyone this, but I would be there and I would miss things I wanted that I never had. I would miss memories that I didn't have.

Memories of things I never got to do with this person, and absolutely do not want now.

The last two times I was in Downtown San Mateo, I didn't have those feelings anymore. There is no space in my heart for this person anymore. There is no softness, no fondness, no nostalgia. Not even so much as a gentle reflection of the times when this person was good. I used to dread being in my old stomping grounds, used to dread that feeling of sadness and.... it wasn't there anymore. I was no longer holding space for the good person they once were--or maybe who I just thought they were.

There is no space left in my heart for lies--both the ones they told and the ones I told myself, because there is only room now for someone else. 

wow.

My heart is so full these days. 💖