Track 7 - Endless Road - Angel Olsen "The Answer - The Road"

“Well, every road I see leads away from me”

I lied on my bed, listing to this track on repeat, it was 3AM, I had just dropped off the van after driving back from Calgary for work, my first ever freelance gig, successfully done. Rather than being exhausted from that long trek home, I lied in bed with my eyes, wide and alert on the ceiling.

I couldn’t sleep a wink.

I had let my spirit run off, free, and it so wisely decided not to come back to that lil space I had crammed it in all those years. My Body, this lil apartment, this darn city! I wasn’t even beside myself because that piece of me was miles and miles away, running somewhere in the mountains.

I was just straight up alone.

“There’s not a single road that leads me home”

And to think they say Wild Women never get the blues.

Last December when I was living the wildest most carefree life I could live; no partner, no job and no apartment... I was feeling blue-er than that masterpiece Joni Mitchell album of the same name.

“My heart keeps telling me, footloose and fancy free, and the road goes by and calls me as it goes”

Lost is the easiest way to describe the feeling. Lack of purpose, lack of direction, hopeless, the thesaurus terms go on and on. But for those of there out there who know me and I mean really know me, they know that aside from all my quirks and ticks there is one personality trait that overpowers them all.

That’s my unwavering determination.

I was lost and felt like there was no where to go, but oh baby, I was going!

Engines blairing.

So you can imagine when the first job offer I got after leaving my full time job was a contract to drive a cube van westward across Canada to Calgary, I jumped at the opportunity.

Obviously I crafted a 3000 song playlist in preparation and packed my portable record player. Aside from that, I let myself go into the trip blind.

“The road keeps sayin’ friend, let’s see what’s round the bend, so is it any wonder that I roam?”

I hit the fucking road jack and wouldn’t you know I discovered that I was in my element. The smell of the asphalt, the feeling of the breeze in my long mane, the deep black skies outside of the city, lit up by a hundred bulbs - stars, and not light pollution. The best part? Nothing had to make sense on the road, everything was just about moving forward, constantly! No ifs and butts, no outside influence, just me, my solid playlist, my travelling companion - that long stretch of the trans Canada highway. I let go of a lot of what was burdening me on that trip and it felt fucking great. I finally had the liberty that all that freedom promised.

Shackles Removed.

“Oh, But I’ll keep travelling on, keep looking at the dawn, till I can lay this lonesome body down”

For the first time in a long time I felt like my head, heart and spirit were on the same page. As seen in a lot of these stories, my head and heart always have something to say, so loud, so obnoxious, but that spirit of mine? It sits so quietly in the background, it whispers to me the softest whispers but with those other voices so overpowering it often drowns.

On that trip, I got a glimpse, like a faded memory from a dream, of my spirit taking the reins. Something about being on the road, boosted it's volume. So, I nurtured it, watched as it yelled at the top of it's lungs and in doing so it silenced even that loud head and heart of mine.

Just for a moment...

Eventually I had to pack up and make my way back to the city, back to the hustle and bustle, back to the grind and trying to find the time. When my head it the pillow in my own bed, I was no sleepy head. Eyes wide, staring at the ceiling. Eyes finally awake - I abandoned my soul out there!

I felt incomplete, something was missing.

“Down in the pines I hear the cold winds blow”

Every time I closed my eyes I could smell the fir and pines. I saw that spirt of mine, out in the mountains, by itself but definitely not lost. I was the one, lying in my bed in Toronto, who was lost.

The next day when I rolled out of bed I sat in the window and looked at the cold city streets, feeling so distant from it all. Rather than satisfy that thirst for travel, the little trip I went on only made me hungrier. I only got a taste, a single, but baby I wanted the whole damn album in it’s entirety. I knew I had to go back.

This is the dream...

To hit the road and sing those songs once more, I want to pour everything of myself out in those words, my head and my heart, till there’s nothing left. Strip it all down because I believe if you tap deeper than these bare bones, pop music will come flooding out of me. Its so ingrained in my entire existence. Somewhere in that, lies the loud and proud voice of my spirit that’s been overshadowed for far too long and I want to get to the source of that sweet nectar.

I imagine it will be sweeter than Honey.

I imagine it will leave me satiated.

“And when that day has come, I never more will roam, and every road I see will lead me home”

So... That’s why I know, the answer is on the road.