Trail Tunes: Day 4 on the Dales High Way
Facing down the inner critic, reminding myself that these criticisms aren’t based in reality, closing out the Trail Tunes series, and contemplating where to take this newsletter next.
“This is why you shouldn’t have even started the Substack.”
“You should’ve known you wouldn’t keep this up.”
“Why did you think this would be any different than the multitude of other things you’ve started and not finished?”
I would never let anyone else speak to me this way. But I still provide airtime, free of charge, to the inner critic, my dark passenger (to coin a phrase from the TV series Dexter). Some of my earliest emotional memories relate to “not being good enough” and, despite a lot of work in this area, I’m still prone to the occasional bout of self-criticism. Low self-worth has been a constant challenge for much of my life, one from which I sought refuge in my younger days through the numbing escape of alcohol and drugs. Whether it was sniffing glue in a theater at 12 years old, my first joint at 14, inhalants in my late teens, or the daily drinking or drug use of my college days, everything served a single purpose: the obliteration of my perceived worthlessness. What started off as “feeling good” became a mechanism to numb myself, then became not feeling at all, and ultimately ended up as an overwhelming pain that the drugs and alcohol could no longer assuage.
Thankfully I reached a mental, emotional and spiritual bottom before the disease of addiction took my life, a gift I’ll never take for granted and one that far too many of my fellow travelers weren’t able to achieve before the disease took them. When I first entered therapy for my addiction, I literally hated myself. For who and what I had become, for the compromises to my integrity, the indignations I’d visited upon myself and others, and the already low moral bars I’d managed to slither under in order to feed my addictions. But the gift of a rock bottom is that it can serve as a true bedrock for building the foundation of a new and better life.
While I’m sure there will be more in-depth posts in the future about my darker days, this is not that post. This Substack is called Joy In The Journey for a reason and I want to touch on that briefly before getting on to the music. Through therapy and a recovery program that provided me a simple set of spiritual tools to learn how to deal with life on life’s terms, I was gifted with an ability to like myself for the first time ever. And through hard work, lots of therapy, and the freely shared experiences of others, I did finally learn to love myself.
Today I choose to embrace joy. I recognize that down days will happen, whether driven by external events (sometimes shitty things just happen) or by the machinations of my own mind (internal monologues, self-judgment, moderate depression). But I’ve come to know that “this too shall pass”, that nothing is permanent, and nothing is insurmountable. The trick (simple but certainly not easy) comes down to acceptance and to changing how I choose to react to whatever comes my way. Which brings us back to those criticisms that started this entry.
I’ve always enjoyed writing. And I’ve always loved music, for as long as I can remember. So when I finally found Substack this past summer (a little late to the party, but whatever) I discovered an incredible community of writers and fellow music lovers. And I wanted to be a part of it. I threw caution to the wind and launched my Substack in August, with my first entry coming in September. But my first two entries were recycled content. While that’s fine, and it allowed me to start my journey, it’s not the reason I started this Substack. I wanted to challenge myself to write, to come up with creative and meaningful content, focused primarily on music but also touching on some of the lessons I’ve learned on my recovery journey.
My first original content came last month as I decided to write about the music that came to mind out on the trail as my wife and I walked the Dales High Way in Yorkshire. It was thoroughly enjoyable, but a little overwhelming as I found myself writing each evening in an effort to keep the entries updated in real time. By day 3, I was a little tired. Physically from the walking, sure, but also mentally from the effort of drafting, reviewing and posting a Substack entry each evening. It felt like work, which is exactly what I didn’t want. I go hiking to escape the demands of the working life. I also felt I wasn’t being present, for myself or for my wife, which was taking away from our trip.
So while I continued to take notes each day of the songs that came to mind, I decided to put the daily Substack writing aside until the trip was over. And I haven’t come back. Until today. I returned from our trip to one of my busiest work periods in years. And I found myself finishing each day with little time left in the day and next to nothing left in my tank. Then there was a quick trip to Miami to watch a Dolphins game with my best friend from high school before returning home to the craziness at work, which has only just settled down in the last week.
Throughout the five weeks since my last entry, my inner critic has been inexorably ramping up the negative self-talk I quoted above. What I’ve come to learn over the years is that my inner critic is a bad actor. He’s anathema to all the good that I want for myself. He’s the festering vestige of the self-hatred that I felt when I got clean and sober in 1994. And, at least for today, I’ve decided I’m walking over him and moving forward in positivity. Because life is too short for self-criticism, self-doubt, and fear to hold me back from something I want to achieve for myself.
I’m currently lying on a couch in an amazing Airbnb in Boston as my wife and I spend a weekend together celebrating her recent retirement. It’s been a lovely weekend, with a Bruins game, a spa day, and a day of walking and window shopping, with a couple great meals along the way. And I decided this morning to pick up the writing again and wrap up the Trail Tunes series. I launched this Substack as an outlet, a place to develop my writing and share thoughts about music, and ultimately a place for my enjoyment. I won’t allow the darker side of my nature to turn it into a rod for my own back.
I’m excited to have another entry going live today, and my mind now shifts to where Joy In The Journey goes from here. I have dozens of ideas and partially written drafts. I have some ideas for regular segments, particularly around playlists, which I love (I’ve got several entries ready to go already). I’m not exactly sure what the focus will be and what the frequency and cadence will look like. But I’m committed to finding out and am curious to see where I go from here.
If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading! Now onto the music!!
“Don’t Run and Hide” by Ane Brun
Sometimes it’s related to weather, maybe it’s related to how I’m feeling, or a word or a comment that comes up in conversation, but it’s not always clear why a given song will start playing on my internal turntable. This was one of those cases.
Out of the blue, early in the day, it was Ane Brun’s Don’t Run and Hide that came to mind, from her 2020 release After The Great Storm. This album ranked 7th on my 2020 AOTY list. It was the first time I’d heard anything by this Scandinavian artist who’s been releasing music for 20 years now. I’m always a little torn when I “discover” an artist with a large back catalog - excited to delve into their earlier work but a little disappointed I wasn’t able to enjoy their releases as they came out. I’ve barely scratched the surface of her earlier work and I’m looking forward to rectifying that.
“Sun is Shining” by Bob Marley
Another classic from Kaya, one of my favorite Bob Marley albums. Earlier in the week it was Misty Morning, which reflected the weather we woke up to. Thankfully the weather turned for us and Day 4 would be a lovely day of challenging hiking as we walked 14.5 miles from Settle to Chapel-le-Dale, taking in Ingleborough, Yorkshire’s second highest mountain and one of the “Yorkshire Three Peaks” challenge.
“Chanson Sans Issue (Ne Vois Tu Pas)” by Autour du Lucie
Another random song, this time a French pop song by Autour du Lucie from their 1998 release Immobile on the Netwerkk label.
“Peaceful Easy Feeling” by The Eagles
Late in the morning as I climbed a ladder stile over one of the thousands of hand-laid drystone walls in the Yorkshire Dales, Tina remarked how peaceful it was. And that was it, I was off, Peaceful Easy Feeling running through my mind and shortly thereafter coming out of my mouth in those dulcet tones that cause the sheep to first glance over in alarm, and then look away in embarrassment. I’ve never listened to a single Eagles album in its entirety but have certainly enjoyed all their hits. And I’ve enjoyed much of Don Henley’s post-Eagles solo work, particularly his earlier releases. Although 1989’s The End of the Innocence is probably his best solo album (IMHO), The Boys of Summer from his debut solo release will always remain my favorite (indeed it’s one of my favorite songs of all time).
“Zombie” by The Cranberries
At some point in the middle of the afternoon we were talking about the physical, mental, and emotional challenges of walking long distance trails. So often the struggle is a mental one. I coined a motto several years ago: “when it comes to my body, I don’t believe my mind”. My body is capable of so much more than I give it credit for. In all the years of hearing my brain tell me (based on its interpretation of the messages it’s receiving from my body) that “I can’t do this”, or “I’m not sure I can do this” there have only ever been a few times I’ve had to end a walk early. A couple were legitimate physical injuries where continuing on would’ve resulted in long term damage. The other was due to confusion resulting from the onset of cerebral edema during the final ascent of Kilimanjaro. I don’t remember the event clearly as I only “came to” several hours later as we descended to the base camp. But clearly the guide knew what he was doing when he sent me off the mountain as continuing on would have risked death.
But back to the music, the discussion around the challenges of long distance walking being “in our heads” immediately brought to mind Zombie by The Cranberries from their second studio album, 1994’s No Need To Argue. While not one of my favorites, Zombie is a great song, a powerful protest song and quite unlike most of their other recorded work. Those first two Cranberries albums were absolute gold for me, not a bad track to be found anywhere. While there were 2-3 good tracks on 1996’s To The Faithful Departed and 1999’s Bury The Hatchet, their first two albums represent their high-water mark for this casual fan.
“No Work on Sunday” by Tenor Saw
Up on the open moorland, as we approached the ascent to Ingleborough, I saw a crow in the distance. Immediately the song No Work On Sunday by Tenor Saw (which has numerous crow references) came to mind.
This is just one of the many vocal tracks laid down on top of the “Pressure and Slide” rhythm (“riddim”), in this instance from the classic 1986 release from Penthouse Records, What One Riddim Can Do. Don Snowden discusses the phenomenon of recording multiple vocals over the same rhythm track in an October 1992 article in the Los Angeles Times:
Dancehall is often repetitious, but that’s frequently because of the common (and legal in Jamaica) reggae practice of reusing the same rhythm - a hit song will spawn literally dozens of others seeking to ride the identical rhythm track to success.
It seems crazy to me now, but in my early teens, I REALLY didn’t like reggae and the repetition was one of the primary reasons, along with the fact that I didn’t understand what anyone was singing. But then I was introduced to the music of a local Bermudian artist, Daddy Yella, whose debut album included a mix of slower, more traditional (what I referred to as “melodious”) reggae songs along with some dancehall tracks. I fell in love with that record. And then I fell in love with the genre. And for the next half decade dancehall, and then conscious roots reggae, dominated my musical experiences.
“Walking on the Moon” by The Police
As we began the descent from Ingleborough we were faced with a steep descent down strategically placed but quite tall steps, what one might refer to as “giant steps”, which led my internal DJ straight to the Police classic Walking On The Moon from their second studio album 1992’s Regatta de Blanc.
This turned out to be the last trail tune of the day. And it turned out to be one of the last of the entire journey. As I got further into the week of walking, a couple things happened. First, I found myself getting out of my head and getting more into the environment, more tuned in to the sights and sounds around me. And it occurred to me that this is exactly why I love getting out into the great outdoors and I didn’t want to dilute the experience. Second, I began wondering whether these tunes coming to my mind were even authentic. Was it possible that I’d sent an instruction that my subconscious was busy trying to fulfill? Were there more songs than normal bubbling up to the front of my mind? Was it an organic process or were these contrivances?
Ultimately, I decided that I “didn’t want to play this game anymore”. So Trail Tunes, while it was fun for a few days, has now been consigned to the bottom drawer of my Substack ideas. I won’t dismiss the possibility that an occasional Trail Tunes entry will grace the digital pages of Joy In The Journey in the future. But, until then, I have plenty of fun column ideas to play with.
This has been my longest entry, quite possibly way too long, so thanks for sticking with me (if you’re still here).
I’ll be back next week with another installment. Until then, happy listening, and be kind to each other.
Walking on the Moon and Peaceful Easy Feeling are faves of mine. I have tracked a couple to listen to later.
As for writing frequency, I am still figuring that out myself. Be gentle with yourself. You'll figure it out!
First, congrats to your wife on her retirement!
Man, was this relatable! I give that “dark passenger” way too many free rides. There’s gotta be a way to lock ‘em out for good.
On the music side, ‘Sun Is Shining’ might be my favorite Marley song. It reminds me of a dear friend I haven’t seen in way too long and a lazy (and extremely humid) day we spent together years ago.