If you haven’t held the “Friends with the Weather” CD in your hand & studied the liner notes, you probably don’t know that the album is divided into 3 movements, “The Light Awakes,” “From the Darkness,” and “Over the Horizon.” As individual songs began to settle into an arch of an album, a story began to emerge exploring how we make sense of and find some peace, hope, and light within the very human experiences of fear, grief, disillusionment, and injustice. How do we allow the light to awaken? How do we sit & learn from the times of darkness? How do we channel that cocktail of insight & experience into energy & nourishment for the road ahead? Energy we will most definitely need as we strive to be a part of building a brighter future.

For me, the song “Light Awakes” is the heart and soul of the album. A song born from the space of deep loss, sorrow, and grief where each day seems to reveal new layers of heartache. In this space, with heart raw & cracked wide open, vulnerable & unfiltered, the light can sometimes awaken & burst threw...becoming a song of hope & transformation. I suspect many of us can think of a time where light awakened surprisingly, straight out of the darkness. Perhaps a moment of gratitude steeped in a loving memory. Perhaps a young person with an exuberance & love for life that shifts your perspective. Perhaps a stirring and restlessness inside of you to engage the world more deeply.

“The spark remains in the space within...the traveler remains in your soul. So let go.”    -Chris Good