The album I cannot write yet

There is an album waiting for me that I am not ready to make. I think about it almost every day. I have a sense of its shape, its mood, the way it should open and the way it should end. I do not have the songs.

For a long time that frustrated me. I would try to force a track in its direction and end up writing something honest but unrelated. Now I take that as good news. The album is patient. It is happy to be older than the songs it will eventually contain.

I am gathering, instead of writing. I am collecting feelings, places, conversations and small embarrassments that the album will need. When the songs finally arrive, I want them to feel like they have been waiting for years. Maybe that is just how albums get made.