Carrie & Lowell

The picture this album brings to mind is of someone at home at the end of summer, going through old photos.

The people in the photos are dressed lightly, the sun is good, and probably nothing important was happening when they were taken. Someone isn’t looking at the camera. Someone is smiling a little strangely. If they were still around, you might not look at these photos twice. But now you wonder: when was this taken? Where did everyone go afterwards that day? Why weren’t a few more taken at the time?

It seems he no longer has the strength to tell it all over again, but he still wants to.

Carrie is his mother and Lowell is his stepfather. His mother was absent for much of his childhood, and the few summers they spent together in Oregon were some of the only time they had. Later, his mother died.

After I learned this, I started to feel that the longing on this album is hard to deal with.

If someone was always good to you, at least you know what you are missing. You can remember the meals she cooked, her way of talking, the questions she asked every day that you found annoying. But what if she wasn’t there while you grew up? What if thinking of her also means thinking of the child who was left behind?

You still miss her. You might even feel wronged for missing her this much.

In Death with Dignity, he talks about forgiving his mother very early on. But I always felt that the songs after it still have a lot left unsaid. Forgiveness can be spoken out loud one day, but the questions left over from childhood don’t disappear with it. Why didn’t you come? Why do other people have this and I don’t? I’m already grown up, so why am I still thinking about this?

In Should Have Known Better there is a childhood memory of being left behind by his mother at a video store. Details like this made it hard for me to keep treating it as just a nice-sounding song. For an adult, it may be something that happened a long time ago. For the child at the time, probably all he could do was wait.

And the regret in the title is so familiar. People seem to easily end up blaming themselves for things they were powerless to change. If only I had known, if only I had grown up sooner, but what was a child supposed to have known in advance?

When the keyboard lights up in the second half of this song, I breathe a little easier. He starts to sing about the newborn child in the family, and his attention finally leaves the place that has kept him trapped. Hearing this, I’m willing to believe he really was happy for a little while. Even if sadness comes after, that little while counts.

I really like Eugene, and I even feel it hurts more than the songs on the album that talk about death directly.

It writes about the smell of lemons, learning to swim, and small things from childhood that haven’t been forgotten. The guitar is clear and the melody is warm, and you could almost take it as ordinary nostalgia.

But he keeps wanting to get closer.

He wanted to get closer when he was little, and he still does as a grown-up. What hurts me about this is that he isn’t really asking for much. He doesn’t ask anyone to make it up to him, and he doesn’t ask for the past to be done over. He just wants to be next to that person. And even that small request could no longer be met.

Some memories weren’t even happy at the time. Maybe it was just going out together, sitting together for a while, the other person saying something offhand. After the person is gone, you find that these are the only things you have to think over again and again.

After Eugene comes Fourth of July. A moment ago it was still summer, still a small child, and the next song it is time to say goodbye.

I’m not very willing to treat Fourth of July as a song for crying hard to. What it gives me is closer to the feeling after crying, when a person is already tired but still has some things they have to keep thinking about.

The keyboard repeats over and over, and the mother and child talk to each other in the song. They call each other by very affectionate names. Hearing those names, you suddenly realize that even in a complicated family there can be very tender moments. But those moments can’t answer every question. Someone loving you and hurting you can both be true at the same time.

We’re all gonna die.

I don’t know whether this line can comfort anyone. The first time I heard it, it was cold, and I almost wondered why it had to be said right now. But as I kept listening, I felt that maybe he had nothing else to say. No sentence could make his mother stay, and no sentence could make up for the years they missed.

So all he can do is keep calling to her, keep talking to her.

As long as the song hasn’t ended, the conversation can go on a little longer.

After Fourth of July there is still nearly half the album left, because after the goodbye, the living still have many days to get through.

The thoughts in The Only Thing are already very dangerous. He thinks about hurting himself, and he is also held by certain scenes in nature. Its melody, strangely, is beautiful, and when the voices stack up there is even a feeling of being gently held up. But if you listen closely to the words, you know this person has not become safe because of it.

I like that it doesn’t write about staying alive as something certain. Sometimes what can make a person stop for the moment really is very small, so small you’re embarrassed to tell anyone. You can’t promise how tomorrow will be, you just still want to look one more time right now.

This album also has some parts that aren’t so easy to sympathize with. All of Me Wants All of You has desire, wanting something from another person, and the awkwardness of two people not looking in the same direction at all. By No Shade in the Shadow of the Cross, alcohol, the body and out-of-control thoughts are all crowded together, and it is uncomfortable to listen to.

But I think these songs should stay here.

When people are sad, they also do things they regret, they try to ask more from others, they keep going even when they know it’s no use. You can’t demand that he look clean even while falling apart just because he is losing his mother.

The intimacy in John My Beloved gives me the same feeling. He wants to be loved but has no confidence in himself; he moves toward a person, and he also turns to faith for help. I don’t think every line has to be sorted out as to who it is addressed to. Listening here, what is clearer is that he keeps speaking, that he keeps hoping something will answer him.

The guitar, keyboard and voices on the album, most of the time, don’t make much noise. After listening for a long time, a few songs do start to sound alike. But I also slowly got used to this volume. By the end, I actually didn’t want a grand passage to appear and announce for him that everything is finally over.

When Blue Bucket of Gold ends, the singing slowly gives way to drawn-out sounds. That part doesn’t explain anything more, and I don’t really want to explain it either.

I didn’t hear a person who had finally figured it all out in Carrie & Lowell. His mother still left, and what happened in his childhood still happened. He has forgiven some things, and he is still allowed to be sad about them.

If I had to say what this album made me remember, it would probably be that a person can grow up for this long and still want their mom to look at them.

Having come to understand so much, having passed so many years, having written so many songs.

Still wanting to.