As our phones and social media now capture a relentless stream of images from our lives, I couldn’t help but notice that 10 years ago, when Joel and I stopped making music and touring and settled down to have a home and kids, the photos I took of my life changed in a distinct way. Suddenly my photos were fully lit. They were taken in broad daylight, in brightly lit rooms, in large open spaces with everything in plain view. The shadows and night, dark corners and streaky smears of nighttime lights had vanished nearly completely.
What had happened? Well, one thing is that I was making a distinct effort to be more wholesome, I was a mother now, after all. And what was the night to me? It was when I nursed and changed and lulled my babies and tried desperately for a few hours of sleep. Not romantic, not mysterious, just routine, exhausting, endless.
But did the night just lose it’s potential for mystery and romance, or had I turned away from it in some further way? As I comb through photos from our touring days, I see the darkness again, my darkness, and I realize I did run from it, looking for somewhere brighter, safer, more approved.
I once thought there was a place I could go that wasn’t dark and shadowy; full of the unknown and pain. So, I tried to remake myself, purify myself, take on a new name, a new life, a new identity. To live in the daytime as if the night didn’t exist. But the unknown turned out to be there too, as much as those there pretended it to be free of such an unthinkable scourge. So now I revisit the shadows. But perhaps they weren’t so bad after all. As anyone who has ventured knows, the unknown contains pleasure as well as terror.
