I listened to the Suburbs a week or two ago, right before we moved across the country. I'd lived in Charlottesville for 9 years - grown up in this neighbourhood, etc. Moving is weird - as much as I wanted, there was no big climactic goodbye with all my friends. Most of them didn't even try to hang out, which I was strangely okay with. We'd been packing boxes, and I'd been getting this growing feeling of dread. I've been on big adventures before - moving, travelling, etc. - and there's always a point where it hits you like a wave: "We're leaving my home and going a long way away, this is real". It can be exciting and saddening, and it hadn't hit me yet. I was just holed up in my room with the doors closed, removing any sign that someone lived there since we had to sell the house, and feeling dead inside although I could tell that I didn't really feel the gravity of the situation.

The Suburbs has always been an absolute favorite of mine (one of two albums that I consider perfect, but that's irrelevant.) It's taken me through so much shit, and I feel like I can really relate to it. So after packing the last box I took my bike and rode around my neighborhood one last time. It was sunset. I guess I don't live there anymore, so here's a link.

I pulled out of the driveway and started up the road as "The Suburbs" began. I love biking to albums - some of my favorite 'emotional' memories come from doing so. And man, this was perfect. Around 6pm - pretty cool, but still lush because this is Virginia. Our suburb is on a mountain inside a forest - just these paved roads and cookie-cutter houses with clay and trees all around. Summers back there are quiet - you get the feeling that no one is back here, but nature is still not present in its entirety. Biked up and down Ridgetop here, finally going behind the neighborhood. There's a massive power line thing going through, with a shoddy trail under it. I've biked that thing alone so many times over the summers. Took in the view of downtown from here, then turned away as "Ready To Start" began. Shit, man. This was incredible. I was on the exact same frequency as this song in that moment - those limp one-note strings, the tired but dark drumbeat, and the guitar line really echoed the dead feeling I'd been feeling lately. This part is full of dried clay and bushes - I stopped before it disappeared into the forest and turned around, back onto our road.

"Modern Man" going by those houses again. I love this song so so much. "Rococo" soundtracked the same thing - it's my least favorite on the record if I had to pick one, but still a wonderful song. The street I'm on sflattens out up near the cul de sac, which is where I've been. My house is situated back near the beginning of the road, in the middle of the drop down the hill - as "Empty Room" frantically begins, I thunder past it. The wind in my face, the trees and the houses zipping past as I fall further and further down. This is what I felt I needed - AH, it felt so good, I was living in that moment. As it flattened out, "City With No Children" came on...

[writing more currently. wanted to share with you guys.]