"You can control your rice, not your life”

My single "Fidgeting" is out today!

Hello Rabbit Hole Fam,

I normally send out this email in the morning, but my day had other plans. Oh well. At least I just had a delicious apple. I also figured out that if you add a little bit of butter, chicken broth, and salt to white rice it tastes REAL good. As my twice-removed great grandpa always used to say, “you can control your rice, not your life.¹*”

As of this morning at 12 AM, “Fidgeting”, my latest single², is out now and you can listen to it anywhere you listen to music.

This song is a special one to me.

I can remember recording it in the first house my wife and I lived together in after we got married. I was a spring day and I was outside recording the demo track. I nailed the guitar on the first take and when I listened back, I loved hearing all the birds as part of the song. It felt like it brought a wistful, calmness to it, so I kept it.

This is another song that came out of my angst of that era of my life. I was locked in a job that came with a house, which sounds good until the job ends, which it was. Ending, I mean. My “creative career” wasn’t really working. I couldn’t find a different job. We didn’t know where we were gonna live and things were just…hard. However, unlike Collections³, the last single, this one was hopeful, which I really appreciate listening back on it.

I swear, I’m not going crazy. No, I’m just fidgeting.

I know I’m not going to stay here, no, I’m just waiting

For the day the grey will fade and all I do is not a waste

When my skills are put to use and I don’t need the rule book

When my water’s turned to wine, when I can sleep at night

When hope turns to sight, and the words they read are the words I write

If I’m honest, I still want what’s described in these words, and this says more about me than it does my circumstances. My life is totally different and if you woulda told me back then what I’ve accomplished now I would’ve been blown away. Yet…here I am still waiting. And, Rabbit Hole fam, the “why” of this has been my biggest personal journey the last year or so.

I’ve been realizing more and more that there are parts of me that are constantly colliding, and at tension with, reality. I’m sure this is a strength and a weakness, however, I’m not quite sure yet how it’s a strength. Most often it just feels like an exhausting part of me to constantly have to manage. There are so many times where I feel like I’m yearning for something, and I THINK I know what it is, but when I truly ask myself, “what do I want?” I don’t actually know. I have to remind myself constantly that I am thankful and that what I want changes depending on my mood or current inspiration. I can control my thankfulness, not my life.

If you think of it, send my wife Trader Joe’s dark chocolate peanut butter cups and good vibes for having to deal with this mess.

This song feels like it captures that mysterious part of me colliding with reality well. It’s not on the hopelessly on the nose like Collections. It’s whistful, dreamy, but also honest. And then you have the birds in the background. The birds who know way better than I do that God holds tomorrow. Maybe that’s why I left them in. As a counter-point to my fidgeting.

I’d love it if you listened to Fidgeting on Spotify. Save it to your playlists. Share it. Use it as a sound in your reels and TikToks. Share it and all that other stuff people ask you to do all the time. If nothing else, just call your Mom and tell her I came out with a new song because you probably need to call her anyway.

Thanks for your support after all these years,
Dave

1. I literally came up with this on the spot. I don’t even know if you can have a twice removed grandparent.

2. **PSA, if you go to Spotify and see that Fidgeting is from 2015, and go “why is that from 10 years ago, read this story about what I’m doing and where all this music is coming from. These songs are old, but they are new to you because I’m only just now releasing them.

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