An album of original music by T.C. Elliott
Listen or download the album at bandcamp or listen on most streaming services.
How do you tell your mother goodbye? Will I ever stop feeling guilty? How can I
learn to live with regret? I’m not sure I’ll ever have the answers to these questions and
all of the others I’ve asked myself in the past three and a half years.
My mother passed on April 22, 2021 after a long battle with a form of leukemia
and an even longer battle with fibromyalgia while at the same time she suffered with
several other illnesses including macular degeneration, back pain and cognitive
impairment. In October of 2020 she fell and was found in a pool of her own blood. She
was rushed to the hospital with a brain injury from which she never fully recovered.
Between her fall and her passing, she was in several assisted living facilities, in
the hospital multiple times and, for a brief stay, lived with my wife and I. At times she
was quarantined because of the COVID pandemic. This was especially traumatic for her
because her brain injury kept her from being fully aware of what was going on. Many
times she swore she was locked in the basement of the rehabilitation facility or that she
talked to people she hadn’t seen in nearly fifty years. You could see the confusion on her
face when she was confronted with a blue sky that could be seen outside her window
while she was trying to convince me to help her escape the basement.
It’s fair to say my mother was troubled. It’s also fair to say she had a beautiful
soul. She believed in angels and she confided in me more than once that she felt she was
a little girl trapped in an aging woman’s body. There is no doubt that she loved me. She
did not live an easy life but she knew she had it better than it could have been. I’m only
sorry I couldn’t have made it better for her than I did.
This album was primarily written in the time between her fall and her passing.
It’s a reflection of both her struggle and mine through this difficult time. Most of the
songs are polished versions of the original (demo) recordings. At least, as polished as I
could manage without losing the feeling of the time. I feel this is a sort of snapshot, a
musical remembrance. Somehow, having a rough around the edges album as a sort of
tribute to that time seems appropriate. Thank you for listening.