A Decade in the Making.
Ben Ashby
I never intended to have ten years of feeling jaded. It just kinda happened. I can pin point all the moments the excitement for living faded and died. I can see it in the photos. I can see it in my eyes. For a solid decade I didn’t feel like putting pen to paper, or typing a story or really doing much of anything. I felt like I was in a dormancy and my prayer was that one day my love for Americana, small businesses, and slow living would return…but for a while I needed time away.
For the past ten years FOLK has in many ways been resting, knowing that when the time was right it would return, and I would return with voice and passion. Older and wiser and with a whole lot of life experience to authenticate the stories, the narratives, and the lifestyle that we share.
For a while I could feel my love returning, but I knew it was something I couldn’t force or fake or push to try to get to return quicker. When the time was right, my voice, drive, and love would return. That has happened. A few weeks ago I graduated college after fourteen years. It was like a light switch was flipped in my soul. It is hard to describe, but for over a decade I simply wanted to finish college, but the timing wasn’t right. In December I graduated and in that moment it felt like it was then time to let FOLK breathe and return to life. For years I’ve gone through the motions, learning endless lessons from successes and a few failures. Each noted and lessons learned to carry into the future. I know what 2023 will bring here at FOLK and I cannot wait. I know I should make a list here of teasers for what is to come, but I won’t, cause that only invites failure…instead I will take one day and one task at a time. A collection of work will be built with each passing day in the year, things I’ve longed to do for the past decade.
It is funny how much I’ve watched others in the past decade. Friends have built vast businesses and viral personalities. I simply sat and tended my garden. I watered and weeded and watched my garden patiently. I plugged away at my little house know that is what fed me and grew me and would eventually relight my passion for Americana and for FOLK.
It is hard for me to put into words how I felt for that decade, but basically it was…why try, why bother to put anything into words, it would just go out into space and never do good or never get read. I believed that to my core. I just felt totally apathetic about everything and I knew that wasn’t my true nature, but for those years it is how I felt. I felt as if anything I did would end up ruined, so why try at all.
In the past few months though I think I felt a little light inside me saying, you know what you’re doing, and it is time. I could no longer fight or argue with my friends when they’d tell me I was an expert on Americana or I knew far more about life than I let on. It was the opposite of fake it til you make it…it was be the silent person in the corner and do nothing.
At this point I am rambling, but it is sorta cathartic for someone that has tried to write for years but simply couldn’t A friend told me I was one of the most fearless people she knows. I laughed when she said it. I thought if she only could hear the self conscious voices in my head. For now though those voices have taken a seat. The garden has grown and is ready to share.
In the past week I have gone through our complete archives. Every story. Every photo. Every trip. I have poured over past lessons and conversations. I’ve pondered meetings and encounters and advice I was given both good and misguided. I’ve looked at where I was at 21 and who I was back then. I’ve looked at who I’ve grown into. I could write volumes on the lessons of everything I’ve seen. I could write lessons on everything I learned from just living this life, but for now….
Lets Go!