Watershed
https://thewaywardpuritans.bandcamp.com/track/watershed
Once in a while, I have the pleasure of working with collaborators to write, arrange and record songs — ‘The Wayward Puritans’ is a sort of ‘band name’ for those projects, and Watershed is one such song…
I wrote ‘Watershed’ around this time last year — in the middle of the first Covid-19 lockdown. That was a really difficult time for my family. My mother-in-law, my children’s granny, had died quite suddenly in December 2019, and within a few months we had learned that my father-in-law, my children’s grandpa, was terminally ill. He died in July 2020. They were both very elderly (89 and 92), but they had always been such a vibrant and valued presence in our lives that their passing felt, and still sometimes feels, shocking.
When I wrote Watershed, in April-May 2020, we were still in the throes of the first loss and — in a sense — we were preparing for, or being prepared for, the second. We were also trying our best to care for grandpa, but the pandemic wasn’t helping, obviously. There were spells we were there with him every day, in their flat, trying to support him to stay at home. There were two spells when he was in hospital, and he spent his last few weeks in a hospice. At times, we weren't allowed to visit at all; at other times, we were allowed in to the hospital because they thought his death was imminent (months before his passing, as it turned out). Towards the end, we were able to visit the hospice but had to stand outside while his bed was wheeled to the door, so we could exchange a few words.
‘Watershed’ isn’t a considered reflection on the associated processes of caring, of loss and of grieving. Rather, I think writing it was a way of processing and expressing some of the emotions involved as it happened. Reading them now, the words seem fragmentary and unfinished , but maybe that’s how it is with love and loss and grief? In fact, the words are literal fragments from a text conversation with a wise friend; someone better acquainted with grief than me. They also reflect the preserved fragments of life that we see in old photographs, as we face the inevitable task of sorting through the belongings of people who have died.
The song’s title came from another photograph. In lockdown, like most other people, I had been walking around my neighbourhood a lot more than before — and paying more attention to what was around me. At one point, I became fascinated by the ironwork built into our streets. I took a picture of drain cover with the word ‘Watershed’ forged into it. That picture features on the song’s artwork (accessible via the link above).
I looked the word up and, literally speaking, in hydrology, a ‘watershed’ is a place where two adjacent river systems meet, though the term also refers to areas of land where surface water converges before flowing into a river, a bay or any other body of water. Of course, in its more common, figurative use, ‘watershed’ is a moment of significant change or transformation.
All those meanings seemed to fit the song. The two grandparents are two rivers whose lives flowed into ours; what flowed to them and through them, now flows through us. Their loss transforms our family. It makes my generation the eldest. That transforms us in strange and difficult ways — we are made orphans at the same time as we are made the custodians of the family (not just of our own children).
This song was further developed and recorded between May and October 2020, under ‘lockdown’ conditions, with my talented friends (Graeme McKerracher, Jamie Savage, Graeme Smillie and Alison Urie) imagining and arranging their contributions, all mediated (like everything else) by Zoom. From inception to completion, the only (socially-distanced) physical meeting amongst the contributors took place when Fergus, Alison and Jamie met to arrange and record the vocals.
The convergence or transformation of the parts into the whole – i.e. the track’s own 'watershed' -- therefore owes even more than usual to Jamie, who mixed and mastered it.
The link at the top of the post will take you to the track on Bandcamp.
lyrics
I have a feeling for something I saw before.
I think of a picture left in a suitcase:
Them carefree, laughing
To breathe: I’ve missed this simplicity so long
It wasn't so bad, there were always songs
Mostly melancholy.
The ache of home, it was never, a place that made me feel.
It won't linger, it’s no bad thing, they are not hurting
We see them still, in that picture
Happy, carefree, laughing
The ache of home, it was never, a place that made me feel.
credits
released October 9, 2020
Words, initial music and vocals by Fergus McNeill
Guitar parts arranged and performed by Graeme McKerracher
Bass, keyboards and drum machine arranged and performed by Graeme Smillie
Backing vocals arranged and performed by Alison Urie
Vocals recorded and track mixed and mastered by Jamie Savage
(c) Fergus McNeill 2020