Thanks, Matthew.

I feel like I'm losing for money
I feel like I'm losing for free
I feel older than the dead angel on my shoulder claims to be

I feel like we're drinking and driving
I feel like we're running into walls
I feel like swimming in your apathy as a kind of parody
For miles and miles, miles

I feel like somebody's missing
I feel like somebody's missing
I think somebody's missing

Matthew Good lives near Lochlan's mother. I ran into him once. We were both walking our dogs. We're the same age. I wanted to grab his sleeve as he passed and he stared at me waiting to see whether I recognized him or not. His gaze was so intense I was staring back nonetheless and since this was almost five years ago I wanted to tell him that I spent the winter previous sitting in the car in the garage with the motor running listening to his songs while tears ran down my face but I don't suppose that's the sort of thing anyone who writes music wants to hear. Even though it wouldn't have gone like you think. It would have gone more like this:

Matthew, could I have a moment of your time?

Of course. Of course. Cute dog.

Thanks! Yours is too. She a Burmese mountain dog?

No, just a mutt (we laugh and the stranger-ice breaks, plunging us into sudden tepid familiarity).

I wanted to thank you for your songwriting. Honestly there were days when your music was the only thing I could feel.

Tell me about it.

I'm a widow twice over. Sometimes it's hard to feel at all anymore and sometimes I feel everything and you have many songs that just seem to reach inside and squeeze my heart in a hug, but a crushing hug that makes my heart bleed at the same time. Like it feels better even as it hurts.

Maybe you should be the one writing songs. I'm sorry for your sadness but I'm glad if I could help somehow. Is it getting better? Are you alright?

Sometimes. I won't keep you from your walk but I've awfully glad I got a chance to meet you and thank you in person.

I'm glad I got to meet you too.

He gives me a mega-awkward but very tight hug without anything bleeding except for my mind and then we walk in opposite directions. I look back at the end of the block and he's standing on the corner watching me. I turn and tuck my head down, trying to carry my composure before it falls out onto the sidewalk and when I look back on the next block he is gone.

I should have said something.

(But at the same time interrupting everyone else's life so they can spend a moment feeling bad isn't what I set out to be. These things I am learning, only some of them seem like things I already know.)