track 11: a couple minutes - olivia dean

To start…

I can’t tell you how happy that I am that people are finally discovering the beauty of Olivia Dean. Olivia Dean first found me during my travels abroad starting with her track “Be My Own Boyfriend”. You can only imagine how much that song meant to me in a time that was so much about discovering and healing. It truly was a personal anthem for me. That track then lead me to discover “Dive”…”Ok Love You Bye”…”The Hardest Part”…”Echo”…”Reason to Stay”…and so on and so forth.

To me — Olivia Dean deserves to put at the same regard as Cleo Sol, Lauryn Hill, Erykah Badu for those of us that connect to music as a ways of healing. Her smooth voice, the artistry in her lyrics, the deep sound of the background brass, and not to mention her magnetic stage presence — I mean, if you are not a fan, I would like to go ahead and say that your music taste is shit. (respectfully.)

All praise aside, she just released her Colors version for “A Couple Minutes” today—a song that immediately got added to my library on that first round of her newly released album, The Art of Loving. It’s one of those songs that brings you back to a particular person, maybe a specific time and place. It’s just so…fitting in so many ways.

Fitting because… 

I met with my ex-fiancé last week. It’s been over 3 years since we saw each other last, 5 years since we’ve broken up. I know that people would never understand why I would want to keep this relationship intact after all of these years, and I think I’ve come to peace with knowing that I don’t have to make people understand.

This is something that has always been my decision because the truth is that I never once thought that he was a bad person (despite the many things I may have said throughout my time of grieving). We all have our things that we need to grow through, and the reality was that at the time, we had particular needs that were not being met through one another. It truly was no one’s fault. As they say…Shit happens. Life happens.

The reason I write this is because I realize that this relationship dynamic has seen me through so much. He bared witness through my real and tangible growth into this thing we call “adulthood”. This relationship found me in my early 20s as a complete noob in the city of Los Angeles — lost, confused, not really knowing where I fit into it all as the only transplant who wasn’t there chasing a dream (or so it felt).

It was there as I determined who I was outside of the circle of friends and family that had known me up until that point in my life. It helped shape my love for live music, it exposed me to the world of travel, witnessed the immense love that grew for my niece and nephew and my identity as an Aunt, saw me through bad jobs and bad bosses, held my hand through the uncertainty of a pandemic.

And, it also watched me as I packed 6 and a half years of my life up and venture out into the beginning of my 30s—even stood by me in the transition phase as I tried to make sense of it all—the anger, the grief, the brief periods of disdain.

And in the midst of this new solo chapter, I created space for forgiveness and compassion. I processed and reflected. I went through the motions. I learned to take accountability. I slowly outgrew the victim mentality mindset and found the silver lining in it all. I became grateful for the experience because I learned to love who I had become, which would have never came about had I not gone through this.

Full circle moment —

we met last week while he was here in Chicago for a conference. And while so much in our lives have changed, so much between us hadn’t changed at all. As someone who has been out of the relationship game for quite some time, there’s something to be said about the comfort in being seen by someone — the ease and flow in conversation when someone understands all of the dynamics in your life, whether it be family, friends, work, or hobbies. The intimacy in recognizing their body language—knowing that they’re feeling anxious because a loud band is playing behind them, or the sadness in their voice while rehashing their last relationship, the tone of uncertainty in creating a new life in a new city, the silent agreement that we both think this bottle of wine is shit, or even comfortably allowing the silent moments to just be while mentally noting that “this is nice.”

At the end of the night, he walked me to the train. I gave him a subtle kiss on the cheek as we parted ways, as he sent me off with a very familiar light tap on the butt. I went home that night feeling nothing but love for this man, while simultaneously feeling closure for this particular chapter between us.

To end it off, I wanted to requote something he said as we rehashed what our relationship was like,

“we just hung out and got along” [[shrugs]]

— and honestly, couldn’t have said it any better myself.

Thank you for letting me love you and then hate you, but then creating space for me to forgive you and love you again— this time in such a different way. Back then, I selfishly loved you based on who I wanted you to be, and this time around I get to love you as you are—strengths, flaws, and all.