Emily Hurd

One of those most inspiring people I know personally is a man named Gerald Dowd.  Gerald is not only an amazing songwriter and guitarist, but also a drummer that has played in dozens of bands, including mine.

On November 1st, he's going to be playing with 14 bands in 12 hours.  All the proceeds from the show go to Beyond Hunger, an organization in Oak Park, Illinois that helps people with food insecurities.  He calls it “Day of the Dowd.”  

I think he may be actually crazy.  But he gets things done with what he's got. And I've never seen him turn down an opportunity to help.

Imagine if the whole world were like that.

Reader, this is yet another reminder: we don't need money, possessions, or connections to make a difference.  Right now, we're sitting on skills and resources that we can use to make a positive impact on people and the planet.  Every passing day reminds me that this is truly all we're here for: to be good to each other.  

If you're free, my set is for Day of the Dowd is at 12:30 pm, and more details can be found here.  Let's get out there nourish the people. See you next Monday. -Em

I think a lot.  Over-thinking has always been my superpower and also my weakness, and I don’t usually know that I’ve maxxed out my brain until something alarming happens. 

Like last Wednesday, when I forgot to send my kids to school with lunches, and I left my phone in three public bathrooms in one day. 

That was my cue.

I just put work aside for the weekend and spent 2 days playing outside at a lake with my family.  And I’m starting to feel like myself again. Yesterday, I noticed crawfish crawling on beach stones and tree frogs wisely camouflaged to look like fallen oak leaves and kids trying to skip rocks for the first time. And I was filled with hope and focus. Sometimes you just need to be present to feel good again.

Reader, when is the last time you’ve made time to play a game?  Or an instrument?  Or played with a dog or a kid or even a game of solitaire?  Because I swear: playtime—though it seems trivial—is therapeutic and necessary, especially in the hardest of times.  I’d been working so hard on upcoming gigs and songwriting and my restaurant’s winter market that I’d lost track of fun.  This seems to be a cyclical issue for me, and here I am once again to remind you: light-heartedness is vital. 

Let’s get out there and do some healthy playing this week and watch it improve the quality of our lives. I’ll see you next Monday. -Em

The air is cold tonight, and the green leaves in our forest are changing into that one-of-a-kind dijon mustard color. I’m listening to the coyotes yip in the neighbor’s soy field while Nina Simone croons “Mr Bojangles” from my record player. I'm drinking cherry kijafa out of a tiny cordial cup that a friend found for me at a thrift store and is now one of my most prized possessions.

I feel infinitely lucky for these gifts.

It's too beautiful to be writing a long blog, so I'm going to head outside and look up.  Because if there's anything that heals me these days, it's the reminder that we're on a giant ball spinning its way through space, and the point of our time on it is to be good to the planet, ourselves, and each other. 

Reader, I don't know if it helps to hear, but as hard as these times are, we are so far from without hope.  Every little thoughtful act adds up.  Let's be kind this week.  Help a stranger.  Give a compliment.   Give a break to someone who messed up.  Most importantly, give a break to yourself if you messed up. And if you’re still feeling a bit lost, look up and get some perspective. I'll see you next Monday. -Em

P.S. My next show is October 30th in my hometown of Rockford, and my friend Breanda designed a poster.  I'd love to see you there. 
 

Seems to me that inspiration strikes at inconvenient times.  It’s almost as if the muses are asking us to struggle while we choose between art and our plans. 

Likewise, inspiration rarely strikes when there’s ample time.  If I have a week devoted to songwriting, I’m uninspired for days.  But when I only have a few minutes, the piano calls to me from a deep place that feels almost urgent.

And I’m learning this happens with more than just music.  Today I had a full list of things that needed to get done and little time to do it all.  But when I was leaving the house this morning, I saw giant puffball mushrooms our woods. 

And when mushrooms are popping, you have to act fast. 

So with a dozen other things to do, I stopped everything, harvested and cleaned the puffballs, and made myself a better breakfast than the granola bar I was going to scarf down on the way to my restaurant.

You don’t often get second chances when it comes to inspiration.

Reader, I think staying inspired all the time is unrealistic.  So when you feel that pull to create, go to it.  Strike while the artistic iron is hot. Show the muses you choose to prioritize them. Some things are just too special to pass up.

Wishing you a week of whimsical priorities, and I’ll see you next Monday. -Em

When I first started songwriting, the lyrics came first, melody second.  Lyrics were my forte. I remember being out at bars in Chicago, and if anyone said a word that triggered an idea, I’d scribble it out on a napkin then hightail it home to start writing.

Those napkin songs are dear to my heart. Words came so quickly to me then.

For the last few years, the melody has come first. I feel haunted by melodies lately.  I’ve had one tune in my head for a few weeks now, and I just can’t seem to find its lyrics. I think I'm so upset by all that's happening in the world that I almost can't focus on one feeling to express it.  I’ve done everything I know how to do to fill in the words. 

But I keep coming up dry. So today I did what people do when they get stuck.

Learn something new.

This morning, I bought a couple books and signed up for a poetry class.  Because even though I’m good at writing lyrics, I can get better.  I hope the class unlocks another level of writing for me.

Reader, I think sometimes we get a lazy with our god-given talents, assuming that our strengths will always be strong. But I think they need upkeep. Everything that we love—our friends, our families, our passions—they all need our attention in one way or another. Let’s keep our energy going towards the people and causes we love most this week, and I’ll see you next Monday. -Em

I’m writing somewhere just above Iceland.  The last week was a blur.  It started in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan with my restaurant staff, then I drove directly to O’Hare and flew to Sweden for a couple days, and now I’m on my way back home…reflecting.

My mom and I have had this trip to Sweden planned for years.  Armed with old photos and postcards, our plan was simple: to walk the stomping grounds of my grandma Ruth, who moved to the United States from Sweden as a teenager. She came from a small town called Gamleby, and we wanted to see where we came from, to feel what she must have felt like living there, and to connect to our roots.

We arrived at her little town in the morning in the mist.  It was sobering. Have you ever gone back to look at somewhere you lived and it made you sad because you realized it held no meaning for you anymore? That’s how I felt in Gamleby. The decline of the city felt like the decline in parts of Illinois.  Boarded up homes, vacant warehouses, businesses closed for good. We found my grandma’s old house, and the woman who lived there was kind enough to let us take a picture there.  The view from the house is no longer of the water, but of the fenced off condemned cement silo on the beach.

We found the hill she loved to climb (she called it “the ant hill”), and couldn’t get far because the city put a water tower there. We went to the town square, and it was dead; we didn’t see a soul. Then we found her old favorite swimming hole.  The grounds were in disrepair, and the once wild path to the beach was like a construction equipment graveyard.  Still, we took pictures together at every stop, imagining what it would have felt like to grow up in that tiny village in the early 1900’s.

And then we left.  Because whatever we hoped to find, it wasn’t there.

But I got 3 incredibly rare days with my mother.  And we bumped into a couple lovely strangers and found an incredible scotch bar in Stockholm and had long conversations with each other over breakfast and saw a family of moose.  And there were highlights. I’ll remember walking the troll forest with her and listening to old jazz music while taking the backroad to Västervik along the Baltic Sea. I’ll remember marveling at the purple flowers and moss and mushrooms that housed giant snails.

In short, I’ll remember my time with her.

Reader, places are just places.  We can go almost anywhere and marvel all we want.  For me, it’s our relationships with each other that make life worth living. I’m very grateful to have a restaurant family and a mother that wanted to take adventures with me this week, and I’m grateful to have a family to come home to.  In the end, I don’t think any place or any adventure will ever hold more meaning than the people in my life.  Stomping grounds are just grounds someone stomped.  While we can, best get out there and do our own stomping.  See you next Monday. -Em

Humans are complicated.  We’re all so different.  We have different tastes and desires and beliefs.  But we also crave acceptance for who we are.  We want to belong to a community, to find our fellow people. And that makes sense: I think we find so much purpose in filling our role in a group. It’s nice to be a part of something.

I’ve found my community with my fellow musicians.  But I’ve also found them in my restaurant team.  Since 2021, I’ve organized something called “staffcation” for all the people that work at my place, The Norwegian.  This year, me and my 26 buddies are going to the Upper Peninsula for hiking, white water kayaking, happy hour bingo, and Lake Superior shore dinners that we’re calling “Bayou on The Beach.” 

I’ve never made gumbo on an open fire.  I’m pretty damn excited.

Reader, I won’t be blogging next week while I’m off with my team.  But I wanted to say how good it feels to work for a group, not just myself. I used to worry that I was people-pleasing when I organized these events, but now I see it as much deeper.  Bringing people together feeds my soul in a deep, indescribable way.  There are certain kinds of happiness that can only be felt collectively.  The joy I feel when I accomplish something with my team truly overflows my heart and turns me into a ball of mushy gratitude.

Wishing you this kind of happiness over the next few weeks.  I’ll see you in a couple weeks. -Em 

I took my daughter out of school on Friday to see Willie Nelson at Alpine Valley.  Education comes in all forms, right?

Willie Nelson is one of my earliest and most positive living role models. I’ve seen him several times. He’s 93 years-old today.  He doesn’t need to play for money anymore. And he surely doesn’t need to play for fame. 

But it’s clear: he needs to play for himself. 

Willie “retired” several decades ago, but I guess it didn’t stick.  And I’m glad for our sakes that it didn’t. Willie’s voice and perspective have always been uniquely his own, and his songs still resonate with me. To this day, I can’t make it through “Always On My Mind” without getting misty-eyed.

Reader, my favorite part about Willie is how he made music that felt true to him, and he found his place on the planet by following his calling. He worked with what he had (rumor has it that he wrote “On The Road Again” on the back of a barf bag), and he let his heart lead the way.  He inspires me to keep going at all costs, and to break the rules a little, for art-sake. Wishing you a heart-centered scrappy week, and I’ll see you next Monday. -Em

On Wednesday, a friend called and asked if the band and I could fill in for the opener at a festival in my hometown.  I hesitated.  We’d only practiced together once. I didn’t think we were ready.   I took a long pause.

Then said yes.  We played downtown on Saturday and had a blast. It felt great singing on a big stage with a nice sound system and even nicer people.

So I guess we were ready after all.

Reader, I’m keeping it short tonight because—to be honest—the state of rage in our country is weighing on me. But I wanted to share an optimistic moral of my week: we are readier than we think we are.  We are more poised than we think we are.  And we sure as hell are more deserving of love than we think we are. Say yes to joy this week, and I’ll see you next Monday. -Em 

In the studio with John Abbey on Thursday, I played and recorded the last song on my album.  It’s just the piano and me. Listening back, there were a few mistakes, but it felt real.  Through the years of making albums together, John and I have learned to ask ourselves: 

Do we want this to sound good, or do we want to believe it?

Because you can’t have both. 

I don’t want my songs to sound just “nice” anymore.  I want to believe the stories and the feelings in the tune.  And because raw vocals have always hit me harder, we left the cracks and pops and flubs. 

Art imitates life. And life isn’t nice. Life is flubs.

I think a lot about what fills me with emotion.  And it’s often when imperfection is involved.   I love when my kids misspell words on cards. I used to love hearing my grandma sing off-key in church. I love drinking from my chipped coffee mug, and I love all the “mistakes” my kitchen crew makes at the restaurant: that’s when they come up with their most genius ideas.

 (Side note: my restaurant served something called “fish dogs” for brunch this week, and I love my chefs for that stroke of genius, born from a flub.)

Reader, my album is done, imperfections and all.  It was an unclimactic ending.  Now I just need to get it mastered, and then I’ll be ready to share it. I hope it moves you the way it moved me to make it, and I wish you a week of embracing the mistakes in your life that give it meaning, depth, interest, and hilarity.  Let's not take ourselves too seriously out there. See you next Monday. -Em