Dear Friend,

It feels like ages have past since I last wrote here (not to be dramatic). I now live in a new state, a new home, and experience a completely different culture and environment. I moved to the Nashville area last month and it feels strange that I am finally and actually HERE.

With the distance comes a greater ache for family…I knew it would be this way, but I feel deeply the fact that we’re spread across the country and I long for the time we can be together again.

writing the song:

August’s single is for my younger sister, Adlai. I love the making of this song because we started it together. One evening this summer, we were in my room together and I started messing around with the guitar melody that you hear in this song. Adlai started singing something along to it, and I loved it so much I had to record it on voice memos—where I record everything I don’t want to forget.

“This is going to be your song,” I told her. If you don’t already know, I’m writing each person in my family a song and collecting them all in an album one day. I’m writing them as they come, so she’s only the second one I’ve released a song for yet.

Later that evening, the melody still hadn’t left me, so I started on the lyrics. It wasn’t until the end of July that I finished them—I couldn’t quite find the right words for what I wanted to say—but I didn't let her hear them until the song was released on August 30, the day she drove back up to school.

She’s finishing her last year studying Elementary Education at a school in Massachusetts, and I wanted her to be able to listen to her song on the drive up from Maryland, where my parents now live.

behind the lyrics:

I’m writing to Adlai in the lyrics, telling her the things I wish I said more, and wish she believed more. She is such a beautiful person, and she doesn’t even see it. I wanted to remind her that she is an irreplaceable rock in my life.

My favorite part is the chorus, because that’s written to both of us. If we’re feeling lonely, we can look up at the stars and take comfort that we’ll both be looking at the same stars, even though we’re miles away from each other. I also love the line “because you are my home / I can’t feel at home here” because she really is like that: she’s the life of the party, really bubbly and fun, and with the biggest, brightest smile, but she’s also so caring and thoughtful and is there for you.

behind the cover art:

I wanted to illustrate a scene of evening stars, but it took me a little while to land on the final illustration. It’s very simple, and the person isn’t very noticeable until you look closer, which I kind of like. It’s like a secret that they’re there, out looking at the stars, longing to be with the other person.