Jessi McNeal - The Driveway (2019)

Jessi McNeal who hails from the Skagit Valley in Washington State. How she finds time to make beautiful music like this is beyond me, considering that as well as helming a large family she also runs a 5-acre “working” farm. That said, she seems to have found a place where this lifestyle has resulted in some personal wisdom bubbling over into her songwriting. The Driveway is the title track of her new album, the theme for which she calls the “messy” middle. Jessi tells us: “The driveway on our property isn’t long, but it still feels like a sacred space between the world and home. I think we all need a bit of easement in our lives where we give ourselves permission to just be, without all of the pressure and demands that life can place on us – a place where we can have let ourselves have all those gut-level feelings about waiting and loss and transition. If we speed through those emotions, we’re going to miss a lot of things, mostly ourselves. Lately, I’m savoring those slow walks to fetch the mail, and I’m feeling a whole lot of grace to just be right where I am in my own unfolding story.”