A Voicemail From The Past

A song about missing people… and making sure you treasure those you love.

I wrote this song on a bus back to Watseka after hearing that my Pop was seriously ill.

Before I left Chicago, I found an old voicemail he’d left me months earlier. It wasn’t anything extraordinary, just Pop checking in, asking how I was doing, telling me to come home when I could. The sort of message most of us listen to once and then forget about.

But on that journey, I couldn’t stop playing it.

For the first time, I realised that one ordinary voicemail might become something precious. I kept thinking, what if this is the last time I ever get to hear his voice? It made me realise how easily we take those everyday moments for granted until we’re frightened they might disappear.

Thankfully, Pop recovered, and I got to hear that voice in person again. But the feelings from that journey stayed with me, and they became this song.

I think we’ve all got something like that tucked away somewhere, a voicemail, an old recording, a home video. We don’t think much about them until one day they become priceless because they capture something no photograph ever can: a person’s voice, exactly as we remember it.

Whenever I hear this song now, I’m reminded not to wait for a crisis before I tell the people I love how much they matter. Sometimes the most ordinary messages become the ones we treasure most.