In Retrospect - Backstory

In Retrospect was an instrumental piece which emerged from the 'mood' of the particular day rather than some fixed idea or inspiration. It came out of sitting at the piano / keyboard and simply recording the feeling or mood in that moment. It was a quiet, sombre, reflective mood. I remember watching a short documentary of motorcycle travelers many of who have circumnavigated the world or traveled across continents for extended periods. They shared their thoughts around this global 'Pause' that effectively nature has imposed on the world perhaps out of being driven to the absolute limits by humanity. While each introspected on the events that led upto this pause in the world, and each had their own thoughts, there were some threads and realisations that emerged individually but were common. I found, I could connect with those thoughts and they aligned with what I felt in that time.

"In retrospect", we have been reckless with our planet & failed to preserve the balance of nature. As a species, we need to slow down, take a step back, become more aware of what we're doing to nature and balance and realign our priorities in life and what matters. Borders, identities all mean very little in the situation the world is in. They are constructs we created but in situations like this, they mean little. A pandemic like this effected every country and the only way to overcome the crisis is as a single species - together. We often lose sight of what is important in our lives and who are important in our lives. Crisis brings that into perspective. We need to think about what is essential to us and what we need not continue doing. We need far less to be happy than we thought we needed. We witnessed nature recovering, air getting cleaner, water clearing in rivers, wildlife coming back to places they've been driven out of and ecosystems starting to heal in the short time we changed our pace of life and slowed down.