End of the Line

Well, It’s Alright 🛤️

On Endings and the Gentlest Kind of Hope | End of the Line by The Traveling Wilburys

There is a version of the resilience message that sounds like a coach giving a halftime speech. Get back up. Keep fighting. You can do it. I understand why that version exists. Sometimes it is exactly what you need.

“End of the Line” is not that version.

The Traveling Wilburys recorded this song in 1988 as part of what was essentially a group of very famous friends making music together for the joy of it. George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, Jeff Lynne. Five people who had collectively done everything there was to do in rock and roll, sitting in a room and playing something gentle and unhurried and warm.

Roy Orbison died of a heart attack in December of 1988, before the music video was filmed. His part in the video is a guitar sitting in a rocking chair, gently swaying. Three of the five Wilburys are gone now. The song has been carrying different weight with every passing year.

What “Even” Is Doing in That Lyric

“It’s alright, even if you’re comin’ to the end of the line.”

The word “even” is doing a lot of work there. Not “it’s alright as long as you keep moving.” Not “it’s alright because things will get better.” Even if you’re comin’ to the end of the line. Even if this is actually an ending. Even then. It is alright.

That is a harder thing to believe than it sounds.

I have spent a lot of years treating “it’s alright” as something you say to reassure people, not something you actually mean. A filler. A placeholder until something better shows up. I did not understand until much later that it can be a complete statement. A conclusion you arrive at after sitting with something long enough that you stop fighting it.

What Depression Does with Fighting

Depression, in my experience, does not respond well to fighting. The harder you push against it, the harder it pushes back. There is a different thing that happens when you get quiet enough to just let it be there. Not surrender, not giving up, but a kind of acceptance that says: this is what today is. It is alright. Not because it is easy or painless or what I would have chosen. Because it is the truth of where I am, and fighting the truth is not a useful way to spend the energy I have.

“Well it’s alright, riding around in the breeze. Well it’s alright, if you live the life you please.” The image of riding around in the breeze is not triumphant. It is not a destination. It is just motion. Gentle, unhurried, without a particular agenda. The pleasure of movement for its own sake, not because you are getting somewhere.

There are days when that is the best I can do. Not a plan, not a breakthrough, not a meaningful step forward. Just getting outside. Taking Wrigley for a walk. Sitting in the car for a few minutes before going back inside. Riding around in the breeze. Those days used to feel like failures. I have learned, slowly, that they are their own kind of forward motion.

The Context of Who Made This

The context of who recorded this song matters to me. Five people, all of them legends, none of them with anything to prove, making something because it felt good to make it. No grand ambition behind it. Just the pleasure of being in a room together and playing. That is what the song sounds like. Roy Orbison got to be part of it before he died, and his guitar is still in that rocking chair, and the song still sounds like it is being played by people who mean every word.

It is alright. Even at the end of the line. Even then.

Take gentle care of yourselves and of each other.

Keep going,

Blake

Disclaimer: While music can be a powerful tool for emotional well-being, it is not a substitute for professional mental health support. The information in this blog is intended for general informational purposes only and does not constitute medical or professional advice. I am not a trained mental health expert. If you are struggling, please reach out to a qualified therapist or counselor. If you are in immediate danger, call 911. You can also contact the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988, or text HOME to 741741 to reach the Crisis Text Line.