All Right with Being All Right

**Finding Grace in the Cracks: A Personal Dive into Kelsey Waldon’s “I’ve Got a Way”**

We all have an album that comes to us in a moment we aren’t expecting. For me, that moment came in early spring, 2017, when Kentucky-born Kelsey Waldon’s “I’ve Got a Way” first hit my headphones. Released quietly in 2016 on Oh Boy Records—the beloved label of John Prine—Waldon’s second album never brushed the lofty canopies of the Billboard charts, yet, in its modest twang and dust-bitten honesty, I found a map for the kinds of cracks and open wounds no social media post ever dares show.

Sometimes, when the sun is slanting too orange in the late afternoon, I still hear the irascible comfort of her voice in “Dirty Old Town,” the record’s sneaky, winding opener:

*“I wanna go down to the dirty old town
And try to find something to ease my mind…”*

It’s a simple enough wish, a longing for distraction and perhaps, in its own coded way, salvation—a theme that slides slickly through every corner of the album. But for someone who’s spent the better part of their 30s fighting a sense of unmoored anxiety, merely “finding something to ease my mind” sometimes feels like a cosmic quest.

**A Voice for the Unspectacular**

Waldon’s music is not for big moments or grand gestures. That is exactly what I’ve come to admire. We live in a culture obsessed with spectacle, where even our sorrow has to be photogenic. But in “I’ve Got a Way,” Kelsey carves dignity and beauty into ordinary, unspectacular survival. She makes being “all right” sound defiant.

It’s there in “You Can Have It,” battered but refusing to be broken:

*“You can give your love,
You can give your money,
But you can’t give your soul away.”*

I remember the first time I heard these lines, sinking into an ugly corduroy couch, weighed down by too much self-doubt. It was my then-partner’s birthday and I had, yet again, failed to conjure the sort of celebration that would have made Instagram blush. But somehow Waldon’s steel-sharp lyric, set against plainspoken pedal steel, made me realize “enough” is so rarely photographic but always precious. You can give and give and give, but you can’t lose who you are—and you certainly can’t fake being whole.

**The Humor in Heartbreak**

Another personal beacon on this record is “False King,” where Waldon calls out the hollowness of riding along with the “kings” of industry and empty promises:

*“You can’t place a crown on the head of a clown
And then hope he turns out to be a king.”*

There’s such homespun wisdom in this line, but what gets me every time is the undercurrent of humor—almost a wink—at life’s disappointments. I’ve worn the jester’s hat too many times in work and love, hoping to be crowned by the approval I so desperately sought. But Kelsey is right; you can’t expect real substance where it was never planted. That’s not just a commentary on music industry artifice—it’s a simple, devastating truth for anyone who’s felt like an imposter in their own life, propped up on appearances.

**Psychoanalysis Under a Kentucky Sky**

I’d be lying if I said this album didn’t feel like my own personal Rorschach test. My depression often lands quietly, a moth settling on windowsills, mostly harmless but persistent. What “I’ve Got a Way” gives me is not the promise of joy—or even catharsis—but a sustainable survival. On “High in Heels,” the record’s most rollicking, self-aware cut, Waldon reflects on her country roots:

*“Mama tried to raise me right
But I came out all wrong
Singing my sad, sweet songs.”*

If I have a psychoanalyst, it’s Kelsey Waldon. She whispers what I learned in therapy: perfection is overrated, unlearning shame is survival, and it’s okay to take up your own weird space in the world. Singing your “sad, sweet songs” is, in fact, a form of hope.

**On Place and Belonging**

One of my personal struggles, growing up gay in a conservative background, was always about place—never feeling at home, even at home. Waldon translates that ache in “The Heartbreak,” her voice brushing the edges of resignation and perseverance:

*“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t care anymore
But wanting for something you can’t have,
Well, it’s worse than being poor.”*

These lyrics splinter me open in the way only true art can. Wanting what you can’t have, whether that’s acceptance, love, or plain old peace of mind, is a quiet ache so few country albums dare to name. But Waldon sings it straight, and in the wide loneliness of her voice, I find my own longing reflected back at me, not judged or patronized, but simply witnessed.

**A Friendly Grit**

Something rare about Waldon’s writing is her refusal to wallow. “I’ve Got a Way” is neither a victim’s whimper nor a victor’s brag; it’s the document of a working soul, a survivor’s notebook. There are moments—like the languid optimism of “Don’t Hurt the Ones (Who’ve Loved You the Most)”—when I gather my own tattered hope, patching it together with her words:

*“Don’t hurt the ones who have loved you the most,
They’re the ones who will miss you when you’re gone.”*

I think, sometimes, about how easy it is to ignore the people who are always there for us. I’ve done it, wounded by my own distractions or self-pity, only afterwards realizing how precious their steadfastness is. Instead of lecturing, Waldon’s music gently tugs my sleeve, reminding me of my humanity—sometimes selfish, often bruised, but capable still of kindness.

**A Soft Critique: Edges for Tomorrow**

As wholly as I love this record, I sometimes wish Waldon had allowed herself bigger risks sonically. The album’s arrangements, faithful to country traditions, can feel overly safe against the sharpness of her pen. I long to hear her step even further off the well-beaten path—more jagged guitars, more rawness, even more mischief. The album’s modest touch is its power, but a second glance leaves me curious for more of the edge you hear in her lyrics.

**In the End: Leaving the Neon Lights On**

“I’ve Got a Way” found me in the cracks of my own living, in the dull ache of ordinary days. I can’t recommend it enough to anyone desperate for songs that don’t just romanticize heartbreak, but document its survival. Kelsey Waldon gives a voice to the underdog, the overlooked, the quietly fierce.

For me, that’s been enough—enough to keep the neon lights on, enough to remind myself, in her words, that you can be “all right with being all right.” Sometimes, that’s the bravest thing we can be.

Kroes den Bock