And what is it about music that can bring back memories that you didn't even know you still had stored up in your little noggin?
I got a text from my coworker about Glee. I started a Glee club at my school and the universe put in my path a partner in this endeavor... not just someone who is willing to help out, but a bona fide musical person who sings and teaches and plays and writes music. This person is so excited about Glee club starting this week that I've become accustomed to her excited texts about the songs we should sing and ideas of how we should structure our meetings. So, then I thought to myself about what songs I wanted to do with Glee. I put on some music and began to listen to whatever came my way from my library and pretty soon, I was memory trippin'.
What's funny is how you will associate a memory to a song. This song may never have even hit the ears of the person it reminds you of, but in your mind- in your memory, that person is completely intertwined with this song. Still the Same, by Bob Seger reminds me of a friend who I don't think cared one way or another about this song. Every time I hear it, though, memories of this person come flooding into my mind. They come in a vignette-type of slideshow, starring this person and the theme that makes up her life as I've interpreted it. Pictures of her laughing and walking around and doing everyday things just kind of float around with the song.
Every time I hear Dangerdoom, I think of one of my ex-boyfriends. He had mentioned that he liked them, so every time I hear it, I think of that summer we started talking. I think of my blue 1994 corolla that I drove around in the summer that I got to know him. I can feel the Portland summer as I listen to Dangerdoom, hearing the ring of my phone (before smartphones) go off as he calls me. For some reason, I am always driving south on 33rd, right by that grocery store with the yellow sign whose name escapes me.
Bob Marley's High Tides brings me even further back into the late 90s. It reminds me of college and a boyfriend I had when we were just getting to really know each other. I think about his room in Delhi, New York. I can remember the fall weather as we walk to his place from the dorms where I lived. He had stone floors in his kitchen and a really big living room. There was this sadness about him that I worried about and wanted to make go away so these lyrics became my message to him... "in high tide or in low tide; I'm gonna be your friend. I'm gonna be your friend."
David Bowie reminds me of Portland. My friend and I would play Bowie on the jukebox at Slabtown. I bought my first Bowie CD my first year living there, living in Northwest. I would play it on my stereo, which was huge and I had shipped all the way out from New York. We don't have to do that anymore. I haven't bought a CD in a long time and I no longer own a stereo. Times change, huh?
I guess the truth is, you don't know what two things you are going to be associating in the future. You might not know it, but just because you watched Will and Grace a few times, your then roommate thinks about you every time she ever hears anything about Debra Messing... true story on my part. Or you sing American Pie one time at karaoke and you will forever be remembered as the girl dressed up in the vintage red, white, and blue tennis dress singing that song because you thought there was supposed to be a superhero party that night.
When I want to remember carefree spring days of driving around with my friends when we had not a care in the world, I'll always just ask for Mistadobalina... ooh ooh Mistadobalina!
