I have a strange relationship with music. I can't play an instrument. I'm not a great singer. I can hear a song though and tell you exactly where I was the first time I heard it, or who I was with. If it is a song from my childhood or young-adult life, I can probably tell you what year it was released. That drives my husband crazy.
I can tell you that "A Little More Love" by Olivia Newton John was the first song I ever slow danced with a boy to. His name was Georgie and he was my next-door neighbor. I'm pretty sure he felt sorry for me and that is why he asked me to dance.
The first album I ever bought - which really means the first one my parents ever paid for - was a Donny Osmond album that I chose at Tower Records in Stockton when I was 7-years-old. But the first "real" album I ever bought was when I was 11 and it was Foreigner's eponymous first album. "Feels Like the First Time" and "Cold as Ice" still take me back to a carefree summer of laying on my bed at night, feeling like a grown-up because I was listening to rock music and not teen idol pop.
Music is visceral for me. I started buying albums and 45 rpm records young and I've never stopped. My life has been a series of playlists since before there even was such a thing. I got my first stereo for Christmas in 1977. It was one of those single-turntable deals that had two speakers and a smoky-gray plastic top that lifted up. It even had an FM radio built in! I thought I was seriously cool. I could stack ten 45's at a time on it, so there was some planning that went into what the mix would be.
It shouldn't surprise anyone then that I was a huge fan of the mixtape. I spent hours listening to the radio to hear that one new song that I liked, ready to hit record as soon as I heard the first notes. For 8th grade graduation my parents gave me a boom box. It was the coolest! It had an 8-track player, AM/FM radio, and a dual cassette player. I could record songs from radio or from 8-tracks and then dub from one cassette to the other to create my own mixes. I was in heaven!
My high school memories are defined by the music associated with them. "Do You Believe in Love" by Huey Lewis & the News takes me back to 9th grade. I'm sitting with a new boyfriend on a set of bleachers at a baseball diamond, flirting and feeling so happy. "Open Arms" by Journey takes me back to 10th grade and that same boy, but this time we've been apart for a while and are back together. Breakup songs are the theme for 11th grade. Early Duran Duran and U2 are 12th grade, all the way.
My brain holds specific playlists for so many things. College, my early-twenties, my time in the Army. "We Belong" by Pat Benatar takes me back to riding in a car in Texas with my brother and hearing it for the first time. Play Peter Gabriel's "So" album and I am immediately in a barracks in Germany with my future husband with nothing more than hopes and dreams. There are playlists for my children's early years. I have a Keeghan list that I listen to when I'm missing my baby. There are so many lists for Mackenzie - girl pop for elementary school, emo for middle school, K-Pop for high school. Most of the time, these songs are happy reminders of good memories. Sometimes they can bring me to tears in just a few notes. That is how music works for me.
The first time I was ever separated from having music constantly playing was in basic training. The only "music" the Army allowed during that time was the cadence we sang while marching and running. About midway through my eight weeks of training, we were supposed to be bivouacking in the field, meaning we were supposed to be camping out in small tents, when it started to rain. When it rains in South Carolina, it doesn't mess around. We had rivers running through our tents. The drill sergeants screamed at us to gather up our gear and head for a bus that had just arrived. I wasted no time doing so!
As I got on the bus, I sat right behind the driver. He had the radio playing! Oh, sweet lord...I almost cried. "Here With Me" by REO Speedwagon was playing. I closed my eyes and silently sang along. Another group of females got on the bus and one of them yelled, "Can you change the station." Before the bus driver could respond, I did for him. "No! He can't!" The driver looked up into the big mirror over his head, made eye contact with me and slightly smiled. "I wasn't going to change it, Private." In my mind, that bus ride is one of the best memories I have from Army basic training.
The one thing I have never done is listen to music that I don't like. Sure, there are plenty of songs and genres of music that I don't necessarily like, but listening to them was always optional. I could change a radio station or, in the case of school dances, walk outside and talk to friends if I didn't like a song. Sometimes there were songs that my friends liked and I would suffer through. That usually ended in me getting angry if it happened too often though. I (yes, selfishly) wanted to listen to what made me happy, not what irritated me. I've never been able to change in that respect - I do not tolerate lousy music well.
The proof, then, that I am getting old is that I have a hard time finding new music to connect with. The most visceral reaction I have to most current music is to want to run any place I can get where it isn't playing. Everything is auto-tuned. I don't believe any of these people can actually sing! There are rock bands that I love - Godsmack, Shinedown, Three Days Grace, Pop Evil - but to get in the car and just turn on the radio to a local pop station is a thing of the past. I just can't do it anymore.
For someone who wants...no, needs...music, that is incredibly sad.
