Moved

It’s funny how the right song, the right lyric, the right melody can move your heart like nothing else can (well, except maybe love). 

There are certain songs that can instantly take me back to a moment in my life and I can smell the scents that were floating in the air, the feeling of loss, the pain in my heart…or the feeling of euphoria, the lightness in my steps and my heart ready to burst because it felt so full.

My friend K posted the “Voice” version of a Great Big World’s (with Christina Aguilera) Say Something..I guess it aired last night.  And it certainly is an awesome YouTube video.  I absolutely love this song, but it’s bittersweet for me.  The first time I heard it was in September (my Cowboy turned me on to it). I downloaded it and heard it and all the feelings I had during the difficult times of my marriage and divorce came flooding back to me. I got choked up and started to cry because here it was…in song version…of what I had been saying to my ex for years… “Say something..I’m giving up on you”.  And I just wasn’t being heard.  I didn’t want to give up, and I wanted him to hear me and have something click and he’d get it...but it never happened.  This song was a gut-puncher for me.

Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar on Me” always brings me back to my aforementioned buddy’s 280ZX. She wanted to hear that song on her wedding day.  We were leaving to go get ready, and we had to have that song playing.  We were laughing so hard and so excited for what was about to happen.  I can never hear that song and not have a shit eating grin on my face.

I love how sending a song to someone can have meaning and deliver a message that perhaps…you could never say quite the right way….Or couldn’t muster up the guts to say.  Or how certain lyrics are poignant. Even my Beanster gets moved. When we listen to P!nk’s song “I Don’t Believe You” the line that always gets her is “It’s like you’re the swing set, and I’m the kid that falls”.  She looked at me and said “Auntie that is so sad”…and she’s right.

Kenny Chesney’s song “Come Over” always gets me.  In the video there was a particular shower scene that I had the utmost pleasure of trying to re-create…and when that song comes on, I am frakking done! I can feel the touch on my skin, the lips on my neck and my body starts to respond all over…Ok, I guess that’s too much information, but you understand what I’m getting at.  The right song triggers very visceral responses.

When I hear Maroon 5’s “Payphone” I’m instantly transported to the Cabo Corridor driving from San Jose to San Lucas. It’s mid-morning, the window is down and my hair is flying all over the place. I have that “I’m gonna get in trouble” feeling in the pit of my stomach, but I don’t care and the smile on my face says “bring it”!  I have skittles in my mouth and I’m laughing. 

I still have a difficult time with Gun’s and Roses “November Rain” because I walked down the aisle to it. Thus the danger of using songs during momentous occasions in your life.  They’ll always be associated with it.  Blue Oyster Cult’s “Burnin’ for You” brings me back to Round Table pizza with my cousin “S”. We’d play that song over and over. Rush’s “Sprit of Radio” brings me back to my childhood bedroom.  I heard it on the radio, and I just knew from the depths of my soul what that song meant and that I was never giving up music “One likes to believe in the freedom of music…”. Thank you Lee, Peart and Lifeson!

I really can’t imagine one day without music.  If I can’t play it, turn it on, drive with it…I’ll sing it.  What songs are your memory makers?