Listen To The Music

A friend of mine posted this image on Instagram a few days ago, and I’ve been thinking about it ever since.  My brother, Adam, has taught me so much about life, and one of his lessons to me is to pay attention to the music.  He can be sitting in a Pizza Hut and hear the faintest strain of music, and he’ll say, “Remember this song?” And he knows the song, the artist, and its history.  So I’m going to take a page from Adam’s book tonight, and remember the music.  There are songs that are touchstones in my life—songs that, as it says in the above post, bring me back to exactly where I was when I first heard them.  And these are the songs that have been the soundtrack of my life:

“Give It All to Jesus,” Evie.  This is one of the first non-church songs that I remember.  I have a vague memory of Mom picking me up from kindergarten and, as we drove home, she played that song and sang along with it.  I loved hearing Mom sing; to me, she sounded just like Evie.  I listened to that song tonight while I was preparing to write this, and I could almost see those early days of my life in the late seventies—the hazy light, my knee socks, my mom’s darker hair.  Evie, to me, is Mom and childhood and innocence all wrapped up in one perfect package.

“Sunshine On My Shoulders,” John Denver.  When I was in elementary school, my sister had a friend spend the night, and for some reason, I went with Dad when he took the girl home.  She lived out in the country, and Dad had the windows down and the music on, on that warm spring night.  I remember leaning my head out the window, letting my hair blow, and listening to the most beautiful voice I had ever heard.  Dad was playing a John Denver tape, and every song made me fall more in love with that voice.  “Sunshine On My Shoulders” was my favorite John Denver song, from that moment on.  And John Denver became Adam’s favorite singer, too.  We knew every word to every song—we still do.  And I can still see Adam playing “guitar” on a tennis racket while we sang “Sunshine on My Shoulders.”

“I Can’t Fight This Feeling,” REO Speedwagon.  When I listen to this song, I’m sixteen again, driving to a homecoming bonfire and hayride with Monty.  We had the radio on, and this song came on.  The words were our story:

“What started out as friendship has grown stronger
I only wish I had the strength to let it show. . .
‘Cause I feel so secure when we’re together
You give my life direction
You make everything so clear.”

Monty held my hand that night when the song played, and during the bonfire, I watched him, the shadows from the fire dancing over his face, and I saw my future.

“The Prayer,” Celine Dion and Andrea Bocelli.  When Monty and I were about to celebrate our second Christmas as a married couple, our niece, Marky, was born.  My sister had gotten so many baby gifts—clothes and diapers and bottles—that I wanted to get her something different.  Celine Dion had a new Christmas CD out, so I bought that for my sister.  And Monty and I bought one for ourselves.  On the way to the hospital to wait for our niece to be born, “The Prayer” started playing.  The song was beautiful; the voices were impeccable; and my soul responded to all of it.  Monty and I listened to that song over and over again, on the day that sweet Marky was born and in the earliest days of her life.  To this day, we both think of “The Prayer” as Marky’s song.  And when I hear it, it takes me back to those beautiful days of a Christmas season of hope and little Marky.  Our lives seemed so simple and so perfect then.

“Hate Me,” Blue October.  Fast forward a few years: Monty and I were living in an apartment, waiting for our new house to be built.  The apartment was dark and dingy, and I was going through severe withdrawal from fentanyl, then back to it again, then withdrawal; it was an awful, sickening cycle that I could not free myself from.  One day, while watching TV, I saw the video for “Hate Me.”  And I cried more than I had in years—the song’s lyrics loosened something in my soul that I had been trying to say to Monty but was too lost to find words for.  I listened to it over and over again:

“In a sick way I want to thank you
For holding my head up late at night
While I was busy waging wars on myself,
You were trying to stop the fight
You never doubted my warped opinions
On things like suicidal hate
You made me compliment myself
When it was way too hard to take.”

These are the “nice” lyrics, before the ones that I really did believe at the time—the lyrics that said, to me, that Monty should hate me for what I’d done, that I only wanted peace for him, that I wanted all of it to be over, and that I was so, so sorry.  When I played it for Monty, he asked me not to play it again.  As much as I related to the song, he hated it—he couldn’t stand to hear me say the words that he didn’t believe were true.  What is true about this song, that I can see with clear eyes all these years later, is the way Monty did try—so very hard—to “stop the fight” when I was “waging war” on myself.

“The Story of My Life,” One Direction.  When Monty and I had been married for a week, we adopted Ricky, an ornery little orange and white kitten who filled our lives with love and laughter.  The first day that Monty went to work after we were married, I looked at Ricky and said, “It’s just you and me, buddy.”  And it was—for almost eighteen years.  Ricky was my constant companion—he stayed up with me at night, not budging from my lap for hours.  When I was in pain, he knew it.  He’d curl up on the pillow next to me and stay as long as I did.  He followed me everywhere.  He made me laugh when I felt like crying.  And he bonded Monty and me closer together because we both loved him so much.  When we moved here, a little over four years ago, Ricky adjusted well at first.  But he started losing weight from eating less, and Monty and I had to give him IV fluids a few times a week to keep him hydrated.  One time, when I had just put the needle into Ricky’s skin under his fur, I looked up at Monty, who’d been adjusting the bag of fluids, and a look passed between us.  We both knew we were losing him.  And on a cold December day, Ricky stopped eating and drinking altogether.  He hid from me instead of following me.  I looked for him everywhere and found him in our bedroom in a corner, resting his head on an extension cord.  He looked up at me, and I knew.  The light in his eyes had gone out.  I laid down next to him on the floor and gently buried my face in his orange fur and cried while Monty called the vet.  The vet examined Ricky and told us it was time to let him go, and within seconds of a needle prick, our precious Ricky was gone.  We left our beautiful boy there in that cold, sterile vet’s office.  Neither of us wanted to go home.  We couldn’t face walking through our front door and not being met by Ricky, the way he had met us every single day for almost eighteen years.  So we got in our car and just drove, for hours, as night fell.  “The Story of My Life” came on, and I didn’t know most of the words, but that phrase, “The Story of My Life” said it all.  I looked at Monty, and he squeezed my hand, and I said, “He really was, wasn’t he?  The Story of Our Lives.”  He was—Ricky was our boy for all those years, and we didn’t know what to do without him.

“Just Be Held,” Casting Crowns.  The weeks after Ricky died were some of the darkest of Monty’s and my lives.  I remember being at a recovery meeting and having to leave because I couldn’t stop crying.  A woman who had become a dear friend to me followed me outside and just hugged me because I couldn’t talk through my tears.  When I left that night, she handed me a piece of paper with her phone number and the title of this song.  I went home and listened to it:

“So when you’re on your knees and answers seem so far away
You’re not alone, stop holding on and just be held
Your world’s not falling apart, it’s falling into place
I’m on the throne, stop holding on and just be held.”

Again and again, I listened to it.  And the tears that I cried became healing tears.  I started learning about the process of surrender.  And I started to feel hope as I looked up and let God hold me.

“Another Year Has Gone By,” Celine Dion.  This song is on the same album that I bought for my sister when Marky was born.  Monty and I used to listen to it every year at Christmastime, but as our lives changed, the song made us sad.  Then the other night, we were driving home from a movie, and that song came on.  I have no idea why; I hadn’t put it on our playlist.  But as Celine Dion began to sing those familiar words, so many memories washed over me.  As the song played, Monty looked at me and took my hand—and I knew he was thinking what I was—about all the years that had gone by.  About all of the pain and the beauty; about our move to this town, and our loss of Ricky, and all we had fought for and lost and gained.  We have a beautiful life now in our little town.  We have three cats.  I’m sober.  We both love our jobs, working for our family company.  I’m writing again.  And after all these years that have gone by, there’s still us.  Monty and me.  And as both of our soundtracks get longer and longer, I know this, as the song says:

“Another year has gone by
And I’m still the one by your side
After everything that’s gone by
There’s still no one saying goodbye
Though another year has gone by.”

 
If you have a song that instantly takes you back, I’d love to hear about it.