Music and me

Music has always been a big part of my life. I enjoy listening to the radio while I am driving about but I have never had an appreciation for it like I have acquired these past few months. I imagine it has something to do with life experiences. I hear the words now, I can relate to what is being said. It’s not just about a good beat or a song that has a good ring to it. I can feel it. I can close my eyes and be close to it. It sounds corny I suppose but I welcome my connection to it.

I grew up with Country, but not a genre I spent much time listening to until recent years. I find it amazing how that music can change my mood. How I can reflect upon a set of words and feel motivated about life. It can make me smile about my life when there doesn’t seem much to smile for. It can take me to places I have never been. I can see mountains I have never seen before. I can feel love I have never felt before, cry tears I have never let myself cry before. I can see behind my eyelids oceans that stretch for miles. I can picture California on a winter day. I can imagine driving through country roads stopping to take a nap along Shenandoah river. I can be slow dancing in the dark or feel the golden sun in San Francisco. I can be anywhere I want to be, doing anything I want to do. Just turn on the radio and close my eyes.

It’s an escape for me in a way. To stop my own thoughts and live in another’s.. Songs that I have heard for so many years but I have never listened to. Maybe it’s just age. A maturity now that I didn’t have ten years ago, a better understanding of life that I can now relate to the music I listen to. It has been helping me to sort out my life. Thanking God for unanswered prayers, oh the things I prayed for! Yes, a Louisville slugger through the headlights had crossed my mind once or twice. Reba helped me spread my wings or at least gave me the inspiration to do it through her song “Is there life out there?” Music can be very powerful and inspiring if you let it be.

I came across a song that I fell in love with. Funny thing is it’s in Cantonese. A song by Andy Hui that I accidentally downloaded but is the most beautiful song I have ever heard. I lost the download when I reformatted my computer and have yet to find another one but I play it in my mind all of the time. It is not in English yet it makes sense to me. That is the beauty of music.

I live in a world that I cannot open up. I know I have talked of this so much lately but it is something I am so conflicted with. Music lets me feel. I can vent and be angry, I can feel hurt and sad, I can feel like I am on top of the world. I can feel all of that and not have to share it with anyone. I do not have to feel embarrassed by being weak, I do not have to feel ashamed by admitting my failures and I do not have to be knocked down when I’m feeling like I have the world by the b***.

Am I crazy, or do any of you feel a similar connection to music? Most people enjoy it but do you ever listen to it? Do you ever let it take you places you would want to be? I hope you do, even if in some small way. It’s an escape, a get-away. We all need to get away sometimes. It doesn’t take a trip to some far off place, just turn on the radio and close your eyes.