In honor of my 33rd birthday, these are a handful of songs that have stayed with me over the years.
Fall At Your Feet-Crowded House. This was on a mixed tape my senior year college roommate was playing one night when I'd came home from practice. "What's that song?," I asked her. It made me feel wistful and desparate and lovely all at the same time. When you need to process how you feel when you're confused about love, play it for four times straight and chances are that your feelings will distill into three simple sentences that describe everything. A boy sang a few bars of this for me once. It sent me through the roof.
Something So Strong-Crowded House. Again with the Finn boys. When I want to feel fourteen, I will play this and dance around in my home office. To me, it's about family and how you feel after life is on fast-forward and yet you find yourself lucky to be surrounded by possibly the world's best people.
Round the Way Girl-LL Cool J. I like to say that instead of having life handed to me on a silver platter, it was served to me on Fiesta ware. What I have is versatile, strong and simple. I'm very much a "round the way girl"-the girl you find in the next office, laughing on her phone as she unwittingly flirts with clients.
Feels Like Home-Randy Travis as covered by Chantal Kreviazuk. I borrowed the soundtrack to Dawson's Creek from someone, and this was on it. It echoes the way I feel about Conan. While he might not be Ryan Reynolds, he's home to me and I feel safe and myself when I'm around him.
Unfinished Sympathy-Massive Attack. I found Blue Lines in Conan's CD collection in the early, dizzy days of my pregnancy. I was confused and ambivalent about becoming pregnant a bare three months after getting married. At work, I would shut my door and just listen to this track a handful of times, and it was all about unanswered questions. It was while listening to this song that I came to terms with becoming a parent. In the middle of one of the refrains, I recall feeling finished with my ambivalence, and I was ready to become a mommy.
This or That-Black Sheep. Possibly my introduction to hip-hop. In high school I'd get together every year with a group of Filipino kids who taught me all about hip hop. You lose yourself jumping up and down to fresh beats. Conan can't figure out why I love it so much. Admittedly, it kind of makes me sentimental.
Everyday-DMB. I bought either in the latter stages of my pregnancy or immediately when The Gov. was born. In the awkward early days of when we were starting to get to know each others and separate human beings, I would play this song to him in the morning, and then hold him as I swayed gently to the music. The guitar in the song always reminds me of 10 a.m. on a summer morning, seeking relief indoors from the already-high sun and tiny newborn onesies with puppies printed on them.
What?-A Tribe Called Quest. This song is made up entirely of questions. Some of them are questions in need of answers, and some are purely rhetorical. I think this is Q-Tip at his most clever and highest level of talent. It's just a great song.
Crush-DMB. I'm the queen of inappropriate crushes. I have them all the time, and I'm okay with that. This song is so great at capturing that exact moment when you come to the realization that you have a crush on someone. The song moves in a way that echoes your emotions as your stomach twists in a little knot. No one can resist that little smile you get on your face when you see the object of a crush.
Posted by equilibrium-girl at June 23, 2006 11:07 PM