musical memories

music is a powerful thing. and precisely for that reason, i love it. last night i watched a movie and while the movie brought back tons of memories on its own, it was the music that enveloped me and swept me away, back into the past. memories of the first feeling of something closer to love than i had ever experienced at that young age flashed within me and for a moment i felt like i was young, innocent, and giddy again. i turned the television way up and listened to the building sounds of strings, piano, and my favorite - the drums; and, then, not too long after the crescendo came back down, i remembered the pain i felt when it was over so many years ago. it was probably the first real heartache i had ever felt. in my maturity, i would be reluctant to say it really was love, but instead confusion fueled by a flurry of flighted feelings neither i nor my flame could ever properly or sincerely express. i have really only been in love, a love that i can only recently admit, one other time and it was many, many years after this.

when i hear james taylor, peter, paul and mary, or harry belafonte, i immediately think of my father. childhood memories of whirlwind trips to see grandparents in rural idaho encompass my thoughts and i can almost hear my dad singing Sara Maria ever so sweetly to me; i can almost feel in my chest, in my stomach, in my face pure joy, comfort, and true father-daughter love. and, it completely and wholly warms my soul.

i should think of this power that music, much like smell, has over us before i decide to compose a moment with favorite beats, melodies, and lyrics. i should think twice before putting on an album that i love during a moment in which i know will be short lived and will most likely later result in disappointment. just because the kings happened to make an album that serves as the perfect soundtrack for a cluster fucked, yet fairly satisfying, rush of drunken passion, it does not mean you actually have to put it on, sara. while i rarely regret anything and certainly don't this, it would have been nice to have had the ability to think ahead and realize that now every time i hear caleb's sweet raspy, and sometimes hollow voice, i have flashbacks so vivid that i can't help but feel wildly inappropriate thinking about such things while composing a routine email at my desk. and yet, on the other hand, i will admit that such flashbacks fueled by core-shivering sounds almost always make me smile and provide a very nice vacation from microsoft office hell.

anyway, my point is that while visually stimulated memory recall can be strong and effective, it is, for me, nothing in comparison to the recollection that accompanies my most favorite thing in the world, music.