The song remembers when ... and whom.

You may have noticed that I will sometimes (these days, rather frequently) write about music. I write about music, or use song lyrics to speak for me.

My music takes a lot of personas:  there are songs that I simply like (and some that seem to like me -- they show up a lot on my iTunes when I hit shuffle).  There are songs that carry profound intrinsic meaning.

There is the very small subset of music that, if it came to a choice between never hearing it again or remaining celibate the rest of my life, I'd have to think long and hard about which path to take -- and on some days, I'd be more than willing to give up the sex. (To wit: Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue," Dave Brubeck's "Take Five,"  Aaron Copeland's "Rodeo" and  "Appalachian Spring," and "Asking Us to Dance" by Kathy Mattea.  Oddly enough, there is a piece of a song that probably also fits in this classification: on the Beatles' Abbey Road, the bridge between "Polythene Pam" and "She Came In Through the Bathroom Window.")

And then there are memory songs.  The soundtracks which reflect so much of my life.

Memory of places.  Memory of people.  Memory of feelings.

"Mambo No. 5" is the back roads of Normandy, where I first heard it. The album Graceland is southern Nevada, where I and the other person who was driving West with me had a fight and let the tape roll over three times while not speaking to each other. "Hotel California" is not merely California, but the border between California and Arizona -- which I was weeping over when the song came on the radio, because I never wanted to return to the state.  ("You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave...." ) Jimmy Buffet's "Boat Drinks" is Wellesley, Massachusetts in February. For self-explanatory reasons, if you've ever heard the song.

"The Sound of Music" is my father.  As is the Marine Hymn.  Sarah Mclachlan's cover of "The Rainbow Connection" is my friend Sarah; Eddie From Ohio's "Number Six Driver," my friend Cathy.  "Rocky Raccoon" is my older brother.  A lot of people who stay in my life for any length of time (although not everyone), and even some who pass through quickly if they have been memorable or important enough, end up with songs attached to them in my mind.

There are the lullabies, "Sweet Baby James" and "Baby Mine" (from Dumbo) and "Deliver Us" (from the Prince of Egypt).  Lullabies that in their own odd way ended up being reflected in the souls to which they were sung -- restless, sweet, and dramatic.*

There are the songs that describe me to me: "The Moon & St. Christopher" by Mary Chapin Carpenter, "Travelin' Thru" by Dolly Parton, the Byrds' "My Back Pages," among others.  There are the songs I wish I could sing to other people, and the songs I wish others would sing to me (chief among them being "Bridge Over Troubled Water.")

There are songs that, no matter how happy or beautiful, are for their own reasons difficult to hear, like picking a scab off a wound that has long been closed: Van Morrison's "Brown-Eyed Girl"; "For Emily, Wherever I May Find Her," by Simon and Garfunkel. Which does not keep me from listening to them, because they are beautiful and were once important to me, but there are days when I cannot bear to, when I deselect their boxes from my playlists.

I often wonder how weird I am, whether other people have this almost obsessive need to create soundtracks for all the parts of their lives. Not that it matters, much: I don't think I can stop doing this even if I wanted to.

How about you?  How does your music resonate to your life?

*A tiny part of me is insanely happy that Sweet Baby James has gone off to the wilds of Western Massachusetts, and will  end up, if not already, quite familiar with the "turnpike from Stockbridge to Boston" being covered in snow.