IT'S FREAKING FREEZING OUTSIDE! Holy crap, Batman! Wtf is going on? I mean, I get it's December in St. Louis, but OMG. I had to stop to get gas this morning on the way to take Tyler to school. Which isn't an entirely uncommon event, since I procrastinate putting gas in the car. I really hate it. I need a man in my life for that sole purpose, if nothing else. I think I can get by/live without anything else a man can offer (I'm even killing my own spiders now!), but pumping gas, no bueno. I'll be taking applications for a new gas pumper ASAP. Comment below, text me, or send me an email with your qualifications. There really isn't anything in it for you, but I promise I'll fuss and fawn all over you, telling you what a big, strong man you are and how much I appreciate not having to stand in the freezing cold and get all dirty and smelly. It's a real ego booster :)
Anyhow, I knew it was cold this morning when I took the dogs out at SIX THIRTY for their first walk. Actually, DOG, not dogS. Little has effectively refused to get out of bed before...about noon. I wish I was kidding, but I'm not. He's apparently the only one with any common sense in this house. The rest of us are up and out by quarter to seven. He stays in bed, asleep, until I physically go in there, pick him up, and force him to go out. And then he stands out there, shivering and shaking, to do his bidness while looking at me like I'm punishing him somehow. So I thought I would try to help him out as best I could. I dug out the puppeh sweater! He's so freaking cute!
Look mom! I'm warm now! And, despite someone else's insistence that he hates it, he's fine with it. No standing in one place, whining and shaking like last year. He was fine from moment one with it. Maybe because he knows no one is going to poohpooh all over him and take it off? LOL. I'm not torturing him by putting him in it, I want to HELP him. And it does :)But while I was standing at the gas station at o'dark thirty this morning, in jeans, my heavy winter coat, freezing half to death, I was wishing Tyler could just ride the bus! But because I chose to live outside of his school district, I have to drive him. Which was perfectly fine, before it got to subzero temperatures! It was so cold, it literally HURT. It hurt to breathe, it hurt when it blew against my skin, and my back and joints were screaming at me! Unfortunately, the gas station isn't far enough from my house for the car to be sufficiently warm when I get back in, the heater just doesn't have time to really heat up. So that doesn't help either. I decided a couple of things this morning. One, I need to get gas OTHER than first thing in the morning. Not that it will be substantially warmer in the middle of the day, if it starts out at single digit temperatures, but a few degrees would help! The other thing is, I may have to start warming up my car before I leave in the mornings. Which also reminds me: I think my ex has my awesome, amazing snow/ice scraper! I got it when I had my Durango, and it's amazeballs. But I cannot find it now :( And I know I had it after the Durango. I'm almost certain the last time I saw it was in the trunk of the green car of death. Blargh.
So instead of spending even more time dwelling on how much I hate winter (I hate summer, too, but that's another blog post for another season), I'll try to stay warm and get back on track for today's post.
Music! Music is a lot of things to a lot of people. To me, it's been a huge part of my life since I was very small. My parents (mostly my father) always had music on when I was a child. It was the background track to our lives. And, as a result, most of my memories, both good and bad, are ingrained with music of the moment. And, I tend to identify very strongly with music and artists that I feel understand or relate to what I'm thinking, feeling, and going through. 99% of the time, it's pure coincidence. Whatever song comes on the radio, whatever artist is flavor of the moment, or whatever album I dig up on my playlist is at least in part, purely coincidence. But, then again, is anything really a complete coincidence?
Music has been playing an even larger than normal part of my life in the last several months. Maybe the last couple of years. I find songs that I relate to, songs that speak to me, and lose myself in them. In situations like I've been going through lately, they tend to be moody chick music, or songs about recovering from being wronged. I don't tend to gravitate toward angry or vengeful music. Maybe it's just not my personality, but hateful music makes me feel...dark. And dirty. Not sexy dirty, either. I did spend some time as a teenager lost in a lot of hateful music and my attitude and behavior was a reflection of those feelings. I hated being that person, I hated the way I felt and acted towards others. I don't want to be that person again. And I think my age and maturity leads me in a different direction, too. I think I am generally a very happy and upbeat person, but when I am hurting, it comes out in exactly that way, as pain. I do try very hard to hide it from other people. But when I'm alone, I definitely let it out. I will listen to songs that I relate to and just introvert, and sometimes, just cry my eyes out. I think most girls need a really good, hard cry sometimes.
It took me months to get there this time. I had effectively shut down for so long, I felt like I was living outside of myself. I knew what was happening, I had an active role in everything that was going on. But I picked and chose what I dealt with. I had to. I knew it wasn't me who was losing my mind, but if I thought about it too much, if I tried to become too involved, I might be the NEXT one to go, and I couldn't let that happen. So I shut down, put up the walls, retreated into myself and became very focused, very task oriented. But when I became overwhelmed, for whatever reason, I retreated into music. For the last few months, I had earphones in almost constantly. I would mindlessly surf the web, play computer games like solitaire, and did everything I could to avoid eye contact and interaction. I just couldn't deal. But the music saved my sanity, I think. I would listen to some songs over and over. Lyrics like "I should have let you go when I saw that it was over in your eyes. What do I have to do to get rid of you, I'll be better on my own. Now, I miss the sun, but as long as I'm with you
It's just another rainy day in London". The repetition brought me peace, like only repetition can.
After everything blew up and we went our separate ways, I found music was the only thing that was the same as before. And it seemed like every other song on the radio was speaking to me in a way. I could relate to things like "can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are shooting stars? I could really use a wish right now...".
It's funny, though, how time goes on, you go through the motions of grieving and healing, and the songs change like your feelings and your life change. You go from "You ever love somebody so much you can barely breathe When you're with 'em You meet and neither one of you even know what hit 'em Got that warm fuzzy feeling Yeah, them chills you used to get 'em Now you're getting fucking sick of looking at 'em You swore you'd never hit 'em; never do nothing to hurt 'em
Now you're in each other's face spewing venom in your words when you spit them" to something like "Now I know you're sorry, and we were sweet, But you chose lust when you deceived me. And you'll regret it, but it's too late. How can I ever trust you again? I feel like our world's been infected, And somehow you left me neglected. We've found our lives been changed. Babe, you lost me" and "You were my fire, so I burned... til' there was nothing left of me I... I touched your face, I held you close... til' I could barely breathe Why give me hope, then give me up... just to be the death of me. We never made it... you hesitated..." to something more like "even angels have their wicked schemes, and you take that to new extremes. but you’ll always be my hero, even though you’ve lost your mind. ‘cause you feed me fables from your hand with violent words and empty threats. and it’s sick that all these battles are what keeps me satisfied" to the latest songs, like "It took so long just to feel alright. Remember how to put back the light in my eyes. I wish I had missed the first time that we kissed, ‘Cause you broke all your promises. Who do you think you are? Runnin' 'round leaving scars. Collecting a jar of hearts. Tearing love apart. You're gonna catch a cold From the ice inside your soul". Funny, isn't it? You can almost see it go from sadness to grieving to moving on. And these are just a small sample of the soundtrack of my life right now.
I don't think that everyone has such an intense personal connection to music. I've tried to explain it to a couple of people, and for the most part, they just kind of look at me like they think I'm reading too much into it, or finding something in it when there isn't. But I've come to realize that it's just a difference in personalities. A difference in lifestyle, perhaps. Because I have had musical "kindred spirits" in life. I have come across people who really get it. People who love music as much as I do, and who live through it the way I do. It's so great when you meet someone like that. And even better when you can share music with each other. It's so cool to talk to someone like that when they're talking about songs, bands, and artists they feel so connected to. I don't come across many people like that.
And, ultimately, maybe that's the only thing I really miss about the ex. The musical kindred spirit. Not that we had the same taste in music, per se, but that we both loved it so much and it was such an important part of both of our lives. But that's certainly not a reason to stay in touch with someone. It's not a reason to be involved with someone. It's not a reason to tolerate someone who is intolerable. I found music before him, and I will continue to find music after him. I'm grateful for the music we shared, and he did turn me on to some bands, songs, and artists that I might not have found on my own, but that could have happened anyhow. And most of his music was very angry, hateful, dark, and twisted music. Not saying it wasn't good sometimes, but it wasn't me. It didn't "fit" me the way it did him. Maybe that was another red flag I ignored? But that's all water under the bridge now. Kind of like this song says for me:
"and time after time
a man who couldn't be a man
I'm alone but I'm alive
and been taught to believe whats meant to be...will be"
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