<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not much of a TV watcher. I don\u2019t know what to watch, and I don\u2019t like having to \u201clook\u201d for new shows. It\u2019s pretty serendipitous when an interesting show appears while I\u2019m channel surfing, but because this happens so rarely, I almost never turn on the TV at all. I do however, like to listen to the radio throughout the day. In the morning, my alarm goes off and plays the classical radio station. After I get dressed, I walk downstairs to the kitchen, turn on the lights, turn on another radio, and only then start thinking about what I will make for breakfast.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I have this groovy thing called XM Radio, and it has a gazillion stations to listen to. This is an excellent thing because the radio stations in the city only have playlists that last for one hour before they start to repeat songs. Maddening. The XM menu lets me listen to stations that play songs from certain decades, or specific genres. I love it.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Music has a direct line to my emotions; I like to listen to songs that mirror my current mood. If I am happy, I choose happy music. If I\u2019m sad or angry, then I find some heavy metal or something with a strong beat. Sometimes though, I crave certain songs or albums because I want to emotionally revisit a specific event or time period in my life.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
When I was sixteen, my grandfather decided to help my parents find and purchase a used car for me. After much searching, he located a \u201974 brown Chevrolet Chevette. It was a bare bones, two door hatchback model that didn\u2019t have much of anything except four wheels, a motor, and a lock on the gas tank. Grandpa installed a head-bolt heater so that it would start in the cold Minnesota winter, and he also put in a cassette player as a special surprise. I loved that car. I didn\u2019t have many tapes, but the few I did own were well worn from constant play: Robert Palmer, The Police, Whitney Houston, Billy Joel\u2026 To this day, whenever I hear Robert Palmer on the radio, I think about my little Chevette \u2026 and Grandpa\u2019s beaming smile when he handed me the keys and told me that the car was mine.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I drove my car until I started college. Unfortunately, I went to a small liberal arts college that had a no-car policy, and my little Chevette had to stay at home while I was away at school. During my first year I lived in a dormitory that was a brief walk from the main part of campus. I hated walking home by myself after dark because my night vision was poor, and the quietness of the evening felt spooky. To combat my irrational terror, I started carrying a Walkman in my backpack. My favorite auditory diversion was Sting\u2019s album The Dream of the Blue Turtles<\/em>. I would push the play button the moment I stepped outside, and listen to the song Russians<\/em> over and over if I was really nervous. I still play this album often, especially in the wintertime, when it gets dark too early here in Minnesota. It\u2019s an instant stress-reducer, and the familiarity of the songs relaxes me more effectively than any meditation script ever could.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n By my sophomore year of college I had mastered the skill of recording a mix-tape, and couldn\u2019t get enough new music to listen to. Unfortunately, during winter term I also developed a wicked case of depression. I remember making a mix-tape one night with two separate playlists, Happy Music<\/em> and Sad Music<\/em>. I almost never played the Happy Music<\/em> side. Instead, the Sad Music<\/em> side played on an unending rewind-repeat cycle. At the time, I had no idea what was going on with my psyche, but my amazing roommates did. They worried about me, and I can only imagine how tired they were of the Sad Music<\/em> playlist. I still feel badly about that. Miraculously, my depression-fog eventually lifted, and my friendships didn\u2019t disappear; it\u2019s amazing that I finished the term as strongly as I did. I recently found that mix-tape, and immediately threw it away. I\u2019m scared to revisit any emotions I might find in those lyrics, and have no desire to listen to any of the songs again.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Music has always provided the backdrop to my life, and now it also allows me to peer into the emotions and developing persona of my daughter. Like me, The Girlie enjoys playing music throughout the day, and so I signed up for a family Spotify plan that allows her to make playlists of her own. I love listening to the songs she chooses, as well as the occasionally provided commentary about why she likes each one; some make her feel happy, some make her feel like dancing, others have a good beat. I sometimes see her revisiting specific songs during homework or quiet times, and I smile. I wonder what goes on in her mind and her heart when she listens to the music\u2026 or how she will remember the songs when she moves on to another time in her life. I hope she continues to share her playlists with me so that I can listen along, too \u2026<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Message of the Day: Everyone has a personal musical soundtrack. Listening to old favorites can spark strong and vivid emotional memories for you and provide personal insight to those you choose to share your music with. I wish I could go back in time and make lists of my favorite and most listened-to songs from each year. I would compile the music into an epic playlist that would take weeks to listen to. I might listen to it by myself, but more likely would I give it to those I love as a way of understanding me when my words fall short.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I\u2019m not much of a TV watcher. I don\u2019t know what to watch, and I don\u2019t like having to \u201clook\u201d for new shows. It\u2019s pretty serendipitous when an interesting show appears while I\u2019m channel surfing, but because this happens so rarely, I almost never turn on the TV at all. I do however, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":175,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-random-subjects"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6ZedX-2Q","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":295,"url":"https:\/\/www.peanutmark.com\/?p=295","url_meta":{"origin":176,"position":0},"title":"The Four Cs","author":"Melissa","date":"January 15, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 I am an optimist. At least I like to think I am. I am a master of positive spin, too; I can take a bad situation and find the good inside. It\u2019s a coping mechanism. 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Yes. You read that right. I. Believe. In. Magic. I know most people SAY they don\u2019t, but deep down either they really do or they\u2019d like to. I\u2019m not talking about pull-the-rabbit-out-of-the-hat or make-the-woman-disappear kind of magic. 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Well, it feels like that, anyway. You know what I\u2019m talking about. You\u2019ve got a to-do list humming along, and then everything falls apart because life hurls a bunch of unexpected events into your day. 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CHER! Guess what I recently did? I saw Cher in concert AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH! I have a long history of mad love for Cher. I loved her in the Sonny and Cher show when I was a little kid, wishing on every star in the sky that I\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Random Subjects"","block_context":{"text":"Random Subjects","link":"https:\/\/www.peanutmark.com\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.peanutmark.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/IMG_0304.jpg?fit=899%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.peanutmark.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/IMG_0304.jpg?fit=899%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.peanutmark.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/IMG_0304.jpg?fit=899%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.peanutmark.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/IMG_0304.jpg?fit=899%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":538,"url":"https:\/\/www.peanutmark.com\/?p=538","url_meta":{"origin":176,"position":4},"title":"I’m Fifty Years Old!","author":"Melissa","date":"May 24, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Well, I\u2019m about to turn 50 this weekend. 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