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At work.
My “sad sack” playlist is on shuffle. This playlist has earned its title, not because it’s necessarily my go-to ‘sad’ playlist, but because Ray said it “sounds like what a depressed middle schooler would listen to”. I don’t completely agree with that sentiment, but I change the title of the playlist as a concession to the fact that Ray is also not entirely wrong.
Plus, I’m not going to lie, I do sometimes listen to this playlist when I am in a little too much in my feelings; when the melancholy hits.
BUT if I were to intentionally put together a list of songs to listen to when I'm sad, it wouldn’t be this exact list.
Saturday by Yo La Tengo comes on and I realize that, like the song, I am “out of tune”, staring into nothing at my work computer. I have quit typing. My eyes have ceased to focus. I am transported. I am 22, laying on the banks of a pond, hidden in the gently waving grass, gazing into a star-studded October sky, listening to this song over and over again in my headphones. Trying to be numb, because numb is a way to shore up the feelings.
I often feel that I would like to write, but also feel I haven’t earned that right or lack the ability. Almost forgetting all of the college courses I took with that express intent. The imposter syndrome takes over, and I recall the decisions that led me to instead graduate with a fine arts degree. The desire passes. No, it doesn’t pass. I just push it back down again. Shoring up desires, just like I shore up my feelings.
It’s not healthy – I can at least acknowledge that.
If I had to do it all over again, I would have gone to school elsewhere. Maybe Austin or Denton. But in order to make that decision, I would have had to been a completely different person at 18 – someone braver, someone ready for the world. And I wasn’t that person at that point in time.
I don’t know what I’m trying to say.
Music has the ability to transport.
11:14 a.m. - 2023-05-11