Sing with Me

Isn’t it crazy how songs can so readily attach themselves to memories and moments and people? It’s pleasant and heartwarming at times… miserable and heart-wrenching at others. 

I can listen to “An Jing,” “Kai Bu Liao Kou,” and other Jay Chou songs and literally FEEL myself at Northwestern, walking down Sheridan Road on bright winter days… I can see the bare trees, the icicles dangling from the branches, little pieces of grass peeking out of blankets of snow… I can feel the cold air biting my face.  I feel myself walking slowly, shuffling my feet to make sure I don’t trip and fall on the ice.  Sometimes these same songs take me to dark winter nights walking to and from the library or Ford… I see the lights and the emptiness… see a person here and there all bundled up, hurrying back to his/her dorm… I can see the snow slowly falling, the pretty kind that looks like it’s from a movie.  So perfect that it almost looks fake.  It lightly falls onto my hair, my coat, my bag… It surprises me to see it falling more clearly and fiercely underneath the light of the street lamps.  To this day, I can’t listen to Jay Chou without being swept back into these moments, and it feels so real at times that if I close my eyes… I think I could convince myself that I’m truly time traveling.

“Way Back Texas” by Pat Green and “Every Time I Hear Your Name” by Keith Anderson take me back to my freshman year at NU, to my friend’s dorm room, the room right across from mine.  Her country music was always blaring, so I’d often listen for it to check if she was in or not.  It was always dark in there for some reason, but dark as it was, it was still always warm and comforting, just as she was and still is.  It was one of two places of refuge (the other being my own room, of course).  I visited often.  I see her in her dark-rimmed glasses, green Soffe shorts and white tank, sitting at her desk on the computer.  Post-it notes plastered all over her desk (as they were on mine), pictures of friends covering her walls.  I would hop onto her bed (that was raised ridiculously high) and sit on her green sheets and hold her Sesame Street pillow.  We’d talk and laugh and even cry at times, and I’d look outside her big window and see the lake and watch it rain or snow (it was oftentimes one or the other).  I’d play with her stuffed build-a-bear (the same as mine coincidentally), and I’d watch the homemade mobile she had hanging from the ceiling twirl.  These are some of my dearest memories from NU, and there are times I desperately wish to just go across the hall and jump on her green bed and listen to these songs again, just like I did all freshman year. 

Fergie’s “Big Girls Don’t Cry” brings me back to the end of my freshman year at NU.  My roomie and I had gone camping with a bunch of people, but we ended up sleeping in a car (don’t ask).  It was … freezing and uncomfortable, but the song played on the drive to the campsite as well as a number of times while we were attempting to fall asleep.  It then continued to play on the radio as spring turned into summer, and now it really brings me back to hot, sunny NU days and the feeling that it’s all coming to an end.  It’s so strange… every time I hear it, I can really feel the sun pouring onto my skin and my heart growing heavier with the weight of those sad farewells.  Having to worry about buying boxes at those college box stands and lugging them awkwardly to my room… sadly packing up all my things as I sweat bullets in my AC-less dorm… leaving new friends for the summer… staying up all night to run to the beach and watch the sunrise…

Mm… something more trivial.  Vibe’s “미워도 다시한번” and Shin Seung Hoon’s “Christmas Miracle” both take me back to Christmas Eve, 2002.  It was cold and wintery outside, and the guy I was absolutely in love with at the time was driving me to church for Christmas mass in his new blue Honda Accord.  Both songs played in the car, and I was squealing inside with the joy of getting to spend that drive with him.  He had no clue, of course, and I’m pretty sure he still doesn’t, but these two songs will forever remind me of those simple and innocently happy 45 minutes. 

Just some examples of the power music has over me.  There are so, so many more.  Countless, in fact.  I probably have a story or moment attached to almost every song in my music collection.  These just came to mind :).

1 year ago with 2 notes 2 notes
tagged as: beauty. heartbreak. memories. music. northwestern. snow. thoughts. jay chou.