Music is for Lovers

I can assure you quite honestly, that my beliefs of what a real man can be like, and the relationship that stems from being with them, has very little to do with movies. Yes, I’ve seen The Notebook, The Time Traveler’s Wife, and Titanic. I own all three, and love all three. But life is not like a movie. While I can lose myself in the romantic aspect of the films, when they are over I can adjust back to reality in one fluid motion. I do not expect a real life boy to act out the animated escapades of Aladdin, or wear the crown of a prince. They will not be air brushed, have unlimited money, or take me to exotic destinations on a whim.

Even books, which I love whole heartedly, do not feed into this image of the perfect guy. Now, to be sure, there are some extraordinary male protagonists in the books that I have read. When a love interest story unfolds, I will read with rapid speed, just to be sure that it happens just ‘as it is supposed to’.  However, with these beautifully written boys, there is undoubtedly an equally beautifully written girl to match him. The characters in these stories belong to each other, in that their journey is incomplete and unfinished without the other. Although I am the first to admit that it seems appealing on the surface, I honestly wouldn’t want to be with a living version of that character. They were created for someone else; someone who is not me. I’m entirely okay with this.

Both movies and books develop relationships between two specific characters in the romantic realm. But they are made up. They are given realistic attributes yes, and can be very convincing. But at the end of the day, their lives can be packaged and trimmed and tied with a bow. Everything has the possibility of working out, despite the mounting evidence that it would be crazy to believe it could. I would never want to be with Edward, because he doesn’t need me, he needs Bella. If I had been Cinderella, I would have runaway long before a ball invitation ever arrived, and I, in no way, resemble a Rachel that could line up so perfectly with Ross. When I look in the mirror, I do not see some built up, perfected version of a girl. I am flawed beyond measure, as insecure as they come, and would need two of me stacked together to reach the height of a normal person. I am not Sleeping Beauty, and don’t expect a Prince Phillip to sail into my life and save me.

No, my grand ideas, my heart’s desire, my longing in the pit of my stomach, all of my problems, stem from musicians. This is where it all comes from, it’s unmistakably ridiculous, and I don’t stand a chance of making it through unscathed. Granted, there are countless types of music, and not every single one will validate my point. But there are many others that will.  

 Musicians are real people. You can read their lyrics, memorize their chords, and if you are quick enough to make it past security, sometimes you can even touch them. They have a past. They were someone’s next door neighbor. They have food allergies, embarrassing moments, and a love they will never live down. Just like me. Just like you.

I listen in every love song for a name. In the Goo Goo Dolls, it’s Meg, Josh Ritter has Kathleen, and somewhere along the way someone met Delilah and the Plain White T’s thought she was worth a song. Train met Virginia, and every girl who heard that song saw a tiny piece of her life played on the radio. The undeniable truth is that these girls are real. And these boys that stand up behind that microphone, strum their guitar, and talk about those girls, by name or not, are real too. That man has seen a woman like that. He saw her, and wanted her to his core. He pushed back her hair, counted her freckles, and connected the color of her eyes to the sea. He really did that. It was real enough that it stuck in his mind and came out in the form of a song.

Behind every hurting boy is the story of a girl. At some point, the smell of peaches and grass curled up next to him, found his fingers, and never truly let go. She tore through his reality, spinning everything on its axis, and changed the way he saw the world. Moments were shared, personalities unearthed, and some portion of one found sanctuary in the other. It lasted a day, a summer, a lifetime. Maybe it never even took form in the physical. It was the girl that he watched, out of the corner of his eye, and never had the guts to talk to. Everyone has had someone, one that has never quite untangled themselves out of the sticky silk spun webs we caught them in so long ago.

There are songs about being in love, and there are songs about love that existed upon a time but fell apart. Couples generally have ‘a song’, which captures an element of their feelings for each other, and mixed tapes were invented for those that speak through the language of melodies and drum solos. If we’ve ever dated, I have a song for you. It might be beautiful, or bittersweet, or full of sharp, angry words. Regardless, if it comes on the radio, my memory flashes to you involuntarily. Because you are a song that was once lived. And these songs, these tangible, heart wrenching songs, about eyes that are like champagne, and eyes that blaze like fire, and eyes that see right through you, are real. Musicians know what to say, and how to say it.

I, one hundred percent, do not think the world is a place of fairy tales exclusively. Personally, I find myself a bit drawn to people that are rough around the edges. That when those quirky, well-loved details show up, they are unexpected, coming out of nowhere. I don’t want a well imagined character. I don’t want a man who hides who he is in order to appear like a well-trained puppy. I could care less about whether his clothes match, or if he puts the seat down, or has a slightly unhealthy level of obsession with sports or video games or video games involving sports. He could have all or none of those things going on with him. He is who he is, and I don’t want a decoy.

But I do want someone who sees me. This is why I wait. I wait for someone who cares to find the details that would put me in a song. And I know that somewhere out there is someone able and willing to do it. Who will look at me and be able to see all of those things effortlessly.  When we love someone, we immerse ourselves in the cadences of their mannerisms. We sense the pattern of their breathing, find out where they are ticklish, and trace our fingers along their arms absent mindedly.  I can stand in my bare feet on a summer night, and watch as a boy behind a guitar recalls all of these things.

And this is why I’m screwed. It’s not Disney. It’s not Hollywood. It’s not the fantasies or the pretending about situations that have never actually existed. It’s music. Lyrics, raw from the life that they originated from. And I know that it’s unfair, and possibly unrealistic, and a shot in the dark, but there’s always a chance however small, that it could happen. That people could actually feel that way. And tell each other. And live happily ever after in the liner notes. 

How I Feel About Books

Those who know me best know that I don’t cry often. I can cry, I just, don’t. I'll withdraw, or glare, scribble madly into a notebook or pace the floor in frustration, but tears are something that usually do not come easily to me. However, this character trait seems null and void when regarding a good book.

I’ve been able to read since I was four. So that basically means, I met my best friends when I was four and have never looked back. I absolutely love books. Growing up, they were my most constant companions. They were never fickle or angry, never unavailable, and never looked to me to be something that I am not. While we may not have had much money for some things, I always had a book. Or rather, a pile of them.

I have shed more tears within the pages of a worthy book than even I can comprehend. I live through books, feel through them, and have had my real-world wounds and misunderstandings healed through them. I have been taught the downfalls of vanity by Dorian Gray, explored the universe with Ender, and felt the losses of Harry Potter. Bella Swan is my friend. I know her innermost thoughts, and see her heart as plain as day. Also among my group of friends are Princess Buttercup and her darling Westley, and the innocent Jonas, as he becomes The Giver. I have lived across the span of centuries, overseen the construction of A Brave New World, and shuddered when confronted with the tactics of the original Big Brother.  As characters have suffered injustices, I have faced their pain. I have been poor, abused, discriminated against, and abandoned through their eyes. I have also overcome opposition, fought the good fight, and unwittingly fallen in love with Peeta Mellark.  

While real life is something that you must wake up to every day, I take my emotional choices much more slowly. You can’t undo harsh words, or undeclare your feelings for someone. People change as their circumstances change, and it can happen in the blink of an eye. In life, I try, and most often times fail, to be as impassive as a rock. My goal is to keep calm, stay strong, and do as little damage as possible. I am not the girl that runs to her hero weak in the knees. I hand out the tissues, pat the backs, and design the plans that will save us. The world is a beautiful, enchanting place, but there are many things within its grasp that are destined to hurt us. Life will separate us, join us together, and leave us crawling on our knees if we’re not careful. It’s a good thing we’re tough.

Between hard bound covers though, is the only place I can ever let my guard down. I release torrents of emotion, littering the dog-eared corners and chapters inside. I have been known to laugh out loud while reading, regardless of my present location. I will storm like a hurricane within a house, pacing angrily, and when asked what’s wrong, I merely stomp over to the book, point at it furiously, and look at you pointedly as if to say, ‘I don’t BELIEVE what he/she thinks they are doing!’ and storm away again in a flurry. Within minutes you will find me huddled up close, my nose buried next to the printed words, seeking redemption, reason, an answer. You had better not interrupt me in my searching either, or pay a most unwelcome price…

Maybe that’s why I love them so much. After all, books are known to give us answers. We can find the answer to anything in the world so long it is prefaced by a title page. Broken hearts, broken lives, broken bones, we bring our souls to a well-worn favorite, and it fits around us like an old sweater. It is always, comfortingly, the same. The message we take from it may be different, who we identify with, who we fear, and who we love. But the story is essentially the same. It’s the most secure thing in my life.

 Meg Murray will always take form in my head, beginning with the words, “It was a dark and stormy night.” And I’ll always read it hearing my own voice read the right pages, and my dad reading on the left. And as we read way past my bedtime, we sneakily insert words into the sentences that don’t actually exist, to see if the other is paying attention.  Then we peek over, real quick, to see if they noticed. When they invariably do, looking back up at you from behind their narrowed eyebrows as they try not to smile, you reread the sentence the way Madeleine L'Engle intended it to be read. With laughter, a sense of adventure, and inescapably, a few tears along the way.