Bless The Telephone

I've been really digging this song lately.

I look forward to having someone to share it with.

The songs make sense

This weekend we watched a previous episode of the TV show Castle. There is a spot in the episode where, prompted by a conversation with his teenage daughter about love songs and poems, Richard Castle asks Kate Beckett how you know when you are in love. Her short, off the cuff, said in passing response was, "The songs made sense."

Now in context it is quite the funny line. But I've been thinking about it. And there might actually be some truth to it.

I've always liked music. There is a real power to music. Music and poetry can speak to the heart and soul. But they generally get their message across better when you've been in that place they are describing, when you've felt whatever it is they are expressing.

And as I thought about it, it just made sense. When I realized I was in love with HP and he was in love with me, my taste in music actually changed slightly (it's a constantly evolving taste anyway, but this was a direction change I could pinpoint rather than a slow evolution). Songs about lost love or longing didn't have the same effect on me as they had before. Songs about love gone wrong really stopped appealing to me. But songs about real love, not summer love, or lustful longing, really started striking a chord in my chest. It was as if they were speaking to me, or perhaps for me.

Those songs just made a lot more sense.

Thanks, but no thanks

One of the talents I envy most in others is the ability to wrap their thoughts and feelings perfectly into 2-5 minute musical segments. There are some songs that just perfectly communicate what I'm thinking and say it better than I ever could.

Roxie made a suggestion for a theme song for this blog. I heartily agree, but I'd like to throw these two in the mix as well.





Unfortunately, thanks to a little surprise I found in my Facebook last night, this is more along the lines of what I'm feeling today. Warning: adult language, which I normally wouldn't put on this blog (or any, really), but she just captures the feelings so nicely. If you'd rather not listen because of that, no problem, as you can get the gist of it from the title.



Remember when I left The Homeland and said I was glad not to have accidentally run into certain people ever again? (Except when I visit, just ask Trixie, I'm on high alert the whole time.) The internet has changed all that. It's also a good confirmation that I really need to work on forgiveness this year.

For Christmas

Everyone keeps wishing us a happy first Christmas together. What do you want to bet that next year nobody will mention that it's our second Christmas together? But it was a good Christmas.

HP mentioned the other night that in the past he always felt that he needed to be moving on with his life at the holidays, that he was still doing what he'd always done and needed to do something more in the next year. I think a lot of people would say that about the holidays. And just like Big Bird, some times it's people we want more than things for Christmas, whether that's to be with our family we've always had, or the family we will have some day.



(I've never danced on the telephone either Big Bird.)

Or, if you prefer a more grown-up version of that idea that's not exactly tied to a holiday, Michael Bublé's latest song "Haven't Met You Yet" is absolutely wonderful (and quite possibly the theme song for this blog).



There were so many times when I just knew that things would be great and I'd be willing to work through all the things that weren't so great just as soon as I met the right person. And if there's anything I learned through my dating experiences, you really never do know when you'll meet them.

Memory Jogs

Music is powerful memory tool. I can still remember the address of my family's home from my kindergarten year, since I learned it to the tune of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star". When a song I haven't heard in years comes on the radio, I can still remember all the lyrics.

Music can also have powerful memories associated with them. Roxie talked about this before. Those memories can, of course, have positive connotations, but they can also have negative, which makes them impossible to listen to ever again.

Right now, there are a handful of songs I will probably never be able to listen to again.

For example:

"The Reason" by Hoobastank - While we'd known each other for several weeks, it was only our second or third date. In the driveway of his friend's house where we'd had dinner and watched a movie, he hugged me and said "I think I'm falling in love with you." As he was driving me home, he played this song and said "This reminds me of you." Say what? It was really awkward because I didn't know why a song about turning his life around because of someone, especially when I didn't think he was all that off track, would make him think of me. It's a lot of responsibility so early on - was I really that much an influence on him so quickly? It was all going so fast. We had a little talk about it after we got back to my place, but were done for good about six weeks later. Every time I hear even a snippet of that song, the awkwardness of that moment is fresh in my mind.

The entire "Everything You Want" album by Vertical Horizon - One thing I loved about the ex-fiance was how much we talked. We could and often did talk for hours. One night we decided to talk about us, but we both lived with other people and needed somewhere private to talk. So, we drove to a parking lot and just sat in my car. We talked so long that we probably listened to that album, simply because it was in my CD player, at least four times. Because of how things ended with us, this album was a reminder of all the failed talks we had. The good news about not ever listening to it again is that I never really loved it in the first place, so no big loss.

There are several other songs that remind me of specific people, places, and things. Sometimes it's hard to listen to them, sometimes it's not. Sometimes, it would be easier to erase one's memory, like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, but since memories and experiences make us who we are today, it's a actually a good thing to keep them around. And there's a lot more music I can listen to without the ones I can't handle anymore.

Anything you can't listen to anymore?

A perfect example of eternal love

Two years ago a friend of mine was diagnosed with brain cancer. She had three children and had just given birth to her fourth. There were times she couldn't remember the new baby. Surgery and medication worked for a while, and while she never got completely better, she was able to have time with her family and children.

But then the treatments stopped working. And then they just took it one day at a time knowing what was coming.

She and her husband were junior high sweet hearts. His devotion to her is inspirational. I watched them and I hope I never have to put my husband through that. And I pray that I can find a love like theirs.

A month or so ago I heard Alan Jackson's "Sissy's Song" on the radio and couldn't stop the tears. This friend of mine was very young. She is a daughter, wife, and mother. And to my mortal eyes, this makes absolutely no sense.

But there is a heaven waiting. Her suffering has an end. Her family will be eternal. In the mean time I know she'll be looking down on them and hoping they don't worry about her any more.

She died today at one in the afternoon. She will be greatly missed. And her legacy and example will continue in the hearts of countless people, mine included.

How we got a song and I announced a, um, something

I know you're supposed to think before you speak, but sometimes that isn't possible, or something.

I've never really known how couples ended up with a song. I've never known a couple who had one. It seemed a thing from the movies or days gone past or something. Yet the other day when the Boyfriend and I were driving around a song came on the radio and before I knew what I was saying I said, "Oh, it's our song!"

But it's not our song because we fell in love to it. It's our song because it follows us around. And we both like it and sing along to it because we know all the words because it's on the radio just about every time we're in the car, some trips more than once. It's our song the way a stray dog is your dog. It just followed us home so we kept it.

The song? "I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz. And it's a bit fitting that the Boyfriend likes to nibble my ear when I scooch a little closer.

We prefer this version of it, acoustic with Toca and a garden gnome. He likes the skatting at the beginning. I like the garden gnome. And we both think the end does get dragged on a bit. Now we just need to find this version for sale somewhere.



As for the second time I've spoken without thinking recently -

Tonight we went to a Church scripture class together. He told the instructor (whom I don't know) that we would be leaving early (we wanted to watch "Chess in Concert" on PBS). As we made our exit, the Boyfriend in front of me, the instructor said, "Thanks [Boyfriend], and (pause) spouse?" I was already half out the door and was completely caught off guard on that one, so the only thing I could get out was, "Not yet." And then we walked to the car while I turned redder by the second and he joined me in the redness when he realized what the exchange had been.

Wish I would've taken a moment to think on that one. Although how do you respond to something like that in five seconds or less?

How do you know?

There are many many things I love about this article: One date wonder. The first of which is that it is a man calling for more courtship.

But what he says makes so much sense. Two people do need time to get to know each other. People are different at different times (women especially, we change depending on what week of the month it is). Some people are different at different times of the year. If you know a person just a few weeks or a couple of months, what can you really know about them? I'm not saying you need to know someone for years and decades though either. There is a happy medium.

A friend of mine recently asked me how I knew I wanted to pursue things with the boyfriend, how I knew things would work out. It's an interesting question. And as I tried to think of an answer, I actually realized that I did it the same way I've known other things.

I loved the talk given in the April 2008 General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints by Elder Carlos A. Godoy of the Seventy - Testimony as a Process. In it he describes how a testimony is rarely the result of a singular event. Rather it is an accumulation of small events that build on each other until we know. That is how we gain a testimony, through a series of events.

As I thought about it, that's how I know what I know about this relationship. I can, actually, point to a few specific moments where I've had a feeling from heaven that things could very well work out, and I've kept those to myself. But it isn't because of those moments that I want things to work out. It's been a series of small events. It's the quirky names he calls me. It's the questions he asks and how he really does want to know what I think. It's putting his arm around me at church or holding my hand when we go to the temple. It's taking me for ice cream when I've had a real crappy day, or even when I've had some great news I want to celebrate. It's all of these moments, and so many more, that make me know I want it to work out. And it's all of these moments that make me know, more than signs from heaven, that it really could work out.

Lately I absolutely love this song. This is what I want, to be in love with my best friend. And that only comes with time.



Another line I love is "lucky to be coming home again." It reminds me of a line from Finding Nemo when Dory says, "I look at you, and I... and I'm home." I think that's part of love, that feeling of being home. And that too can only come with time, from building on small moments together.

The woman in the song

Things have been relatively calm for me relationship wise, but I still get the itch to write. So I thought now would be a good time to get through some articles and whatnot that I've been wanting to respond to for a while.

Jeez, over a year ago, a friend showed me the blog Charming, but Single, and in particular her post "Coming clean in a roundabout sort of way." I don't read the blog any more because, 1. she stopped really posting, and 2. she just really didn't seem to have a handle on life. But that particular post has stayed with me and I've wanted to write about how wrong she is on one point ever since seeing it.

She says:

I do want to be the Woman in the Song – the one who makes him crazy, keeps him up at night, without whom his days would all be nights. And even as I think that, I immediately reject the notion of such as pure fantasy. We don’t all get to be the heroine. We aren’t all the Woman in the Song.

She's wrong. We do all get to be the heroine. We do all get a chance to be the woman who makes him crazy, who keeps him up at night, without whom his days would all be nights. It is not pure fantasy!

And the best thing is that he will be your hero. He will make you crazy, keep you up at night, without whom your days would all be nights.

And it will feel like it is better than any fantasy, beyond your wildest imagination.

Some of us heroes and heroines just take longer to find each other. Some of us don't hear the music to that song till later. But if you don't believe you are a heroine, then your hero won't see you as such either. I have seen many couples where I know I could not have married the guy and been happy with him, but the woman who did marry him is happy beyond belief, and he couldn't be more in love with her. So in the end, it does all work.

In the end, we are all the woman in the song. We just have to find the man that is singing.

The Song Remembers When

Do you ever have those songs that just take you back to some memory? Even if the song wasn't a part of the memory at first? Or do you have those songs that just seem to capture your feelings at the time so perfectly it's like they took the song from your own heart?

I remember I was driving home from class almost two years ago and a song came on the radio ("Strawberry Wine" by Deana Carter) and I couldn't breathe. It was like the song had reached down inside me and pulled out, something. The bittersweet that it pulled up. And the lines: Is it really him or the loss of my innocence I've been missing so much. Well, they just shouldn't play songs like that when I'm driving on the freeway.

But maybe I needed that song. Maybe I needed it to reach down and pull out whatever it was it did so I could face it, and then cast it away. Because when I heard it on the radio the other day, I remember it having that effect on me once, but the feelings it pulled up then aren't there any more. And I definitely don't miss him any more (and that's a whole other story too).

The song right after "Strawberry Wine" the other day was another one of those ones that grabs things down deep inside me, or at least it was one of those. "Don't Make Me" by Blake Shelton. The chorus on that one used to really get me: Baby I love you, Don't wanna lose you, Don't make me let you go. Took such a long time, For me to find you, Don't make me let you go. Yet as I started to sing along with it this time, I was fine. I think in the past it was because it had seemed like it had taken such a long time to find someone I wanted and I was so afraid they wouldn't want me. But that doesn't worry me any more. There was a time when I felt I could definitely relate to this song, when it was singing the fears and worries of my heart. But it isn't any more.

So maybe "The Song Remembers When" (by Trisha Yearwood), but I don't have to carry those memories with me any more.

That one percent

Ninety-nine percent of the time I am perfectly fine with my current social situation. I have an interesting life that keeps me active. I enjoy what I do.

But there is that one percent.

I would say that a large part of that one percent comes when I have to interact with people who are not satisfied with my social situation. They seem to forget that it is my life, not theirs. But that is not the topic for right now.

The other half of that one percent is different. Everyone has ups and downs in their life. Everyone. We enjoy the ups. We work through the downs. And we move on. We shoulder our loads and keep going. Except when you can't. Sometimes it's just too heavy right then. That's when I don't like being single.

This week I had several major deadlines hit all at once, with several more coming in quick succession over the next few weeks. And it is really weighing on my shoulders right now. And at that end of the day I would love to have someone I could set things down with for a bit. Or someone I could hand off some of the small and mundane things to for a while. Because when I am stressed like this, the small things just don't seem so small. I think that's probably why I was near tears this afternoon over a small detail about a trip next month. It has been resolved now and I ate more chocolate, so it's smoothed out now.

Sometimes I just get tired of doing everything alone.

Taylor Swift (I believe country music has the best love songs) has a new song out, "Love Story." It's stuck in my head lately. The last verse speaks to this a bit for me.

I got tired of waiting,
Wondering if you were ever comin' around.
My faith in you was fading
When I met you on the outskirts of town,

And I said,
"Romeo save me - I've been feeling so alone.
I keep waiting for you but you never come.
Is this in my head? I don't know what to think-"

One of these days Romeo will get here. In the meantime, there might be some things I drop because I can't carry them all myself at the time. As long as I don't drop the chocolate, I'll be good.