Tuesday, December 30, 2008

The First Love of My Life

Sometimes I just want the intoxication; I want to lose myself, sometimes.

Music, created for the faint of heart. But what power it possesses, the power to smother you with its words, and how you feel it, how you watch yourself waft up and sway with it, and as you float away, you wave goodbye, because you’ll be gone until the last vibration has worn out, until it’s faded away and we’re forced to be ourselves again.

And how it feels okay to lose ourselves, for a bit, because it seems when we return, we’re not the same person. Like something’s gone. But it’s okay, because it was something nonsensical and harmful and we didn’t need it anyway. And something has been lifted, and we can breathe, finally, all as we reminisce in the memories of the tunes, slowly flirting with the air around it, and we smile weakly and close our eyes, thinking about what we once were, what we thought we would be, and what will happen.

And how music makes us appreciate what we have, what we are, what we can be, what we see ourselves as, others as. And how the little things in life are suddenly enlarged, put under a microscope and displayed for those who want to see. How the rasp in one’s voice is multiplied and concentrated and seems to mingle and how beautiful it sounds, how singularly lovely it is, it makes you want to run, run to the utopia that is so rare, but you believe you’ll find it, because music has seeded the truth in you…a brilliance of hope, coming only in situations where you need it most.

Music can take you farther than any form of transportation ever could.

It can strengthen the emotion you feel.

Music can be created, or simply enjoyed.
Music is around you, your mom, your cousin, your crazy pet, your obsessed secret admirer, your boss, everyone, even if they don't take the time to notice or appreciate it.

Music can be encouraging, or make you feel like the universe will eventually collapse, because of its burning desire to crush all of humanity.

It can heal wounds that doctors will never be able to fix, and create tensions among even the most close of friends.

Music does things to people that even drive them to insanity, or cause them to commit a crime so unforgivable that they live out the short remainder of their life in a damp corner of a dumpster.

But it also acts a reminder;

A reminder of someone you love, a reminder of how much you despise your ex, a reminder of thoughts in the back of your mind that were never even contemplated until this very moment. It has the capacity to store secrets and stories within its meaningful lyrics and notes, secrets that no one except the one who wrote it can ever truly know about.

Music should provide company when you're alone, and solitude when around others. It connects events and times in your life and in others, with ideas and descriptions too powerful for human ears to understand. But we do try our best to believe every single word they pronounce, and every single note their guitar or piano creates. Often times, music is considered a religion, where the individual can be drowned out in sound and prayer, through whatever musical instrument or stereo system they own.
Music is and always will be all these things, and obviously it would be lying to say that it is not an important part of our lives.

It's certainly an important part of mine, perhaps even everything.

The way I see it, people can choose to be content with how they live, or take the wrong path and end up in misery for the rest of their lives, until they get hit by a bus or develop an incurable disease. The way I see it, music can guide you when all the maps in the world become inaccurate, and all the help in the world has disappeared.

Miracles can and do happen.

What is music, in any sense but a miracle? How can something so simple make us simply feel so much? And touch us so much?

Music can be born, but it will never die. It's immortal, just like time.