Look down

Here is the deal: this was supposed to be the summer of the here and now and outward living, as well as the summer of anticipatory forward thinking. It turned out, as life almost always does, to be quite different than what was expected, and I've probably spent more time this summer in retrospective thought and inside my head than any time in the last several years.

(Oh, I've spent a fair bit in the here and now, too, but I would have given anything for 'it' to have been anywhere else.)

As it turns out, it's not all bad. I am remembering things that weren't forgotten--god knows, I never forget anything--but that had lost their sharp story telling crispness, dulled by being relegated to just memories. I started to remember more clearly and as I did, there was that whoosh! of all the sights and sounds and smells that were the makeup of what I was thinking about.

Especially the sounds.

***

I've always been able to associate songs and pieces of music with all notable events--and quite a good number of unremarkable ones--in my life. I suppose it's the same for a lot of people: if we all sat down and put our mind to it, we could some up with a pretty comprehensive soundtrack for our life. I'd never really given much thought, though, to how closely and how often I could relate something that had happened to one or more pieces of music. Like Mick in The Heart is a Lonely Hunter realizes, "[b]ut all the time—no matter what she was doing—there was music."

(Love the book. Love Mick. Possibly felt more affinity for her as a character than any I can ever remember, partly because the closeness in age to her when I read the book for the first time.)

***

It's been good fun (amazing I can still use that word) , despite 'it' all, looking back at everything. Even though I'm now where I'm finally more inclined to step out of my own head, I have--truth be told--gotten a kick out of the intense navel gazing, especially with all the music associations, and don't quite want to stop, yet. I'm curious to see how long I can keep going--or how much I'm willing to remember--before I lose either steam or interest in sustaining my audience of me. Even I have a limit, I would think, to how fascinating I find myself.

That's the deal.


P.S. The whole F.R.O.G. thing? Self, that was just me being extra witty and punny, what with carrying on the whole frog theme from my other two blogs, and the references and the acronym. In this case, I think I went overboard and defeated the original purpose.