Christopher Street

My world is all musical

I remember getting my first walkman. I was maybe 16 and we ordered it from a mail-order house called LVT. It was quite small and not a little expensive--but my dad bought it and he is famous for buying, if not on the bleeding edge, at least on the dull edge of technology. Come to think of it, I don't think that in the years that would follow, I would ever have one a cool as that one was.

But I digress.

I remember the revelation that that walkman was. Suddenly, my life had a soundtrack. I didn't have to listen to my parents talk about whatver parents talked about. I didn't have to listen to my brother. I didn't have to listen to the cheerleaders at the game. I didn't have to talk to the cashiers at the store. I interacted with the world like I was deaf--and in a real way, I was. I was at least deaf to the sounds of the world. I heard only what I wanted to hear.

At the time, what I wanted to hear was David Bowie and Duran Duran and Elton John and Hall and Oates and, well, Michael Jackson. Come on! Give a sister a break! It was 1983!

The point is, that I took my personal soundtrack everywhere--to the mall, in the car, at the grocery store. I tucked it in my hideous band hat and marched pre-game with it, causing me no end of hat-balance issues. But, were it not balanced in my hat, I would need to suffer through the ensuing football game sans tunes. And, to my 16-year-old self, that was torture of the highest degree.

Now, I am not sure when it happened, but as some point, I stopped taking it with me. Maybe in college, probably after. I don't remember why. Maybe it was during the tragic period between college and grad school when I thought that I should be acting like a grown-up. I know that at some point, though, I just went back to listening to regular earth, with its regular earth noises.

And, at some point, I forgot that there was another way.

Now, you may remember that several months ago, I started ripping my entire CD collection to mp3, so that we could put together a music server that would be accessible from all the PCs in the house--seven at last count! Once that was done, I thought, humph. Maybe I should look into getting an mp3 player. You know, so I could take the mp3s with me? I did a bunch of research and decided that I wanted an iPod.

And then I got laid off. And an mp3 player was an extravagance that we could ill-afford. The irony of that is that if I had just bought the iPod before I got laid off, it wouldn't have really made a blip on the disaster that was the last year, economically. The amount that 13 months of unemployment shoved us into the hole couldn't have been affected much at all by an additional $500. However once I was laid off, it was out of the question.

So, for 13 months, I researched and I drooled. I wasn't sure why I wanted one, exactly. I don't listen to music in the car much. Mostly, I talk on the phone. And I don't listed to music at home, much. Mostly, I watch TV.

But, damn. I wanted one. I guess maybe it was the geek in me. Or maybe it was a sense memory of a time when the world was full of music, if only in my own ears.

I told John that the day I got a job, I was going out and buying one. There were to be no questions asked. I was doing it.

And I got a job. And I did. I didn't get the iPod, though. I came to my senses on the price issue and bought a machine--the RCA Lyra 2840--which had four times as much storage for the price. I now have, in my pocket, 3119 songs.

And my world is all musical again. I remember now, as I sit in Borders, having listened this afternoon to Will Smith, Paul Simon, REM, Prince and the Revolution, the Moody Blues and Nancy Griffiths, how intoxicating it can be to be in your own world for a while.

But would it make a good TV show?

It's interesting.

Many times, I have nothing to say. Other times, I have plenty to say and no energy to say it. Yet other times, I have plenty to say, but I don't know HOW to say it--but I guess that can be lumped in with the no energy thing, in that I lack the energy to try and say it properly.

And sometimes, I just say stuff about nothing.

Mine is the Seinfeld of journals.

I went to the doctor yesterday. I don't perceive that there is something wrong with me, necessarily (although those who know me know that I never rule out Something Being Wrong With Me); it was rather one of those visits that the doctors insist on if you want to keep getting refills on your medication. They need to see me, I guess, to make sure that I'm not dead and it's someone else taking my Paxil. I find the whole process ludicrous. I mean, yesterday, I sat in the outer office for an hour and a half, then I got weighed, got my blood pressure checked, got a **hug** from my doctor, who asked me how I feel, if I'm comfortable with my meds, if I need to have a mammogram. She listened to my lungs, told me I look great! and then wrote me the scrip.

What an utter waste of time. Next time, can't she delegate the hugging and the "you look great!" to my pharmacist? I promise that I will check my own damn blood pressure while I'm waiting in line at the Target. I would even still send her my co-pay. Hell, I would stop by her house and let her listen to my lungs.

It's the waiting for an hour and a half--listening to the hardest-core twangy country music station that exists in DC--that busts my buzz.