Of Youth and Song

Saturday night, I was carded when attempting to buy a harmless little bottle of red wine. Ha! It had been so long since I was carded that I had started to believe my youth had finally, irretrievably left me. But one wonderful cashier changed all of that with a quick pass of my Syrah over the scanner and one simple question, "Can I see your I.D.?" Oh youth, it's nice to know you've not vanished completely! Thanks for sticking around a while longer. I'm sure the Corn Pops in my pantry had something to do with it.

Later that same evening, my friend Josh was thumbing through my vastly whittled-down but apparently still-impressive CD collection and asked about Elliott Smith, with whom he's only vaguely familiar. I could only blather like an over-enthusiastic parent and when Josh asked which of Smith's CDs he should borrow as a primer on the genius and beauty of the late singer, I swiftly thrust X/O into his eager hands.

Today at the gym, I listened to X/O as if it were my first time (a rather messy attempt to try and gauge what Josh might be thinking as he listened). Am I the only who constantly pretends I haven't heard a song before, tricking myself in a lame attempt to get that initial emotion from it, to relive my virginity with that particular song? Someone please assure me I'm not crazy. A simple, "No, I do that, too!" will suffice.

Anyway, listening to X/O in full took me instantly back -- in a way only music can -- to a very specific time in my life.

I had been in New York only a few months, and had just recently moved into my first NYC apartment, an uptown, first-floor flat along the East River. I was thrilled to have escaped the confines of my aunt's house in Brooklyn and to finally have my first Manhattan address. The album came to me in the form of a cassette tape from my brother, with whom I'd discussed how much I liked the songs Smith did for Good Will Hunting. I'd also heard "Waltz #2" on WFUV and was absolutely floored by it.

Those days, I spent a great deal of time on the M31 bus, which crossed 57th Street and traveled north-south on York Avenue. Listening to X/O now takes me back there in a flash. Back to the days of riding along York, passing by Sotheby's auction house, long a curiosity of mine; passing the gates of Rockefeller University and wondering what the hell went on there; passing beneath the Roosevelt Island Tram. X/O was my constant companion throughout the winter months I dated Adam and tried to convert him to a Smith fan. X/O was one of only a handful of tapes I had to keep me company when I attempted to fly west for the holidays in 1998, only to be sidelined by the TWA airlines strike that left me stranded on a St. Louis runway for 4 hours that snowy Christmas Eve, while flight attendants served up free booze and my fellow passengers accepted the delay with surprising jolliness. The music moved and soothed me, even amid the inescapable chaos of holiday travel. That's a mammoth feat in itself.

Music is the only medium, the only art form, that has the power to immediately and effortlessly transport me back to another place and time in my life and elicit the memory so completely and so powerfully that it's often too hard to handle. Hence, the select number of CDs in my collection that have gone unlistened to for years. The emotion certain songs awaken are too raw to face and lie dormant only so long as the music stays out of my head. Only music has that power, at least over me.

Posted by ayelet at August 21, 2005 09:49 PM