A Little Morning Music...

Looking back, I can see that each significant change in my life has sparked a short period of shut-down, a time of withdrawal...I gather the loose threads, tying or cutting as needed, and find myself moving back through my collection of music.

Thirty years ago, this would have been accomplished cross-legged on the floor close to one of the speakers, carefully placing each cherished piece of vinyl on the turntable, singing along to the lyrics on the album cover. iTunes has changed the surface structure of this experience for me. And so has the 'net.

Googling a dimly remembered phrase from a childhood memory enabled me to find the first song I ever remember singing along to on that battered old pink kitchen radio: "Please don't talk to the lifeguard, please don't talk to the lifeguard...guess I'll swim way out into the sea and then he'll have to swim out there to rescue me..." "Don't ever do that," said my mom, as I perched on the counter singing and watching her measure flour for cookies. "Never pretend to drown..."

I now live in a world where I can be watching an episode of Chuck, hear a song I like, and have it tracked down and in my iTunes in an hour.

This ease has worked in my favour these past few days as I have compiled a new playlist for this moment in my time...and today I greet the morning with it.

Morning has Broken, Cat Stevens; That Lucky Old Sun, Louis Armstrong; Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want, The Smiths; Different Drum, Stone Poneys; You Belong to Me, Jason Wade; Songs from the Wood, Jethro Tull; So What, Pink; The Circle Game, Joni Mitchell; Many Rivers to Cross, Jimmy Cliff; Redemption Song, Bob Marley; Dream a Little Dream of Me, The Mamas and the Papas; Everybody Hurts, R.E.M.; Boulevard of Broken Dreams, Green Day; 100 Years, Five for Fighting; Forever Young, Joan Baez...and the Reflection song from Mulan....of course!