Soundtrack

1983- Frank Oz's voice floats out of the Playschool record player, singing about the trouble with being green, as I collapse in a heap after spinning circles in the living room.   The oriental rug becomes a magic carpet as it bucks and sways with the Earth.  My little sister pokes her bald head out of the orange plastic tent and pounces with roar, a tiny living doll for me to wrestle with.

1987- We pound our lunchboxes to the tune of I Got My Mind Set On You while the wheels of the bus spin beneath our seats.  I poke my tongue through the holes left by my vacating baby teeth and smile watching my best friend's braids bounce up and down.

1990- My uncle drops his voice, rocking "I'm a soul man.. duh nuh nuh nuh" at the side of Jim Belushi's grave on Martha's Vineyard- a brief tribute, complete with dancing.  Giggling, we solemnly leave flowers, grass, and various rocks we've found on the headstone, while my dad tapes the whole scene.

1993-  "You have to hear the whole thing- we're taking the long way home," my dad shouts over the epic guitar riff from Freebird that pulsates through the car.  I stick my head out the window and close my eyes, the wind whooshing my hair out of my face as I feel music for the first time.

1995- Eric Clapton serenades as I drag the tall boy with the long black hair to the dance floor.  He tells me I don't have to stand on tiptoe, but when I shrink back to my normal height, he says maybe I should.  The man in the song sings about the wonder of it all while I put my arms around his neck, and feel safe, like I'm home

1997- I stand on a stage and electricity shoots out of my fingers. The calm before the storm, and I know-it's been coming for some time-what "real" is. The stage lights flood my vision, the people dissolve into a shadow, and I reach for his hand to guide me through.

1997- Stumbling up the metal stairs on the boat, tears blur my vision, and the movement of the post-graduation cruise and the realization that "it's over" make me feel a little sick.  In the darkness, an arm reaches out around my waist, guiding me to the throngs of dancing teens on the deck, and I turn into warmth and comfort as Hard To Say I'm Sorry blares out of the DJ's speakers.
  
1998- He doesn't want the world to see me, and I don't think that they'd understand, but with whisky on his breath, and his palm against the back sliding door, I sneak him into the dark house and over to the couch.  He puts his arms tentatively around my waist, ensnaring my fingers with his, and we curl up watching the lead singer of the Goo Goo Dolls run through a dark tunnel on MTV, neither of us wanting to admit there's a shelf life to whispers and hiding out.  

1999- Pushing the door open, I see the broken shell of my sister crying into the fish-patterned quilt on her bed.  Jerry Garcia sings about taking his daughter home as I cradle her in my arms and our sobbing melds to a hushed crescendo, knowing Daddy's never going to be right there beside us again.

2000- We bounce around the car, while The Watermelon Crawl reminds us we aren't in the north country anymore.  Blue Ridge Mountains make way for statues of Elvis and a southern drawl while we laugh and draw signs, cruising in our topless car through the Deep South.

2004- Elphaba is defying gravity as I speed west toward the possibility of everything.  Her voice drains into Julie Roberts crooning about breaking down, and I have to stop myself from pulling a u-turn in middle America, reminding myself for the thousandth time that you regret the things you never try, not the ones you do.  


2007- The colored leaves softly swirl around my feet as my heels sink into the soft ground.  My mother's hand holds tight as she whispers "no crying", and the strains of "Storybook Love" cue our walk.  Looking up as we round the corner, I can see my future husband's smile, and my happy ending.

2010- My daughter rests her head on my shoulder, her boundless energy curbed for the moment by my voice singing about jet planes and how I'll never let her go.  I breathe, thankful for this moment, for our lives, and think how close I came to losing both.

2012- A baby cries, interrupting Ella Fitzgerald, her namesake, as she enters the world.  The nurse towels her off, and my husband places her on my chest, and I think how perfect she is, how she stops crying at my touch, and how lucky I am that with this one, there are no complications.

2014- Belting "I'm The Only One", we cruise in a black Subaru under the bright blue sky. Reveling in a road trip to another country, we pull off the road towards a sign for homemade mustard and blown glass, regaling each other with tales of our former lives, when we were younger, wilder, and totally free.

My Notes: I've updated this, fixing the language and adjusting pieces, while adding in new memories.  I felt it only fair to reshare, as I made my students write their own versions in class, and it inspired me to revisit my own.  The original intro, and then the newly revamped soundtrack, are below.

I started this on the 14 year anniversary of losing my dad.   It's such a euhpemistic term- lost.  As though somehow we will find our dead again some day.  I hope that somehow, we will.  I'd love to know Dad's take on my kids, life trajectory, and the Yankees' championships that have happened since his passing.  But the afterlife and religion, and spirituality and mythology, can wait for another day.

Thinking about the brevity of life inspired me to re-read a short piece,  Soundtrack by LisaGroen Braner, something I was introduced to during one of my Master's classes.   If you haven't read it, take a moment and treat yourself.  In homage to that work, and to the memories that I've been mulling for the last few months as I worked and reworked my own piece (giving myself until Father's Day to complete it).   I created the following.