Notes to self.

My ipod and I are having a renewed love affair. 

Last week, while navigating the nation’s airports, I watched five episodes of Burn Notice (seriously, my new throb…yogurt and all…) and listened to a dozen podcasts from A Prairie Home Companion and This American Life.  How did I ever tour without this amazing little device?

It’s like all the best mix tapes all in one place.  How many hours did I spend dubbing 80’s rock ballads?  Songs that defined who we were and who we wanted to become?

I’m old enough (solidly in my mid-thirties thankyouverymuch) that giant chunks of my life are defined by a certain group of songs.  I can blink…and be right there.

Tonight, it’s Nickel Creek.  It’s 2000.  And I’m creating stagehand training materials for my first season at the University road house.

Last night, it was Fleetwood Mac.  And I’m in my purple Dodge Dakota.  And I’m going over to sleep at my new boyfriend’s apartment and my heart does a flip flop.  It’s 2001 all over again. (I married that boyfriend, for the record.)

Shania Twain.  And I’m in my tiny midtown apartment getting ready for a fag hag night on the town. 

Kenny Chesney, Chumbawamba, Ben Folds Five, Peter Gabriel…I’m driving truck on tour.

Toad the Wet Sprocket and I’m in the electrics cave in Maine, trying to pretend that I knew what I was doing. (I didn’t.  Not really.)

Jewel, Enya, Counting Crows.  I’m in my last year of college.  And collecting all the V-cards I can possibly find. 

Pearl Jam?  Nirvana?  Red Hot Chili Peppers?  That was high school.  And I discovered Birkenstocks.  And coffee.  And angst poetry.  I should look for some of that.  It’s probably worse than I remember. 

My first slow dance with a boy (who I recently discovered on Facebook) was to “Love Bites.”  Or was it “Every Rose Has Its Thorn”?  Both remind me of him.  You know, the eighth grade version of him. 

It makes me wonder what music will define me this time?  I mean, do I have to really know who I am?  Or have I mentally returned to the days of sweaty rock ballads, V-cards and miles of highway?