Just to preface this blog, I wrote this more as a piece that I’d like to hear on radio. I drew inspiration for this from some of my favorite radio stories, though to be honest, it is not really like any of them. I don’t have a good enough microphone to try to do that justice, so instead you will get the text version of this. I invite you to read it in my voice if you know what that sounds like or anyone else’s for that matter and think about what this might mean to you.
My Life as a Soundtrack
I decided recently that my life needs a soundtrack. One day I want to be followed around by the ghosts of Glenn Miller’s band, playing as I perform the average tasks of a twenty-two year old living at home with my parents.
I want to watch Frank Sinatra looking puzzled as he tries to come up with the right words to describe me as I stare at the different packages of romaine hearts, looking for the right one for my lunches for the week.
I imagine the bands of my soundtrack would have a bit more fun with it watching me cook. They’d see me standing by the kitchen countertop mixing together a salad dressing and drowning out the sound of my bickering at the television. I really hope it’s Louis Armstong’s trumpet drowning that out.
I have to hope that Rod Stewart would make an entrance into my life soundtrack. Hopefully he’d come by to give the perfect background sound to turn parts of my life into the chick flick I imagine his songs could create. Who knows, he might be able to improve my luck in that category.
There are a few songs I’d like to make sure are not in this soundtrack of my life if I can be so bold. Do you think we could avoid playing the theme to Jaws in my life? I like all of my limbs and unless I hear the theme at Universal Studios, I can’t imagine anything good could be happening if I hear that song.
I’d like to avoid any song by Nickelback and Avril Lavigne, as I believe this could be a sign of an awkward turn of events in which I end up at Avril and Chad’s wedding (I had to look up his name, I promise). Maybe we could avoid anything with a deadly theme like James Bond or Star Wars. Like I said before, I like my limbs and don’t like my chances in either of those situations.
My music should send me traveling around the world. I want to hear the words of Matisyahu’s Jerusalem as I walk through the Old City and chow down on some schwarma or some schnitzel. I’ll somehow find myself face to face with Benjamin Netanyahu discussing foreign policy, which I know less about personally than I do about the books of the bible that come after the Fives Books of Moses.
With a glass of Havana Club and Tu Kola in one hand, I want to hear Frank Delgado singing Loco Por Ti. Hopefully, when this song is playing, I am starring into the eyes of some lucky girl’s eyes (okay, let’s be real, I’ll be the lucky one) and find myself surrounded by the whole Cuban gang. There is no question that Ariel will be ripping up the dance floor by the time Qva Libre comes up to play Buena Suerte and I’ll be just trying to keep up with him.
I fear one day I’ll hear tunes reminiscent of the ones that played Steve Job’s funeral in my soundtrack. It will signal the death of someone important and recovery will take a long time. I will sit around and ask myself why I wanted a soundtrack in the first place. I will give John Williams the stink eye for standing behind me while I try to wipe my eyes off. He just wanted to offer me a tissue, but I would have no part of that, because I will have told him it was just allergies.
At some point, maybe I will hear the national anthem of this great nation and serve my country in elected office. I will find serving in office to be a constant struggle, yet a joy at the same time. I’ll hear something like Bach’s Cello Suites or something that equally academic. I’m hoping maybe I’ll Also Hear Fanfare for the Common Man, because that would just be cool. It will be a truly special part of my life.
My hope is that this lifetime soundtrack consists of more highs than lows along the way. It is filled with more memories than I would bother you with. I’m so early in the soundtrack that few of the musicians have even been chosen. There is plenty of noise on the outside that can serve as distractions along the way, but I know that it will all be special.