music and memories

Got a random reminder the other day of how intertwined music and memory can be...it's amazing the power a song can have, even if you only hear a snippet.

Backstory: Many years back, my long-time partner developed feelings for a co-worker (spoiler: It led to the end of the relationship and was a very dark time for me, though the passing of time (and a lot of introspection and effort) would eventually lead to a better path and a better Stacey).

Back then, there was an older song that played a lot on the radio for some reason (maybe it was on a soundtrack?), whose title was the name of that co-worker. Plus (extra bonus!) the theme of the song was that the singer was smitten with the titular person, could see them being together, that things they thought were wrong in the past could be right in the future. You know, the kinds of lyrics someone going through a tough breakup loves to hear...Hollywood couldn't have written it better. <eyeroll>

Fast forward many, many years down the road. I'm a different person now. After coming through the other side, the lessons learned from that time in my life still serve me well...not the way I recommend learning about yourself, but if it has to happen, you might as well face it head on. So yeah, there I was umpteen years later, sitting at lunch, in circumstances that I couldn't have imagined in a million years, and I catch a bit of the song playing quietly over the speakers.

It was weird. It didn't hurt. It didn't bring back the emotions. It just tweaked me a bit...like tugging on a loose thread at your cuff and feeling it pull further up your sleeve. Connections, vague outlines of memories, a diaphanous blob of long-forgotten feelings.

It definitely didn't hit as hard as it did back when it was all fresh. In fact, it had no true effect, but I found the *memory* of the feelings to be fascinating. It was kind of like looking at a picture of a flower: You see the picture, you can match it to a memory of a real-life flower that you've seen, and you might have a recollection of what it should smell like, but it's removed from reality. You get a kind of "huh, yeah, I remember that flower" blip in your head, then you move on to the next thing. It was interesting to see that the cross-references were still there in my brain, but that they had dulled and diluted and no longer had power.


(There were two songs back then that made everything way, way too real at the time: the one with the co-worker's name, and one that had the singer cursing another for making them fall in love with them.

That one sucked. It was playing one time when I was hanging out with the co-worker (they had been a friend, a close one, actually) and they started crying on my shoulder about the song. So I comforted them, thinking it was about their own dying relationship. Yeah, no...turned out they were crying because it was *my* partner they were thinking of, and their relationship was failing because (and I kid you not, they said this to me) they "wanted a person like <my partner>" (another spoiler: They actually wanted my partner). So yeah, I wasn't fond of those songs, lol.)


(Oh, and don't get the idea that I blame the co-worker for what happened. While no, it's not terribly cool to pursue someone in a relationship, the weight of the choices fell on my ex-partner. They made the commitment to me, they were the one in the relationship. And if that relationship was no longer what they wanted, then it was on them to end it with honesty and integrity, with respect for everyone involved. Not going to lie, though, it would have been easier if I *could* have blamed someone else...I guess that's why so many people do.)