American Gothic…

One day baby, we'll be old… oh baby, we'll be old and think of all the stories we could've told…

Yes, tout le monde… I've been spending too much time with iTunes and realized (for about the billionth time) that music has the most uncanny ability to associate with memories and firmly implant themselves in my brain (and yours, too… I'm going to guess!).

And since the sad memories are the ones that tend to stick harder in the brain than the good ones, I've found myself feeling a bit abstract, hence these unsmiling photos.

In any case, since I'm a glutton for a good cathartic experience and I adore talking about myself, I thought I'd share a small sampling of songs from the last decade or so of my life and the memories which they evoke in my mind. Please feel free to reflect and comment back with songs and memories that you hold close!

1) The Paper Kites- Bloom- It's my Soldier Boy song. I found The Paper Kites during an insomniac spree through YouTube because I felt that my music collection left quite a bit to be desired. I came across this song and thought that it was perfect for my across-the-ocean relationship. Soldier Boy took a bit of convincing, but finally agreed that the song was perfect for us!

2) Lady Antebellum- Just a Kiss- Before Soldier Boy, I was engaged to a monster. I didn't really know he was a monster when we got engaged, but our breakup was intensely horrific. I literally thought that I would die of a broken heart. I was volunteering for a therapeutic horseback riding program where I crossed paths with a country-obsessed-rodeo-loving-yuppy-north-shore-cowboy. He helped me get out of my funk by shuttling me all over the suburban Chicago countryside in his giant white pickup truck while blasting Lady Antebellum. This is one song that I feel confident that I can sing almost as well as the band!

3) Amos Lee- Windows Are Rolled Down- Post aforementioned breakup, I realized that I had a lot of growing up to do and a lot of fears to conquer. When I was learning to drive, I was in a car that was in a bad accident that gave me PTSD. I was terrified to get into cars, much less drive them for months. I eventually got over it, but still had (and honestly, still have) a fear of driving. I went back to the crash site (blasting this song) and drove through it a gazillion times to prove to myself that I wouldn't crash. And I didn't!

4) Livin' on a Prayer- Bon Jovi- This song takes me back to living in Manhattan. My college roommate and I lived on our own little prayer in moving to the Big Apple and trying to make it big in fashion. I ran out of money and faith in myself and moved upstate with my dad, but she is still there and I'm sure is doing big things. In any case, we enjoyed singing this song on the subway during our morning commute.

5) Last Dance With Mary Jane- Tom Petty- Kind of reminds me of my college roommate as she grew up in an Indiana town who grew up tall and grew up right with them Indiana boys in them Indiana nights, but it also reminds me of my dad burning incense and drinking beer out of urinals (snagged from a hospital visit) at sunset in upstate New York.

6) Le Chemin- KYO- Study abroad in Paris. I spent one of the silliest nights of my life blasting this song and taking photos at the Tour Eiffel.

7) Whatever You Like- T.I.- This was my jam at the end of college. Because I'd ended up homeless and jobless for a while, I worked incessantly through college and kind of missed out on some of the typical undergrad experience. Once I figured out that I could graduate early, and moved in with the aforementioned roommate, I broke loose a bit. This was the getting-ready-pre-gaming-shot-taking song of my senior semester.

8) Run- Snow Patrol- Freshman year of college, right before spring break, my best friend, Summer, passed away in a car accident. We'd made plans to spend a weekend at home together and since I had to drive through her college to get home from mine, she asked if I (meaning the people I was driving home with) could give her a ride. Our car was pretty packed, though we really could have made room for her, and I was told to tell her that there was no way she would fit in our car. She got sick mid-week and decided to have her sister come up from Chicago and drive her home. Her sister was tired when she got to campus and wanted to stay there for the night, but their mum told them to come straight home. She fell asleep at the wheel, flipped the car, and Summer died on impact. That was in 2006, but I still have a hard time not tearing up when I hear this song.

9) California- Phantom Planet- Yeah, I loved the OC. And my dad lived in California. Badly. My senior year of high school, people called me Paris (as in Hilton) and when I got to college, I told people I was from "SoCal" and not Chicago. This song was my anthem.

10) Hands Down- Dashboard Confessional- This.Song. For real. Ok, so I've pretty much been a proud goody-two-shoes for the better part of my life. My role model as a pre-teen was Ren from "Even Stevens." She got good grades, wore cute clothes, and had a hot boyfriend. I wanted to be her. Then, my parents divorced, I started high school, and depression kicked in. Dashboard Confessional (cheesy, yes) was medicine for my soul and this song took the cake. Plus, I once ran around a cruise ship, somewhere in International waters, at 2 AM, singing this song and throwing pineapples into the pool on the lido deck with my spring break friends. Take that, goody-two-shoes me!