Well I’m back on the road. Back to Espana. Back to Erin. Her birthday is this Monday, so I am making a quick trip to see her and celebrate her 27th year with her. Although I was just in Spain a month ago, this is a much needed trip for us as we haven’t been doing so well managing the distance the last few weeks. Hopefully some time together will remind us of good we are together.
But the story of Erin and I isn’t the tale I wish to tell today. Rather, I’ve been thinking about the numerous adventures I’ve been on since I turned 18 and left the safety net that is home. It sometimes boggles me how all my trips to different cities, states, countries and continents blend together in a thick, hazy misted memory. Yet, what is amazing is discovering the random triggers not only lifting the fog to reveal a bright, vivid image of what was….but enabling you to relive and feel a stolen moment from time.
Much like Harry Potter falling into the pensive, you’re transported back to a frozen still of memory reenacted where you simultaneously become audience and participant in the memory itself. As such, a flood of emotions wash over you as suddenly as a Pacific tsunami, and you are overcome with familiar emotions of a remembered past. Yet, you are enlightened by new perspective on an old tale, enriching the moment all the more.
I came across this feeling more than a few times recently. For me, the item most often serving as the port key to a forgotten past is music. More to the point - specific songs. So here are six songs that often act as mileage markers along the road that maps my travel in and through life.
Song: “Mainstream”
Artist: Outkast
Album: ATLiens
Moment in Time: October, 1996. Trinity Cross Country Team Travel to Memphis
Feeling: Overwhelmed, lost, floating, searching. But comforted by the music.
I list “Mainstream” mainly because it was the one song from this album that came on with the shuffle feature from my iPod, but most of the non-radio songs from this album take me back to this time. If my life was like the movie Inception, then the ATLiens album was my go-to talisman. It kept me grounded in reality when I felt like I was living through a surreal dream world that was the Trinity Bubble.
While I had always grown up around white folks, going to school at Trinity was definitely a culture shock. I had never been surrounded by people who didn’t share similar interests, ideas, and backgrounds as mine. I struggled to find an outlet. I didn’t find a spot on the basketball team. I stumbled onto the cross country team. Never in a million thoughts did I imagine myself driving in a 12 passenger van through Arkansas on my way to Memphis, TN to run a 5 mile race as hard as I could with a group of people who had never really had much opportunity to be friends with someone who was black or Mexican, or in my case, both. While I was excited by the opportunity to continue a life in sports through college, I was unsure of the path it was taking me on because it was too new and different from comfort zone. The only thing I could do was slide on my headphones, sit at the back of the bus, and get lost in the contemplative lyrics of Dre and Big Boi, who seemed to be in search of themselves, as well. ATLiens, I knew the feeling well.
Song: “Days Go By”
Artist: Dirty Vegas
Album: Dirty Vegas
Moment in Time: June, 2002. Pentathlon camp in COS, deciding to leave Texas
Feeling: Scared, sentimental, holding on to something but knowing I needed to let go.
I was super depressed around this time period. I just had a really bad break-up with my college girlfriend of three years. I had lost my job. Pentathlon wasn’t going as well as I hoped. I felt lost. And this song summed up a lot of that feeling. Plus the video of an older, professional man in a suit break dancing to honor the memory of an old flame is straight money. Love it.
Listening to this song as I type, I can remember coming to Colorado Springs for a pentathlon camp and deciding to simply not go back to Texas. Aside from my family, what was there for me besides bad memories and hurt feelings? I can recall driving around town during the summer, feeling lost, just searching for something from within, knowing I had less than $50 in my bank account. Even as low as I felt about my predicament, I felt hopeful is some way – bolstered by the decision to move to COS and plunge head-first into the rough waters of pentathlon.
Song: “Beautiful”
Artist: Snoop Dogg with Pharrell
Album: Paid Tha Cost to Be Da Bo$$
Moment in Time: October, 2002. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. First international trip for pentathlon.
Feeling: Eyes wide open, hopeful, overwhelmed with excitement
It’s hard to beat the first five seconds of this lick. Pharrell sets it off and the beat jumps in, setting a breezy, upbeat vibe that completely takes me back to Copa Cabana Beach in Brazil. That fall, this song and video came out just in time see me qualify for my first international trip in pentathlon. Brazil isn’t a bad place to pop your travel cherry, that’s for sure. But more than that, qualifying for the competition was incredibly meaningful for me. It validated the decision I made a few months earlier to move to the Springs despite little success in the sport of pentathlon and even less income. But by the time I was heading to Brazil, I had a new job, a room at the OTC, a new girlfriend, experienced snowfall for the first time in a decade (it was only a dusting but I was still amazed), and my time in pentathlon was looking up after beating the top ranked American to qualify. In short, I had a new lease on life and was very happy to see what I could make of it. Next stop, Rio de Janeiro!
Song: “Stem/Long Stem/Transmission 2”
Artist: DJ Shadow
Album: Entroducing
Moment in Time: Jan/February 2003. Canadian Winter Nationals for Pentathlon, Alberta, Canada
Feeling: Focused, centered, relaxed, ready. In my container.
After befriending a few Canadian athletes in Brazil (that’s a PG way of putting it), I was invited to compete in their county’s winter nationals held in the seemingly frozen tundra of Alberta, Canada. I normally don’t get to see much on competition trips, but this time it was a bit ridiculous. I saw the airport, an airport internment room (I had a little gun trouble with the Mounties), snow and ice, a hotel room, more snow and ice, a rec center, more snow and ice, my hotel room again, and more snow and ice. But I wasn’t in Canada to really see anything , I kind of figured there wasn’t much to Alberta and seemed to be right.
I was there to compete. And this was the first time I felt absolutely at peace and ready to compete the night before. I still had the pre-comp jitters, but I was focused and centered on accomplishing the goals I had set forth. I couldn’t quite sleep that night, so I listened over and over to DJ Shadows’s Entroducing, a critically acclaimed hip-hop album that really propelled the drum-and-base instrumental forward as an art form. And this song had me locked in. The end of the song finishes without a beat and fades more into a melody. Listening to it has you feeling like you are living out a moment set to the soundtrack of the Social Network. The music captures you, pulling you into the moment.
The next day, I had one of my better days as a pentathlete, winning the 3k run, having a personal shoot and swim (at the time) and finishing second in the fence. I finished second overall, just missing out on a win by two fencing touches.
Song: “Trouble”
Artist: Coldplay
Album: Parachutes
Moment in Time: July, 2003. Austin, TX. Just won Fencing Nationals, Div 3
Feeling: Sad. Alone. Questioning.
It seems quite paradoxical to win a national fencing tournament and feel depressed afterwards. But that’s where I found myself at the time. I was competing at US Fencing’s Summer Nationals Austin. I had only been fencing for less than two years and romped through the Division III ranks of the competition with little concern for the feelings of the people I slaughtered. The closest a competitor came to me was in a 15-10 bout. Although the level of competition wasn’t very high, I still was on fire relative to my own skill level in a tournament with well over 200 competitors who all had to qualify to be there. And it was a great feeling to win that way.
But afterwards, I just remember winning and having no one to celebrate with. I had just been introduced to this Coldplay album, so I had been listening to it as I drove around Austin, heading to meet a girl I had recently been introduced to. I remember thinking that if success in the sport remained to be like that moment, I was not heading in a good direction. It made me question the point of it all when you don’t have anyone close to you to celebrate with once the medals have been passed out.
Song: “Incident at Gate 7”
Artist: Thievery Corporation
Album: Sounds From the Thievery Corporation
Moment in Time: August, 2008 Beijing China, Olympic Games
Feeling: Do Work Son!
In the first week of working in Beijing for the 2008 Games, a group of staff stopped in at an American owned pizza and sandwich shop. And for a random lunch spot in the middle of China, the place had some crazy chill ambiance. Patrons could tag graffiti notes in marker, young Chinese hipsters came in and out, placing orders and chilling out with friends. And in the background played some serene, down-tempo, drum-and-base music that had you bobbing your head and swaying your shoulders in rhythm. It was just “cool” personified.
One of the women I was with ran the dining services for our high performance center and she found herself vibing to the beat as well and went to ask the manager about the music being played as she wanted something similar for the dining room. A few days later, the store owner came through with three data discs full of similar music. Heavy in the rotation mix was songs from Thievery Corporation.
The music from the instrumentals is perfect throw onto an iPod and go to work to. And since much of my work consisted of solo duties and back and forth travel to the airport, Thiever Corporation got played heavily. With so many memories coming from my work at the airport, is there a better title to a song triggering airport ops flashbacks than “Incident at Gate 7”? As Bama would tell it at the Hot Spot, “Do WORK son!”
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