All of the words in all of my life

I recently signed up for a local writers' mailing list so I am now inundated with legal issues, ads for writing classes, requests for agent recommendations and response group notices on a daily basis. Most of it I delete without reading (I can barely call myself a writer anyway, do I really need an agent or advice on how to self-publish?), but I save all the calls for submissions. Who knows? I might actually, you know, submit something.

Tonight I was trying to find some appropriate writing samples to send to my interviewers (because I would like the opportunity to turn the job down), but decided to make myself feel better by being Proactive and starting a revision of one of my submission possibilities. This, I told myself, is what REAL writers do. Revise revise revise!

Ha. Five minutes later I was surfing iTunes.

People, I love iTunes. That thirty second song blip is genius. I have a fancy shmantzy iPod that I do not use because I don't exercise and Phillip keeps forgetting to give me the thingy to make it play in the car. Also, it is full of the entire Sting discography, whiny crybaby Coldplay and a horrifying amount of nonsensical jazz, the kind that makes my eyes glaze over and roll slowly to the back of my skull. Must our iTunes library be shared? Really?

But I can sit at my computer all night long reading blogs and news sites and message boards and listening to my carefully crafted playlists. Let's skip how this qualifies me as nine kinds of nerd who should thank her lucky stars that she found someone oblivious enough to marry her anyway, and move directly to the handful of fantabulous songs I recently downloaded for my listening pleasure.

You all know I like country, right? I am not from the part of the world that does not make fun of you for listening to country music, so I put up with a bit of derision for this. (Also for the way I use double negatives, but that's besides the point. And how I wish I could have used 'Y'all!' at the beginning of this paragraph!) Even my friend who likes country doesn't listen to country anymore. (What a dork!) I'm just telling you this because I don't care if you think country is the purest form of dreck, Rascal Flatt's new song 'What Hurts The Most' is gorgeous. (And if you think a song that's got banjo in the background can't be gorgeous, you have never listened to Bela Fleck's 'Big Country'. In fact, you are not allowed back until you have listened to that song, in its entirety, and imagined yourself on a road trip through Our Great And Beautiful Country. Shoo.) So anyway, 'What Hurts The Most' is my new favorite country song, hands down. So what if Rascal Flatts is the country equivalent of the Backstreet Boys? If that fiddle doesn't make you want to sob, you have a heart of stone.

But okay, I actually have another favorite country song. I am horrified to report that it's Faith Hill's new one: 'The Lucky One'. People, I may love my country music and, at one time, may have considered joining the Kenny Chesney fan club, but I'm not big on the big female stars. Shania is annoying. Faith's songs are dumb. Ok, wait. Maybe just them. ANYWAY. I've never really liked any of Faith Hill's popular songs and I've never held it against Tim McGraw for marrying her because dude, if you look like Faith Hill you can totally get away with the dorkiest songs ever. However! Her new one is the perfect combination of fun, meaningful, catchy and awesome. Love it! The girl you see driving the '92 Ford Explorer with the windows down and shrieking along to her country music is me with Faith Hill on my radio. Although, pretty much any song about "I thought I'd be farther along, but it's all good because I have you yeah yeah yeah!" makes my heart go all aquiver.

The next one I heard while I was watching last week's Everwood. (Do you watch this show? What? Seriously? Okay. Go listen to 'Big Country', THEN watch the episode of Everwood where Amy Abbott goes all "Okay, you know what, I'm gonna take a second and wait for you to provide some type of explanation as to why this HOOKER THONG is in your couch cushion" on Ephram. (It's a family show, really!) Done? Excellent.) So Andy and Ephram are sitting in the living room at the end of the show, all significant and father-son-like, and there's this piano in the background and a very earnest-voiced man singing that he is the luckiest. Lucky! It's a theme! As soon as the significance and earnestness tapered off into "Produced by Greg Berlanti", I ran upstairs to Google Everwood soundtracks and AHA! 'The Luckiest' by Ben Folds. Recently I've discovered that I am not a Ben Folds Five fan, but an emerging and enthusiastic Ben Folds By Himself fan. Love this song! Again, any song where a guy is singing about how much he loves someone is sure to turn me into a puddle (see: "What Hurts The Most"), but STILL. So earnest! So significant! So... dripping with MEANINGFULNESS. People, I am nothing if not a sentimental drip.

And speaking of TV shows, I found my next song on a recent episode of Scrubs. (And if you haven't seen Scrubs, you are officially not allowed to read my website. SERIOUSLY? WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOING WITH YOUR FREE TIME?) So at the end Carla and Turk are celebrating getting pregnant and a song is playing and everyone is hugging and Phillip and I look at each other and say: "Is that a CHRISTIAN song? On Scrubs?!" We are not used to our secular and spiritual worlds colliding in any way. But what other kind of song uses the phrase "I lift up my hands and I worship"? But it was kind of a cool song so I rushed upstairs to consult Google and now I have 'All The Words' by Kutless on my new playlist. I have never heard of Kutless. If you ask me, that's a pretty dumb band name. (I just checked them out on iTunes. Apparently? Very popular. Oops.) I'm fairly clueless when it comes to Christian music anyway, seeing as how I find most of it unlistenable. That's not very nice, is it, especially as that is also how I would characterize most of what plays on MTV's countdown show. Which I totally don't watch, of course. And this song isn't that special. It sounds a lot like one of the other Christian songs I like, 'Spoken For' by MercyMe. Power chords, a boy with a clear voice, words that make me happy. But I just like it. I like how Scrubs used it. I like what it's about. It made me actually look up the Christian station on my radio in the car. I promptly switched to the country station, but the point is, I TRIED. 

So if you have discovered any awesome songs via a television show lately, or came across them the way normal people do, let me know. It's been a long time since I heard anything new. I've forgotten that I used to be someone who spent half her rent money at the used CD store.

Comments

[lee]

i did the same double-take and google lookup in regards to the scrubs song. it definitely caught me by surprise.

it seems like all i listen to any more is indie local stuff. i think it's because i can afford to go to their shows, and sometimes they even play at my house.

[Lukey]

Most fans of new country make fun of me, 'cuz I only like country if it's older than 20 years old: Merle Haggard, Johnny Horton, or Patsy Kline. I can listen to Randy Travis, too, since he's kind of borderline, but I love the song "Three Wooden Crosses" on his greatest hits; almost brings me to tears every time. See you soon.