Musical Monday and Other Things
Well so anyway, yesterday I was in a little store and loved the music I was hearing so asked about it, and the store owner showed me the wonderful display of amazing Putumayo world music CDs. She had been playing the Blues Around The World CD, and I bought it because I just loved what I was hearing and because I love listening to blues, and because not only was it blues but it was from artists around the world and that makes it even so much more cool, and also because I figured this would not be music that I could easily find to download. And I am just in love with this CD now!! In love!!!!
As usual, it's nearly impossible to choose one song and even so hard to choose just two, but I'll somehow chose just two songs. But I'm seriously in love with this whole CD, and I keep constantly rethinking my choices because there are so many good ones!
"Listen My Son" by The Unseen Guest:: From the insert - A collaborative group led by an Irish musician, Declan Murray, and an Indian musician, Amith Narayan, The Unseen Guest blends together Indian rhythmic traditions with blues, folk, and rock song forms, combining the rhythmic accents of the tabla, occasionally referred to as "the Indian talking drum," with the steady beat of the blues guitar, banjo, and mandolin..."Listen My Son" is an excellent example of the group's unique style. Their rich vocal harmonies ride on a gently pulsating rhythm, which is accented by a repeating mandolin phrase. There is an aura of mystery here, too, echoed by the song's enigmatic lyrics and especially its chorus: "Listen, listen my son, my son. I can't tell you twice what I can't tell you once."
And because it's impossible for me to usually ever choose just one song, but especially impossible on this CD, here's another one that is just as perfect, unique and wonderful as the first:
"La Flaca" by Jarabe de Palo:: From the insert - "La Flaca" ("The Skinny Girl") was a huge hit in Spain in the summer of 1997, and it helped the group Jarabe de Palo and its leader, Pau Dones, establish themselves as one of Spain's biggest-selling artists...Pau Dones wrote "La Flaca" following a trip to Cuba in the mid-1990s...With its steady rock rhythm, graceful melody, and Latin percussion elements, "La Flaca" provides the perfect backdrop for a very hot, blues-inspired solo on the "fuzz-toned" electric guitar. Dones sings about his obsession with a hard-partying Cuban woman, "I'd give anything for one kiss from La Flaca."
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Today has been a very quiet day. I woke up early but really haven't done much of anything. Well, I did do all my dishes and completely cleaned my kitchen, and that feels so good. And I vacuumed my rugs which makes about the biggest difference in the world at making my place look clean again. And I also cleaned and straightened my living room. So I don't feel completely bad. Other than that, I've spent much of the day listening to music and organizing pictures on my computer, and other things along that line.
Yesterday I had a wonderful day! I met Florida for breakfast at a new place that neither of us had been to and that was about in the middle between where we both live, and in such a cute little area that we both were curious to explore a little. Breakfast was so fun, the place was so cute and eclectic, and so yummy, too! Then we walked up and down the little street there and went in a few cute little shops and talked and talked and it was just absolutely wonderful and so fun.
Then we walked on some little side streets and looked at houses and got a little sad that older places with character are always being torn down all over the city to make way for completely blank and sometimes dead-looking condo buildings. And we stopped in a little record store for Asparagus to ask about some group, and the guy who runs the store was really cool and there was so much to look at, and I kept liking many songs that he was playing and he was so nice and told me what each one was whenever I asked.
Then we walked all the rest of the way back to Florida and Aspargus's place, and we all played with their cats and laughed at their silliness, and chatted much more, and Asparagus made me five CDs of wonderful music that I hadn't previously ever heard, and Florida gave me some leaves off of her catnip plant which James and Emma just ADORED when I got home! I love Florida and Asparagus to death, they are both so wonderful both separately and together, and are just the perfect couple ever - and really have the kind of marriage and relationship and communication that I want. I always have such fun with them and would do anything for them.
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I've been thinking a lot lately, about so many things. About love and what it is and how to keep it alive in a relationship. About the fact that the only person and thing we can really control is ourselves. About how to grow individually but also grow with a partner. About how so many people get divorces and get their hearts broken and eventually grow out of the love and move on. About how love changes in a relationship. About how easy it is for a couple to grow apart and for the love to start leaving. And about how then it's back to the only thing we can control - ourselves. About how the ideal that we all think we want is one love for life, a marriage that is wonderful and happy and we die still loving the other person. About how that doesn't often really happen, and maybe it isn't all bad because we all do change, and sometimes partners change in different directions. And everyone says children change the relationship so much. I just don't know, but I see so many people who move on after broken marriages and broken hearts, and they find such beauty and love with someone else. Would the love in the marriage come even close to that new love had the couple stayed together? What exactly is love and how and why does it sometimes stay and sometimes go? And how strong is it if we can fall out of love? What is love, exactly?
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I'd been having a lot of those questions percolating around in my head for about the past week, but they've been even more in the forefront over the past few days because I've been talking daily with a friend who has been going through a very hard time with love for the last three years, and when we talked on Thursday night I found out much more and also that this love of his is coming to a sort of crossroads right now. We have talked for hours every day for the past few days and I'm so incredibly thankful that I'm able to be there for him.
I can't even explain how I have loved our conversations. I've been able to be a friend when he's cried, I've been able to bring in so many of my own experiences and he knows absolutely that I really understand, we've analyzed personalities, coping mechanisms, depression, addiction, pain, love, therapy, life. It has gotten me really thinking about so many things as well - and some new ideas have popped in my head such as sometimes people having a sort of addiction to mental suffering because it allows them to hold onto what they know and not have to face the world without it. And it's made me wonder even more about why some people can recover from heartbreak and fall out of love and move on, and others hold onto the love and those feelings of love don't leave for a very long time, and they don't move on. And I start wondering why and what is behind each reaction. And for these people who hold onto the love, whether sometimes they really develop more of an addiction to the former partner and idea of their strong love as a coping mechanism - because after a certain amount of time wouldn't the love itself actually leave? Or am I wrong and the love can continue just as strong as before despite no contact or unhappy contact - when is it actual love and when is it the idea and remembrance of love? Or for those people, do they sometimes have a stronger love or a deeper love than others? And those are just some of my many questions with regard to what makes people act the way they do when a relationship ends.
My friend told me that I should get my Masters in Social Work because I would be an amazing therapist. It has me really thinking. Because even the suggestion ignites excitement within me. I was a psychology major in college and jumped in headfirst and I loved those classes and found them so incredibly interesting and intriguing. But I decided not to go to grad school for psychology because at the time, I decided that I didn't want to sit and counsel people hour after hour and would only be really interested in developing my own theory of personality, which I decided was rather selfish in a field where people should be very unselfish. So I decided to go to law school instead. Which has never ever excited me in even close to the same way as psychology.
On Friday I mentioned what my friend said to The Meat. He looked at me and told me that he has often thought that I would make a wonderful therapist/social worker/psychologist because of the compassion I have in me. That night I read up on the grad program at one local university. It's just a thought right now, and anyway all the programs start in the fall so I would have an entire year to decide and apply if this is something that I actually want to do.
So that's all in my mind as well. I do kind of feel that I'm in the wrong field entirely. I don't think I'll ever love the law. And even after my first year of law school I didn't think law was the best field for me, but I didn't know what else to do so I kept going. However, I think happiness in a job has so much to do with the people you work with and the whole culture and situation at the job. And I'm 30 now and to pursue a masters in social work, at least at this one place I've looked at so far, would mean two years of part-time schooling and the third year would be full-time. I wouldn't be 31 until I started so I would graduate when I was 34 and only then begin actually working in the field. And when would there be time to date in there? And I want to have children and work only part-time when they are young, so what then? Even though I'm 30 now and have no prospects, I still hate even thinking that I won't get pregnant until I'm 34 or older! And also, I really don't feel like having to take out loans to go back to school now. Unless there were grants or scholarships or something, this could be a very expensive option. However, there are many people who do make career changes later in life, and many people who go back to school later in life. And going back to school to study psychology and sociology and completely intriguing and infinitely interesting subjects in those areas sounds so so so fun, as opposed to the unfun that was law school classes.
Anyway, this is just an idea going around in my head a little right now. I know there's no pressure to make some quick decision, so I'm not stressed at all about it. But at the same time, this is the first time that I'm acknowledging the possibility of leaving the legal field completely, and going back to school, and I'm thinking about and have to think about future happiness and whether career is something that I want to be a part of my life or whether I could be happy just doing a job and enjoying the people who I work with. And it's the first time that I'm really acknowledging the possibility that I may have gone into an entirely wrong field for me that includes three years of law school and five years since then - and that's a lot of time to have spent and potentially wasted. [Not that I regret where I am at all though, because it has led me to have some amazing people in my life and to meet others and to experience things that I wouldn't have otherwise, and I've also learned so much during this time.] But so to conclude, I'm not stressed about making a quick decision, but it is bringing up some more kind of stressful and possibly frustrating things in my mind.
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Okay that's enough for tonight. I've gotten the major things out and I feel good now that I've been able to write down a little on the basic wonderings of my mind regarding love, and also discuss a bit about the little idea in my mind of going to grad school and completely changing everything.
