100 Naked Words — Day 2
Reflections, Ripples and Ramblings of a Restless Mind
I speculated, ruminated and cogitated over what to write about today. I formed a list, I (briefly) considered a mind map, I wrote down, then promptly wrote off, a raft of ideas, titles and themes. I’m certain I’ll write about some of the more interesting (for a given value of interesting) topics down the track, but for all the mental gymnastics I went through, I wasn’t convinced that any of these ideas were worthy of my first ‘real’ day here.
Yesterday was something of an introduction of me to you, the reader, and to some extent to myself, this alter-ego that I’ve suppressed for so long (suppressed is strong, ignored, yes ignored is more honest). So today was meant to be my grand reveal, the one they’d talk about in coffee shops, hunched over low fat lattes or in wine bars, steeped in the opulent aroma of good Montalcino red, leather and patronage.
It was to be my epiphany manifested.
I couldn’t even decide on a title.
Then as I wandered down the road to catch the tube, my pulse quickened, my mood lifted and the pressure dissipated. I stopped thinking and lost myself.
In music. So that’s what I’m going to write about today.
I’ve had a love affair with music for most of my life. I played piano and flute to a decent level but lost interest, unsurprisingly, as I found it in more natural teenage pursuits. I sang (in the higher registers thus suffering the ridicule school kids are so adept at inflicting) until I lost not interest, but ability, and not to teenage pursuits but, well, to being one.
Music was a place of refuge, the rhythms were as mantras to me, meditation without the fadiness; lyrics spoke to me in ways they shouldn’t have, sparking a rebellion against North London middleclassedness, albeit an insipid, flawed and short lived one.
But my main recollection of music was that it’s what brought us together as friends, first at school where we’d improvise beats in the park or become lost in Lauryn Hill’s voice listening to Fu-Gee-La for the first time, hunched over James’ walkman (yes that long ago people). Our little crew didn’t go to clubs in those days to drink or chat up girls, but to hit the floor, waiting for Giles to drop beats at Bar Rumba, Nuyorican Soul and jazz our solace; house parties pumping out jungle beats, busting a rhyme to Busta Rhymes, breathing the diversity of eclectic, electric, syncopated beauty around us.
University broadened the base, brought more of us together. I’ve written about some of my darker legacy at uni, I’m still not ready to talk about it out loud. But for good and for bad there was always music. However dystopian my relationships became, what remains with me is Lewis Parker with Archie, Ronni Size live, deep and dark drum and bass, grimy, soulful garage. Lakota and Blue Mountain — brotherhood. Friends made, friends lost. Music the constant.
I lost touch with music for too long after that, it didn’t matter that with iTunes and the iPod it was more accessible than ever, I played it but didn’t listen any more. It wasn’t that I had lost my enjoyment of it, just that I had lost my connection.
But I found it again.
Two things brought me back to music. Running. And my daughter, Ishani.
(OK and Spotify)
Running — all of a sudden I was regularly listening to beats again. Not tunes I knew, but whatever was on the D&B channel. And as much as I love running now, I couldn’t have done it without that 170 BPM pumping liquid, smooth beats through my headphones. Because let’s face it, without music, running is just an acceptable form of masochism.
Ish’s style is eclectic, just as mine was, we love and hate each-others’ taste equally. We borrow from each other, fight in the car over who gets to choose the playlist and become childishly excited come Hootenanny time at New Years.
We both lose ourselves in music, and connect over it.
When we’re arguing about nothing, I know we can always come back to the beat.
Music is back in my life every day. On the tube, walking to work, meditating, working, in the gym and in the car. It shuts me away from the world when I need it to and opens it up again just as easily.
Now, music is just as much a part of me as it ever was. Maybe I’ll make new friends over a song or two, take my wonderful wife out for a tango or my little one to watch some breakneck Bollywood bhangra.
Or maybe I’ll just listen in solitude, finding respite once more in the melody, bass and beat.
All it leaves me to say right now was that this piece was brought to you whilst listening to some TOOOOOOOONS!
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