It seems my memory bank relates many songs to certain occasions or events. Like the song "Way Down Yonder in the Paw Paw Patch". That one can only reminds me of riding to Mrs. Luin's nursery school. We sang it sitting in the back of her blue station wagon (all loose and shit - no seat belts! Gasp.) What - you say you've never heard of that song? Why you're missing a good one!
"The Ants Go Marching One By One" and many other similar obnoxious songs remind me of girl scouts and summer camp. Kumbaya, ya'll. My vote for the most obnoxious?" 100 Bottles of Beer on the Wall."
Junior High was the time of young love and first dances. All the slow songs of that era bring back those dances. We usually ended each dance with Chicago's "Color My World." For the first formal dance sponsored by the school, I wore a blue corduroy dress that tied at the waist. Awesome! Even today that song still makes me go "awwww" in a melodic fashion. How cute - lil kids dancing slow with each other. Other fave - "Hey Jude."
In High School my friend Joanie Troll sometimes picked me up for school in her green car. The Doobie Brothers song "Black Water" makes me think of piling into her car, with several smokers (my buddies thought it was badass then) harmonizing to that song. Or we'd be in Sally's Merc.
Move on to my lifeguard days - at Sunnyside Pool in Atlantic, Iowa. The only station we could really get was the AM one out of Omaha. Top 40 baby! Certain songs come on and immediately I thing - yep, lifeguard song. I got one day off a week that summer - sometimes I'd head to Omaha to purchase new albums to play on my stereo. A couple I remember getting were Foreigner "Feels like the First Time" and the Commodores - "Easy on Sunday Morning was my favorite."
Tunes are important to college students. I was glad to have my stereo - received as a high school graduation gift from my parents, for my dorm room. Frampton Comes Alive was one I listened to when I got to school - with "Do You Feel Like I Do". I'd gone to see him in concert at Civic Auditorium in Omaha with Craig Both the summer before I went to ISU. I think Chris Deardorff and Jeff Weppler (RIP buddy) were with us. My first college roomie, Loraine Dunn turned me on to Lynyrd Skynyrd - loved me some "Free Bird."
The first few weeks I was at college there was a live band playing at the Great Room at the Memorial Union. The did a great rendition of BTO's "Takin' Care of Business." I learned how to do The Gator (it's a dance that involves gyrating on the floor) that night - so hearing that song brings back good Gator memories! Our friends Moose and Steve influenced our (my roomies and me) music listening during my college years. When I hear Thelma Houston's "I've Got the Music In Me", I remember borrowing their stereo for our apartment parties. Fleetwood Mac's "Sarah" reminds me of driving in the back of Fred Behr's dad's car to Breckenridge to ski for spring break - 20 of us packed into one condominium, what a blast!
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| ski group - we had a great time! |
When I graduated from ISU and headed to Sioux Falls to my first job, Christopher Cross's "Ride Like the Wind" send me on my way from Ames west. The song "Mountain Music" by the group Alabama takes me to when we started camping in Ridgeland, Wisconsin at Mike Huston's folks' farm each 4th of July for about 15 years straight starting in 1980. It was tradition for a long time - loved those times, that family and the song brings back those warm feelings!
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| Ridgeland - we drank a lot of beer! |
Hearing Steve Winwood's "Valerie" reminds me of my time in the Big O - Omaha - windows downn on my Chevy Monza driving down West Center Street on my way to Bakers Grocery Store. Then Paul and I got married and moved to Council Bluffs (or as the T-shirt says Counciltucky). Sadly - we tired of moving all those albums around and tossed many in the dumpster when he got a promotion and we moved to Osage in northern Iowa.
Music came even into play when we were deciding what to name our first child. Lindsay? Stephanie? When started listening to Pure Prairie League's "Aimee" we knew that was it. When our babe was born she was an Amy, which means "Beloved". I traveled for work when we first moved to Osage - listening to Springsteen's "Born in the USA" from that era.
Moving south to Creston - brings us to the infamous First National Bank Christmas party. This one involved a dance at Crestmoor Country Club - one loan officer's young wife dirty danced with an older loan officer who was a widow. Much liquor was involved. I began a love affair with the song "Love Shack". It's still my favorite dancing song today - just ask my kids. And friends. And husband. Pretty much anyone who knows me! When my kids were young, I introduced them to many of my favorite artists and I'm afraid it took. Amy still loves Fleetwood Mac, Wilson Phillips, Jann Arden and some other bands we played in the day. I would put the stereo on and we'd dance - oh how we'd dance.
I could go on - but you get the picture. I'm sure you have your own music memories. Care to share? As you can tell some of mine are very specific - a song goes with a very important memory in my life.
Thanks to the writers and musicians in this world who have helped make the times of lives richer.
