Music has so much nostalgia wrapped up in it. For people who get goosebumps over their favorite songs, like I do, there is an extra intensity. A song will come on the radio, or at a bar and I will be overcome with the emotion of whatever memories it conjures up. Bittersweetness, usually. Why are those the songs that take you back to another time? Lately, my world has been an audio trek down memory lane.

Dashboard Confessional – Hands Down

I will not pretend this is a good song. It is undeniably cheesy as fuck. But I listened to it when I first met my ex-boyfriend and it made me think of him. It was also one of the few “girly” songs of mine he could stand listening to. It makes me think of summer evenings laying on his bed in his bachelor pad, listening to music in our underwear, the sparks flying back and forth between us like nobody’s business.

Queen – Under Pressure

This was the soundtrack to a lost friendship. Driving around listening to this on full blast drinking iced lattes in an opalescent Ford Probe with a broken headlight.

Sarah McLachlan – I Will Remember You

My senior class song, the one they sang at my graduation. My graduation that I didn’t attend. This makes me feel old and slightly sad. Has it really been almost 10 years?

Deana Carter – Strawberry Wine

This CD was given to me by a friend I had a deep unrequited love for. I listened to this song over and over again when he went away to boot camp and wrote him letters every day for 3 months. Oddly, it was the only song I remembered all of the words to when I was wracking my brain for something to sing to my daughter when she was teething, years later. I still sing it to her at least once a week. He’s married now.

Ani Difranco – Both Hands

“I am writing graffiti on your body, I am drawing the story of how hard we tried.”
On a constant loop after I couldn’t save us. It hurt and maybe helped.

Wilco – Hummingbird

Drinking Pabst and playing pool in a not very impressive way with my best friend. Eating french fries and being able to get drunk because I knew he would make sure I was ok. Every Friday night.

Built to Spill – Car

The delicious combination of amazing friendship, aimless driving and chainsmoking. This song was playing when we learned everything about each other through hours and hours of intense discussions, punctuated with coffee in the morning and beer in the evening.

Mike Doughty – Unsingable Name

The song that was, in a cruelly ironic twist, playing on the car stereo when I had to break someone’s heart. Good music for a man to cry to.