MUSIC IN CARS

MUSIC IN CARS

Here's a game.  Do you remember before covid, sitting in your yard in that slightly uncomfortable lawn chair with a cold drink next to you? A hot day with a bunch of people you know talking, laughing, cooking? And you sit, watching and thinking... this is great, this is summer and the song comes to a crescendo; a horn and a voice and it's just one of those perfect summer moments? You close your eyes, open them taking it all in and someone says something...you move on.

And music in cars. Who thought of that anyway? What is Summer but open windows and music in cars? You're driving alone through the soft air, windows open, with a mood on, slightly sad or tired and this song comes on as you drive the tree lined streets. You slump back in your seat, the car glides through the middle of a peaceful dream.

Or you're in a group of friends in a car, a song comes on and someone starts singing; soon everyone is singing, shouting, laughing at each other; at the song. The mood in the car is happy. You can literally feel the happy.

And what is a voice singing but one pure expression of a person? There you are, you brave person, letting us hear something that comes from inside of you, formed by your bodies structure, your personality, your mood. What is one thing we miss when a person dies? The sound of their voice.

And next to water, on cement, sand or grass; your eyes, half closed, lying on a towel or a blanket feeling the heat of the sun, half hearing the people next to you talking and in your ear...a song you love. You are drawn in. You're in the song. When the song ends, you surface like you've been underwater.

So, when you're cutting a swath through middle America on Highway 52,  a flat, two lane road with a lot of cornfields, a usual get lost in my head road but today, with music on; hearing new songs by singers I already know, enough variation for more than habitual listening... I see a herd of horses with a foal peeking out, men working on a shiny tin roof... I see the road ahead cutting through up and down green rows of trees, I see faded red barns, a hawk flying.  I see, in this overcast sky, blotches of darker gray. 

Time moves encapsulated by this car. I'm appreciating the peace of being, in a place totally mine; my thoughts, my attitudes, my feelings with my companion, music.  And I'm still doing something, which works for all of us in America; to be doing something while doing nothing but listening to music and driving a car. 

And remember that song, we always seem to play or talk about when we're together? At holidays, parties..  To hear the song outside that space transports us in a series of musical notes to the person we are in that place. Brother, sister, mother, father, friend, family.

Miraculous. But really, who thought of putting music in cars?