Amma-Rants

I've come to the conclusion that sometimes in life, the things that we do that end up meaning the most to us are little things -- ones that we don't even realize that we're DOING at the time.

For the last several nights, I've been listening to Dylan on the way home in the car, basking in the fact that I FINALLY got around to burning a new cd -- it only took me four months to get to it -- and YES, I still listen to cds in the car, not caring for radio, and not quite ready for the "new-fangled" in dash mp3 player.

I listen to a hodge podge of stuff -- trippy electronica like Robot High School (there's an awesome Chachamaru AMV set to it, if you're into that kind of thing), the Shiny Toy Guns cover of "Major Tom Comes Home", which itself was a sequel/tribute to the old David Bowie song, which is pretty darn cool in its own right, and "Shake It", the song that got me hooked on K-ON!, in spite of the fact that I've never actually SEEN the show; I just drool over Mio while watching the AMV, but then again, from what I've heard about K-ON!'s level of plot development, this is somehow entirely appropriate. Mio, I still love you.

I almost never buy or listen to complete cd's anymore, preferring instead to mix my own. The top of the playlist is front loaded with dance techno -- really fast stuff to listen to while I'm rushing off to work in the morning -- but towards the end, I put in some more relaxing tracks that help me unwind on the way home: some nice game music, a few folk rock pieces (Dylan's in here) and even one Celtic ballad.

I love STORY artists, like Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison, David Bowie, and Elvis Costello. And there's usually a story behind every track I burn onto a cd. In the case of Dylan, the song is "The Times They Are A Changin' ", and I got hooked on it after seeing it used in the opening for Watchmen. I didn't like the movie at first. It leaves a very nasty taste in your mouth. But it grows on you -- it's one of those movies you don't necessarily enjoy, but it's very powerful. It makes you think, and while I initially hated the film, I found myself thinking more and more about it over time. The opening in particular is amazing, for the way it tells a mini-story in itself, that whole death of Camelot in America, as retold with super heroes.

As mentioned in the title, singing along to Dylan is HARD. He has such an unusual voice, and the way he uses broken timing and off beat rhythms is so tricky, that even if you know the words, you find yourself saying them a moment BEFORE or AFTER he sings them. I'm no great vocalist -- sang in the school choir back in elementary, but that's about it. And I don't usually sing in the car. Or the shower. Or anywhere else, for that matter, but out of sheer joy at having some new music to listen to, and slap-happiness from being way too tired, these past few nights, I've been belting 'em out, and having a good laugh at myself at the same time. I must say I'm pleased to report that for this evening's commute/studio session, I was for the most part able to stay with him.

But getting back to the point, very often in life, its the silly little things, like singing (even badly) in the car, while driving home at night, that we later look back on and remember fondly. And tonight, I realized, as I was turning off of the main drag, onto a side street, that at some point in the future, I would be looking back on nights like this and times like this, and remembering them with that sepia toned fondness which time imparts to things, making them more than they were, or, perhaps more accurately, revealing what they really were all along -- we just didn't know it at the time.

"And the present now will later be past . . ." The times ARE changing. But we must not forget to enjoy things for the way they are now.