Grocery shopping

One thing about living in a small town is that a trip to the local grocery store becomes a tour through a rogue’s gallery of sorrow and angst. After awhile, you simply acquire too much information about people. That man has pancreatic cancer, that woman had an affair with her friend’s husband, that man just got laid off, that woman’s daughter was killed in a porch collapse. Perhaps that’s one reason, besides the produce, that I prefer doing my weekly shopping at the Whole Foods that’s 10 miles away. I rarely see a familiar face there, other than the cashiers and baggers. I can buy my organic brown rice while cloaked in anonymity, surrounded by other anonymous shoppers with stories unknown to me.

Today I had to go to the local Jewel, though, because there was a snowstorm, which made the roads too unsafe to drive very far – the wail of sirens has disrupted the quiet of the snowfall several times today, presumably to clean up crashes – and I needed a few staples to sustain my little family unit for the next 24 hours. Once I got to the store, I found myself sitting in the parking lot, avoiding the inevitable, to listen to a song that had just come on the radio -- The Shins’ “Kissing the Lipless:”

But you've got too much to wear
On your sleeves
It has too much to do with me
And secretly I want to bury in the yard
The grey remains of a friendship starved.

Hearing the song was like unexpectedly running into an old, dear friend. (Ironic, given the lyrics.) If anybody had noticed me sitting alone in my car, belting out the words, they would have thought I was crazy. In fact, it’s likely that somebody did notice (it wouldn't be the first time I'd been busted rocking out in my car), and that my tenuous mental state is already working its way through the gossip network. Another thing about living in a small town is that you need to develop a suit of armor against the slings and arrows of speculative chit chat. If the idea that people might sometimes talk about you bothers you too much, you will need to work very hard to stay under the radar and avoid a lot of authentic human contact.

Music is one of my defensive weapons against small-town angst. In fact, it’s my weapon of choice against all kinds of trials and tribulations. Unfortunately, I don’t play an instrument and can’t carry a tune, but even my musician husband admits that I have a pretty good ear. I can usually name that tune in three notes, and I can identify the influence of one band on another (“Did you hear that riff? That’s from ‘Sweet Virginia’!”). A missed note makes me wince. Going to see a live band is more than recreation for me; if the performance is good, it verges on a spiritual experience. I’ll never forget the transcendence of a Sufjan Stevens concert several years ago. His crystalline voice soared above the audience, while the vocal harmonies and sparsely orchestral arrangements synchronized perfectly with the poetry of his lyrics. I think Sufjan was self-consciously aiming for some kind of sacred communion with the audience; he and his band members wore giant angel wings. This probably sounds very cheesy, but it worked for me.

I think having a strong connection to music must be hardwired into some peoples’ brains. Some people connect to sports or painting, I connected to music. I didn’t grow up in a musical home. I was offered piano lessons from a little old lady in a smelly house full of cats but otherwise wasn’t encouraged to pick up an instrument. The only music I remember my parents listening to was the soundtrack to “Saturday Night Fever” with a little bit of Abba sprinkled in. Somehow, thank God, I found some of my own music to listen to when I got to junior high – The Who, the Police, and yes, I must admit, Styx (Paradise Theater!) were my saviors in seventh grade. From there I moved on to the Beatles, Stones, and the Grateful Dead, learned about jazz, classical, and Elvis Costello when I got to college, and then discovered Nirvana, Uncle Tupelo/Wilco/Son Volt, and Pavement soon after graduation. My taste now runs mostly to lo-fi indie rock, but every once in awhile I like to mix it up with a little funk (The Meters), R & B (early Ray Charles), techno-dance (MGMT), power pop (New Pornographers), or classical (Mozart). And of course, the Stones and the Dead always sound good.

I’m happy that my kids seem to have inherited a musical gene, or at least they have been effectively indoctrinated. My son just started taking piano lessons (here, at home, not at a smelly cat house), and he sits at the piano to practice without being reminded or nagged. He knows way more than a six-year-old should about Wilco and the Stones. My four-year-old daughter doesn’t like to rock quite as much as my son does, but she sings as if she’s on a Broadway stage, with heartfelt emotion and confidence. I know I won’t be able to protect them from all of the problems that life has in store for them. Life is hard. People get hurt, and people die. But, if my kids can rock their way through it, life may be a little bit easier.