Slice of Life Day # 7: The Hiss I Love

I was a child of records. Then 8-track tapes. Then cassette. Then finally CDs. I thought I was happy with the music that was "digitally remastered" on the CDs. I never even imagined I'd be looking back.

But then my husband got me a record player a few years ago. I dragged the box of records up from the basement. Probably they were all ruined, I figured. I slipped one of the discs of vinyl out of its cardboard cocoon. Placing it onto the turntable, I switched it on and lifted the needle up, then dropped it into place.

Hissss. 

It was a sound I'd completely forgotten, didn't know I'd been missing it for decades but was immediately grateful for.

Then the piano notes came bashing through, setting up a fast-paced rhythm. 

"I feel the earth, move, under my feet. 
I feel the sky tumbling down.
I feel my heart start to trembling,
Whenever you're around..."

Carole King's Tapestry album was the first record I bought for myself, after being weaned off the soundtrack to Mary Poppins, along with Glenn Campbell LPs, my parents' records. 

What was the first vinyl record you ever bought? Or, have you never bought a vinyl record?

I Remember...

         I admit it. Any time I can slip in an ellipsis, I do.  So, when I saw Barb's memoir piece on her blog, I pounced on it. Not because I wanted to share a part of myself via a piece of writing. No, I knew that I would have the opportunity to slip in an ellipsis (or six) if I wrote a "I remember" piece.  So here goes...

photo by Stephanie Whitehead

      I remember going on vacations in the Falcon station wagon, a flyswatter flailing back at us when we got too loud, and eating picnic lunches along the way...

      I remember falling in love with James Taylor, lipsyncing to Carole King, and taping David Cassidy's picture all over the basement wall...

      I remember learning about apartheid through Alan Paton and the French Revolution through Dickens and about Kent State and Woodstock because of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. And I remember discovering that a thirteen-year old girl has no chance of winning the heart of a God of an English teacher...

     I remember giving birth to a beautiful daughter at home--in my own bed--and afterward, having cake and coffee with the doctor...

     I remember going to France for the first time. Four hours for dinner, shooting off the top of champagne bottles into the woods so "champagne trees" could grow, and wishing I could stay forever...

     I remember my life changing with a couple of messages in my in box. The discovery of a sister I never knew about. The news that, yes, someone other than me saw value in my stories...

     I remember, and now that I am past middle-aged, I grasp my memories tighter with every advancing year...



      What do you remember?  And you have my permission---go crazy with the ellipsis...