music or time machine?

Music is like having your own time machine.

Seriously, think about it.
Songs trigger memories from the past. Music and words we listened to have a tendencancy to mark every period of our life. I know certain lyrics are capable of shifting my mood. Many can make me laugh or cry. I've even experienced shoulder dancing...yes, while driving the car. Just let the right song come on the radio and it literally moves me till I'm singing my heart out, bouncing and dancing to the music with the speakers blasting. Who cares what the other drivers are thinking? Not me. Because for a few wonderful minutes I'm a teenager again, and they take nothing serious! Who-oo! Whether it's Tom Jones belting out ‘She’s a Lady’ or the Bee Gee's singing 'Staying Alive,' I crank it up and cruise!

Admit it, just the title conjures up the image of John Trovolta rocking in his white leisure suit, right?

No doubt about it, the music and lyrics often sends me tumbling backwards and feeling like a kid again. Back when I could do anything, be anything. Because I believed. I was invincible. That's powerful stuff.

But on the other end, what’s it like to know that your music has touched someone so deeply? That the thoughts and feelings poured into the words of a song has reached inside and connected with a total stranger. Writing of any kind is like griping your heart and wringing it out like a rag, squeezing out every emotion for the world to see.


Singer/songwriter Skip Ewing recently shared a video link in which he talked about the rush of performing live and looking out into an audience, listening to them singing the words to songs that he wrote. Like any arist, whether it's painting or what, he claims that you "reach the hearts of others by opening your own."

Listen to the interview here

So this afternoon I'll go about my ordinary chores with the radio on. And maybe take a trip on 'The last train to Clarksville' or listen to Billy Paul sing about what's going on with him and 'Mrs. Jones,' Who knows? I might even take a 'Magical Mystery Tour.' The possiblities are endless. And all because of songs. And the authors who wrote them.

Where does your favorite song take you?