You would think I’d deplore this hour long drive each way, but I look forward to it. I like being in the car alone where I can fill the air with loud music and not offend anyone. Our speakers are really great, the bass is perfect and I ramp up the volume to a ridiculous setting, flipping between stations to find the old favourites so I’m in a constant state of nostalgia.
I like my music loud. So much so that the beat reprograms the natural rhythm of my heart. My entire body, not just my ears, feels the power of the music, sometimes almost vibrating in my seat. These days, there seems to be so little time on my own to indulge in the preferred high decibels. At home the radio is kept low as not to deafen the pups and at the shop we don’t want to drive the customers away. Sometimes when I work late I crank it, but these days it seems the airport run is my only opportunity to blast the tunes. Whenever I’m asked what kind of music I like I say “Loud”. It doesn’t matter to me if it’s Classical, Blues, Rock & Roll, Country, Rap or the oldies but goodies, as long as the volume is in the double digits, I’m in.
Quite frankly most people I know are fuddy duddies when it comes to music. They keep it barely audible. Aging doesn’t mean we have to turn down the volume; we should be pumping up the jam baby....feelin’ alive....gyrating that couch potato arse! It seems people lose their sense of youthful play, smothering their wild child with grownup responsibility and worrying about appearances. Screw that! Music is a transporter to another place and time, it evokes memories and makes us feel good and this chick wants to feel good!
I don’t particularly give a rat’s rear what anyone thinks of me when I’m driving to work and a good tune comes on. Today it was Bob Seger belting out “Old Time Rock & Roll”. I beat the steering wheel like a bongo drum while trying to sing over the volume. I’m sure the folks on the sidewalk heard me coming; the sound is probably as loud outside as inside, like a prehistoric thumpasaurous charging. I’m in for the rush, those glorious few minutes of feeling charged and alive, like a youngin' again, back when music moved my emotions with the power of an earthquake.
I’ve talked about this before....to the over fifty, it seems loud music and dancing is more of an annoyance than a thrill and it gets worse as the number grows. For me, what used to be a staple in my social life, now I can’t find anyone to go to a dance. Even if I could convince them to join me they’d sit at the table fighting back the yawns while I burn up the dance floor on my own. They probably think I’m making a spectacle of myself but I know what to do with a good song. I gyrate, twist and contort my body, feeling the tune to my core. I don’t care if I can’t dance for beans, my feet can’t keep still and that feeling moves up my body until I’m shaking like jello! Right now Katrina & The Waves, “Walkin On Sunshine”, is on Randy’s Vinyl Tap on CBC radio, with host Randy Bachman and my butt is bopping in the chair while I clap and type in rhythm.
Wow, now it’s the Jackson Five’s “ABC”. How can any anyone sit still?
I’ll be listening to music until my arthritic fingers can no longer fiddle with the volume knob. I definitely won’t be sitting in a lazy boy waiting for the end but when it comes, hopefully someone will slip a radio into my casket set on Flashback 70’s for a bump and grind send-off.....I'll get a horizontal groove on until the batteries wear out!