Seasonal

It's wild and rainy outside - and yet when I arrived home this evening I noticed that it was strangely warm for the time of year. The temperature must have shot up during the day. I can hardly believe that we are in December already and I allowed myself to play All I Want for Christmas is You by Mariah Carey in the car as an acknowledgement that Christmas is coming soon. To explain, I self-ban unseasonal songs in the car - I never play "Mr Blue Sky" by ELO until the first properly warm and cloudless day of Spring, and I only play "Baby It's Cold Outside" by Tom Jones and Cerys Matthews during the winter. It would just be wrong to play songs inappropriate to the time of year. I would of course never judge someone else for doing so - even though they would be wrong! I also have songs that are only suitable for playing when I feel happy e.g. "Wagon Wheel" by Nathan Carter. And I have songs for when I feel thoughtful e.g. "Pulaski at Night" by Andrew Bird. Or for when I feel a bit sad e.g. "I Hope You Meet Again" by the Saw Doctors which I first heard at a funeral and whose lyrics remind me of when my Dad died. Like many other people I'm sure, music is an intrinsic part of my life, linked to times and events. A song that I haven't heard for years can evoke a particular day twenty or thirty years ago or more. In fact the song "Bye Bye Blackbird" takes me back beyond my own lifetime to a summer in about 1926 or 27 - my Dad described to me that he heard a man whistling it in his street in Coatbridge and it was the first tune that he ever remembered hearing. So when I hear it I always picture that little boy hearing it for the very first time.