Musical Interlude

Despite the assertions of a friend of mine, I don't have a good singing voice. It cracks at times and it isn't very strong. The best that can be said for it is that I am able to keep it on key. Nevertheless, I enjoy excercising my vocal cords by singing along with some favorite music.

I don't know how my friend does it. She listens to music on headphones while she composes letters, blog posts, emails, and other writings. My kids also have the ability (so they say) to do schoolwork with music blaring loudly beside them. I can't. Anything that requires my full attention means I can't pay attention to music and singing or whatever it is that I am working on. Instead, I use music to accompany me when I am working in the kitchen or doing tedious chores like ironing shirts. I also use it when I am driving places because it makes the time pass more quickly.

Today I was making lasagne's in the kitchen. One is for tonight's festivities. We are celebrating my son Nathanael's 18th birthday. He actually turned 18 last Lord's Day, but his dad and I were away and his second eldest sister just came down for the weekend, so we thought we would wait til today to perform the birthday rites. While I was working away, I had on some music that I used to listen to long ago -- The Electric Light Orchestra. Man, just hearing that stuff transported me right back to my teen years.

You know, on the one hand you couldn't pay me enough to go back and relive those years over. And at the same time I miss them. I had some good times while I was a youngster, even when I was dating. The summer I was 16 was probably one of my best summers. That was the year I worked at a truck stop not far from my home as a waitress, and it was also the summer I spent dating Jimmy Hughes. Jimmy was the son of a gal my dad knew growing up. I know my parents didn't really approve of Jimmy, but we never did anything bad or questionable. He used to pick me up and drive me to work and come back around midnight to drive me home. During the times we weren't working, we would bomb around the backroads of Westmoreland county in his little Toyota and listen to music and yak. I was broken hearted when he wanted to stop dating me, but obviously, I recovered enough to take up with Marc and get married. Jimmy still lives in Moncton, as far as I know, and no doubt knows about me and my brood of 11. He's probably congratulating himself on his narrow escape. heheh

Another lad who escaped my clutches was "Q". His name was actually Robbie Cusack, but we all called him "Q" for short. I "dated" him for all of one summer. We didn't actually spend a lot of time together because I was at summer camp either as a camper or working as a counselor. I saw him from a distance a few years ago when I was back home visiting my parents. He became a DJ at a Christian radio station and introduced Steve Green at a concert my mom and I went to. I wanted to say hi to him, but he got away before I could. He was bald.

Yesterday I was at the store and picked up a People magazine and glanced through it. There was a picture of Brooke Shields with her new baby. Cute baby, but man... Brooke, who is slightly younger than me, has huge crow's feet and wrinkles on her face -- more than I do. I have yet to get crow's feet. Of course, my hips are more generous than hers, but I can lose the hips.

Well I'm babbling now and haven't anything astounding to say. Thus ends the interlude. Back to work.

What I'm Listening to: Default