If My Life Had A Soundtrack

Cant Get It Out Of My Head

July 23rd, 2008

“Delta Dawn”, Tanya Tucker’s version, brings me to a trip we took to the hospital to see my brother who spent a couple of weeks getting skin graphs on a badly burned hand. My sister and I would be in the back of the station wagon and it seemed every time we made the trek to the hospital “Delta Dawn” would come on the radio. My sister and I would sing every word. Got to the point I couldn’t wait to make the trip again to bellow out another verse. It is amazing how to this day I will always associate that song with that event.

“My” songs may not be the best songs ever written but as fate would have it they happened to be playing at the right time in the right place to have become a memory placeholder for the important events in my life.

I don’t have too much recollection of music prior to the age of about 11, ok, I do remember some Sesame Street songs and the intro to Gilligan’s Island and perhaps Scooby Doo but they don’t bring me back in time like “my” songs do.

“Can’t Get It Out Of My Head” by ELO - it is the very first song I ever danced too. It was a church dance sponsored by our youth group. Annette walked over to me and asked me - well, ask isn’t right, she grabbed my arm and pulled me on the floor, thank goodness it was a slow dance… I have no rhythm. To this day the song cuts deep both ways, I smile when I remember the dance and it saddens me as the song progresses, Annette was struck and killed by a moving vehicle a few years later.

Loverboy’s “Turn Me Loose” was the song playing on my radio when I turned into Candlestick Park. The song reminds me of the first major league home run I saw in person - Ron Cey slapped one over the wall, the Dodgers went on to win the game over the Giants - someday I’ll have to go look the score up… Another memory I have of that day is how cold and windy it was in the stadium but how hot it was in the parking lot, strange city.

“Lido Shuffle” by Boz Scaggs was the first song I played on my brand new stereo I purchased while on a Med cruise at the Navy Exchange in Naples, Italy. It wasn’t my cassette but it was the closest and after hooking up those Technics SBG-800s with the 16 and a quarter inch woofers I was ready to listen. I still remember my division officer busting through the door of radio 3 yelling at me to turn it down. A few days later those speakers helped me complete a radio check to Rota, Spain - I pumped out 500 watts of AC/DC “Back in Black”, Rota didn’t seem to appreciate fine rock and roll by the tone of their response…

It was a Saturday night, April 30, 1983, we had just finished watching the TV version of the James Bond movie, “For Your Eyes Only” when I turned to the love of my life and uttered the words, “Will you marry me?”. Sheena Easton’s voice has been heard in my house for the last 25 years like clock work and “For Your Eyes Only” will always be “Our song”.

There are many more memories firmly held in place with songs from my past and I am sure there will be many more in my future. Of course I hope in the end it will be a multi-multi-multi disk soundtrack of my life!

What songs make up your soundtrack?