City of Legends

Last night, flipping channels before bedtime, I hit the last several minutes of "Nip/Tuck", a show I have always enjoyed just not had the emotional stamina for these last few weeks (always figuring I’d catch up later).

 

As luck would have it, as the series finale ground to a touching and surprising denouement, the music come sup and it’s one of the "fateful five", those songs that can rip my heart out with its resonances:  Art Garfunkel’s beautiful and haunting rendition of "All I Know".

 

It would be the next day, today, when the haunting began again, three or four times today I have had to fight back the tears.  It’s tough, as I had just opened up in preparation for some very deep writing, and to have this slip past my normally adequate defenses, that was brutal.  Nothing to do now but ride it out.

 

But, anyway, my "fateful five" may not make sense to you, but on top of being evocative works in their own right, they all are tied to key people and moments in my life, and are, as follows:

 

"All I Know" by Art Garfunkel

"Barely Breathing" by Duncan Sheik

"Close Your Eyes" by Edward Bear

"Crash Into Me" by The Dave Datthews Band

"This Woman’s Work" by Kate Bush

 

They all connect to my life in ways I cannot easily express, and speak to and of me and my heart.  There are other songs that connect directly to me as an individual, but these reconnect me to life, to my heart.  And I am eternally grateful to the musicians, lyricists and singers who have made them so memorable and powerful.