Oui, They Are! (A Playlist)

This silly little blog is such a funny thing. Some days, I hate it and want to knife it and abandon it for dead. Other days, like today, it feels like my only friend, a quiet, constant comfort that's always here if I need it. Thanks, VT. I heart ya ... at least today.

Moving on. I started back to college this week. I graduated with a degree in Lifespan Development YEARS ago, and am back for a second degree in the hopes of continuing on to get my Master's. It will be a slow process, chipping away at each semester six or so hours at a time. But I'll get there. If I'm being honest, which I am, this last week of my first week back to college, was tough ... for several reasons.

That first day back, in some ways, I felt like I'd just moved to a foreign country again. The kids look different than we used to at their age. Oh, accept the "white hats." They (ils) still wear polo shirts (often colorful), and khaki shorts, but I've seen some bright yellow ones, too, and baseball caps, which they don't take off upon entering a building, and they have that "Sigma Chi haircut," still. The rest of the dudes look pretty normal. And young.

The girls (elles)? Oh well, just let me skip them altogether because I'm not a good judge of what's "in" now, nor was I when I was in college for my first degree ... please. I pretty much dress the same now as I did then, maybe minus overalls, bless my heart. In fact, I still have and wear the same two pair of Converse I had in high school. Wha? Yep.

Parking garages have been erected from the concrete parking lots I used to know. Everything is scan-able, electronic. People type their notes into their laptops as I scribble in my notebook like ye days of old as I take notes on The Dream of the Rood and Beowulf.

In my French class, they just can't be 18. There's just no way. Oui, they are! Maybe the most noticeable thing that's changed, and maybe only to me because it was rare to see my first run-through of college, is headphones. I used to rock my Discman and headphones on campus back in those days and it wasn't a very common thing to see. Now? EVERYONE is jammin' to some Beiber. But today they have those dandy little things called iPod's.

So that leads me, of course, to music. I have compiled a playlist of the list of songs that have been played several times or gotten me pumped up this last week. It's so so good. So I wanted to tell my blog about it. Here goes:

Lucky Light - The Sugarcubes (I fell in love with the Sugarcubes when I was 14. This song is happy to me. I used to want to read a book and ride a train at the same time when I was younger because of it. It also talks about doing two things at a time, which is sort of a theme I'm learning about in Old English poetry, that words often are compounds, meaning two things and also reference a larger concept at the same time, giving that style of poetry incredible texture and meaning.)
A Little Bit Cooler - The Cool Kids (When I feel old and uncool on campus, this is my mantra. I play it real loud.)
Friday I'm in Love - The Cure (A throw-back to the good ole days of always looking forward to Friday's.)
Walls - Shout Out Louds (Addicted to this song right now.)
Straight A's - Sleigh Bells (This and Infinity Guitars pump me up.)
We Used to Wait - Arcade Fire (This song is about the beauty and power of the written letter, how that seems lost today and how much can be learned through the process of "waiting" for a letter. It speaks to me both in reflection of how real the power of this was/is to me in the day of the written letter, which for me was high school and college, and how it's sort of a goal of mine in pursuing writing in college to deeply appreciate what has been written and to keep this form of art alive in my own way, somehow.)
Expectations - Belle & Sebastian (Ugh. She's so me.)
Teachers - Daft Punk (DJ Milton is IN THE LYRICS. Need I say more?)
ABC - Jackson 5 (My bf's and I danced to this high school at our talent show. We got 2nd place. We rule. P.S. I was Michael.)
Sorrow - The National (I get mad at this song, it's so good. And perfectly melancholy. They absolutely slay me, just like this song.)
Jail La La - Dum Dum Girls (A place I've never had to go to and hope never to, unless how I got there was really fun). It kind of seems like this is a school-girls' song.
Push It - Salt-N-Pepa (This song is dedicated to me and French I.)