My Life in Vinyl and All the Other Music Mediums

The musicology of me

When I was born, 8-track tapes were just overtaking vinyl, supposedly improving sound and offering greater convenience with their ability to play continuously. No scratchy static and no need to replace the needle to hear the album again.

In the Groove

My astrology chart (according to some systems) has me as a Leo, at least according to the Sun sign. I was the typical lion, gregarious, playful, and outgoing…as a youngster, it would seem that this was my groove.

Until the needle slid across the record with a loud screeeeeeeeech!

I am a Virgo Rising, and rising signs indicate the mask we wear and, according to astrologer and author Jeanne Avery, what we revert to when we’re in survival mode.

Perfectionist! That’s the Virgo in survival mode.

A Yellow Submarine elation led quickly to the melancholy of Eleanor Rigby.

Eight Track on Repeat

The music, however dissonant, that was on my eight-track tape was the need to please. My father is German-Irish, Catholic, and military, and nothing less than perfect little soldier children would do. Mom just tried to hold us all together.

Better seen and not heard. If you’re getting Bs, you might as well be failing. Perfectly behaved, never talking back, never questioning, never acting out.

Thinking about it today, I had written down that the best memory from my childhood would be tumbling in the grass with my sisters. Oh, and I loved to sing and play teacher. Otherwise, my life was spent hopefully out of sight, out of mind, out of the way of my father’s irrational wrath.

My mom and dad did the best they could. I don’t deny that. But I still have to come to terms with how to translate that into meaning in my life.

It reminds me of the one eight-track tape we had that sticks in my memory. You could say that We Will Rock You needed to transition to We Are the Champions, just like it did coming out of the speakers.

Portable Cassettes

When I was in fourth grade, my parents divorced, and within a few years, my Mom got her college degree and moved to California. My siblings and I stayed with our Dad and new stepmom (and half brothers), but one by one, the original siblings followed Mom.

I was the holdout. Trying to figure out how to make the most of my relationship with my Dad. I was always called the favorite, but my Dad didn’t have favorites. I just followed the rules, so it seemed that way.

Should I Stay or Should I Go Now? by the Clash and I Want to Break Free, another Queen great, would be my soundtracks.

I finally got portable and moved to California to begin my senior year of high school.

Compact Disk

Somehow I missed everything the wide open world had to offer me after high school, and I made myself small, like a compact disk.

Haunted by the beautiful music of the Phantom of the Opera, I retreated behind the curtains and looked for any way I could hide, even though I wanted more than anything to be seen.

It’s not all as dark as that. I did have two beautiful children from my second marriage, but I was still trying to find myself while also running from myself.

I was singing Think of Me to whoever promised to be my Angel of Music.

Digital Diva

Following the end of a seventeen-year marriage, I began to come out of my darkness. Now, I was writing my own music, with titles like No Apologies, The Naked Truth, Call Me Crazy, and Guilt Trip Rejected.

I had an online radio show, playing mostly Indie music, and found my place in the local music scene.

That is where my current husband found me and stalked me until I gave in to our first date. It was a sweet stalking, though. We laugh about how he’d show up at event after event, asking me out.

Vinyl Makes A Comeback

I have lived five decades now, and even though I think I should have hit the billboard charts a long time ago, I am finally slowing down enough to join the journey. It’s not for nothing, but writing on Medium has been therapeutic for me.

It would seem that I have finally found my groove — although my needle does fly off from time to time, and the record does bounce — and it’s reminiscent of that Beatles song I mentioned.

We all live in a yellow submarine, and our friends are all aboard.

I’m finding my playful side again, and I am learning to love all the static and feedback of the music that is me.

Thank you, Kim Kelly Stamp, for this musical prompt! This was fun to write.

Runa Heilung is an Old Soul Alchemist, mystic, and dream archaeologist. She works with dreams, oracles, and the imagination to help people rediscover their Inner Wisdom.