# 191 TOO MUCH INFORMATION, TOO MUCH MUSIC

The other day I made a new Friend and in our introductory conversation, my new friend excitedly told me about her massive collection of old songs. And yes, when she rattled off the names of the songs in her collection, I knew them. The titles were as familiar as old nursery rhymes.

Then she offered to loan me her collection. Generous on her part but I needed to decline because of emotional whisperings in my soul. But how does one explain that? I began to mentally draft a response when I suddenly realized that maybe I’ve been blogging too much. Blogging so much, that I had forgotten that conversation does not allow equal freedom of expression. In casual conversation, no one wants to hear whisperings of the soul. Those whisperings can cause discomfort akin to the embarrassment of “too much information”. Yet, in blogging, they’re okay. Blogging openly invites whisperings of the soul. (NOTE: just another little item to add to your list of ‘Why I Blog.’)

So, returning to our original discussion, that is why I couldn’t be forthright about why I didn’t want the music. Instead I awkwardly slithered away from the topic by simply saying, “Thanks for the offer but no thanks. Maybe later.” And that was the end of that. But now, I am back to blogging. So you are less fortunate. You are going to get the complete goods on why I don’t want to play old tunes.

It’s really quite simple. If I listen to the music, I know what will happen. Those tunes, so adeptly masquerading as Sweet Nostalgia, are really ‘Star Trek Transporters’ in disguise. And I am immediately slapped into a transport beam that takes me back to the best and most optimistic time of my life.

You see, ‘Once upon a time…’ in olden and more optimistic times, I lived in Camelot. A special place where there were no global concerns, political concerns, and few other concerns. At least not from my perspective at the time. So one would think a return visit would be a pleasurable jaunt. And it is except for one thing. The music takes me there, but when the music stops, I am transported at break-neck speed back to today’s realities of utter chaos, corrupt politics, failed morality, and common sense replaced with nonsense. And that is when I crash and burn.

To explain further, the music spawns lucid recollections of all the wonderful idealized notions that come with Camelodian (people from Camelot) ethnicity. The conviction that wisdom lights the way for politics. That any just endeavor will bring a fair reward. That the sky will always be blue, streams crystal-clear, and last, but not least, the conviction that after the cold war (and John Lennon), there would be everlasting love and peace.

So can you blame me? In today’s world, I’d rather not listen to that old music that buries me up to my neck in the self-styled and erred thinking of my native birth. Instead, I prefer to sit in silence and let the thick fog roll into my memory bank. Memory avoidance deletes all those failed hopes, as long as I remain vigilant in my determination to avoid the music.

And in addition to all that, I don’t want to listen to Dean Martin croon (and God he could croon). When I hear him I weep and fold. Whoops, sorry about that. That was ‘too much information’ for even a Blog.