musi(c)ngs

I have music playing in my head all the time. Non-stop. Like, almost 24/7, for my whole life. Oftentimes, I sing or hum along to it; whatever happens to be playing at the time. Unfortunately, I've found that this generally annoys people. Especially if I do it while they're trying to tell me all the details about the amazing thing that happened to them yesterday.

It sometimes annoys me too, if I get stuck on a particular song. And even more so if I don't know the whole song, so that just a piece of it loops, over and over, like a record with a skip.

But most of the time, I'm glad for the music. And quite often, it's a source of inspiration and an aid to introspection. I can usually tell that I'm supposed to pay special attention if the song in my head isn't one that I'm really familiar with, isn't one that I have in the living room on a CD, isn't one that was on the radio in the store yesterday afternoon when I was buying yogurt. When I get a song like that, randomly selected by my subconscious, I generally try to stop and listen to the lyrics. They're usually telling me something important.

This morning, and yesterday morning, my mind has been playing a B-52's song that I've only heard a couple of times. It’s repeating like a mantra:
Roam if you want to, roam around the world
Roam if you want to, without wings without wheels
Roam if you want to, roam around the world
Roam if you want to, without anything but the love we feel