For the Love of Headphones

While I often find myself in love with something: a new song, a perfect pillow, a new, horrible television series (Lorenzo Lamas reality show?), a gorgeous professor... the one thing that I never fall out of love with is my headphones. There is nothing that can get my heart racing faster than an incredible song heard through the little speakers attached to my ears by that long white cord that goes all the way down to my sparkly evergreen iPod full of some of the greatest songs ever recorded.

On a regular day I'll listen to music on the television, the computer, maybe the good old cd player or record player, and of course my headphones while I walk back and forth between campuses, etc. It makes me feel like a princess, like nothing can hurt me as long as I'm listening to something that makes me feel good and more confident than I could ever feel on my own. I have a strange relationship with music and part of that is making sure it is always personal. While music is one of the most fun things to share, it's also the one thing in my life that I feel very protective about, the one thing that is so private I'm not sure I can properly describe it with words, it's much more based in feelings. Headphones allow me to pretend that the music I'm listening to is not just in my ears but my entire body. I can feel it in my soul and through my being. Somehow I don't get that feeling through other mediums. It's like I'm having a private moment with someone whom I don't actually have to speak to (which is good) but I get the bonus of feeling comforted by their voice anyhow.

It's funny: I understand completely how cavemen got along without shoes and bathrooms but I can't really imagine how they didn't have headphones. I guess I'll give a personal example.

I don't have the internet at my apartment. We live close enough to the university library that I'm able to bring my laptop down there whenever I feel the great need to do something worldwide-webby. In the meantime I'll write little notes to myself about songs I need to download on iTunes (I am officially 100% musically legal now by the way, which I highly suggest) and bring them with me on the days I do manage to trudge down and get them. I set up my computer, sit on a stiff red chair, plug in my headphones, and drift off into my own world. Once the headphones are in I don't have to worry about the girl with the odd ponytail giving me strange looks or the creepsters with large pepsi cups in their laps - I just worry about the volume panel.

I once saw a young man on a library computer with heaphones in flipping out in front of the screen. There must've been twenty people sitting around us and there he was dancing in his seat, playing air drums and counting time with his hands and feet and anything else he could get to move. I laughed at the time but then tonight I was just like him. I got the new John Mayer album ONE DAY EARLY thanks to his incredible, underrated management team and I couldn't contain my feet. I was bouncing all over and couldn't care less who saw. The beats felt so good in my headphones that my soul was shaking.

Tomorrow I might wake up wanting to kill my boyfriend or drop out of school or not loving my dear John Mayer (well that won't happen) but one thing is for sure: I will always be in love with my headphones.