Through the darkest days of college, Jewel’s album Spirit was on repeat. I would sit up late with my headphones plugged into my huge Gateway PC tower, the sound of the CD spinning the only thing my sleeping roommate might hear… other than the typing of my fingers.
There’s a lot of truth in that album that I thought I understood at that time in my life. It wasn’t a particularly easy time in my life, the hardest that I had yet experienced. I was muddling through life with undiagnosed anxiety and, as such, I thought I was simply stark raving mad. Friends made fun of me for not being able to call and order a pizza, something I still don’t like to do. I fought the dark shadows of an eating disorder on top of that anxiety. I fell for boys who knew they were handsome and used it to get what they wanted. Not just one, but a series. I was homesick, but wouldn’t admit it as I had so desperately wanted to leave that small town. I felt alone, and considering I kept everyone at an arm’s length, I kind of was alone.
I sat and listened to Jewel sing words that I couldn’t put to my own life. Tears would roll down my face. I lamented in my broken heart, my self-image, my unfortunate lot in life to have a 7:40am class. I wondered if the clouds in my life would ever part, allowing me to see the sun again.
Then I got pregnant.
“Don’t worry mother, it will be all right…”
I don’t remember listening to the Spirit album much while pregnant with the Munchkin. That could be due to any number of reasons. The quick move out of her father’s house meant that I left some things behind. I am assuming that this CD is one of them, because I recently found the case — but no CD. New music replaced that album and listening to any of those pregnancy music choices nowadays will instantly transport me back to that time which will hopefully remain the hardest, darkest time of my life.
“I’ve heard your anguish, I’ve heard your hearts cry out…”
Thanks to Spotify, I have rediscovered the Spirit album and have been left to think about what life was like before the Munchkin arrived in my life. It’s hard to even remember who I was or what I felt back in those days. I am lucky enough, I suppose, to have all of my writings from my sophomore year of college forward — though reading through my college writings is like nails on the chalkboard of my brain. And my soul.
“We are tired. We are weary. But we aren’t worn out.”
I wish I could reach down and simultaneously hug and smack my former self. Or at least tell that poor shadow of the woman I have become that these days were the easy days. That boys and hard classes and waking up at 7:20 to make it to a 7:40 class? Meant nothing. That my figure was the least of my worries — and pretty darn good looking. That my world was about to be turned upside down.
“Set down your chains until only faith remains.
Set down your chains.”
That soon, and very soon, I was about to begin living a life uncommon — a life that would shape and shade and form and mold and change every aspect of who I was, who I would become, how I thought of myself, how I functioned in the world for decades to come.
“Lend your voices only to sounds of freedom
No longer lend your strength to that which you wish to be free from.”
Listening to the music with new ears gives me insight to the girl who was so afraid to fail that she couldn’t even take the first step in doing anything. It gives me insight to the girl who thought she knew everything and that there was no hope, nothing left. It gives me insight to the mother who still feels like she fell short.
“Fill your lives with love and bravery…”
I’ve come a long way from the scared little girl in college, sitting up late listening to music that she thought she understood. I’ve come a long way from the mother who thought that she didn’t have enough to offer. I acknowledge that I still have a long way to go in this journey, but I’d like to think that I’m living this life uncommon as best I can — and enjoying it as much as I possibly can while accepting the ebbs in the tide with as much peace as I can find somewhere deep inside my soul.
“…and we shall lead a life uncommon.”