![\"\"](\"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/ist2_840500_beautiful_teen_girl_listening_to_headphones.jpg\")
Sometimes things change so gradually that you have no idea they\u2019re changing at all, until you look back and you wonder\u2026when did that happen? Where did that go? When did that stop?<\/p>\nSometimes things change so gradually that you have no idea they\u2019re changing at all, until you look back and you wonder\u2026when did that happen? Where did that go? When did that stop?<\/p>\n
The mainstage show tonight was a cabaret style production of big band style music; not a true big band of course, as we only have a 6 piece, which always makes things a bit sad (it\u2019s never the same when the brass is tracked in\u2026and it never will be). I\u2019ve seen the show before, I had even seen it earlier this evening. But at the late night show, there was the tiniest bit of a shift in my normal circumstance. As a crew member you see, I\u2019m restricted to sitting at the back of the theatre \u2013 by the time the sound reaches me back there, it\u2019s slightly muffled, slightly muted, and I can\u2019t feel<\/em> anything. Appreciate certainly, but not feel<\/em>. However, since I\u2019m on this cruise as a (semi) guest, I was able to slide into a seat three rows from the front for the second show.<\/p>\n And suddenly I was crying\u2026<\/p>\n At first I had no idea why I was crying, and then it came barreling into me like a brass-tinged freight train.<\/p>\n I was homesick.<\/p>\n Not homesick for home exactly, home is still there after all, I\u2019ll be back there in a few days. No, homesick for\u2026something that went away\u2026something I was suddenly back with.<\/p>\n When I was growing up, there was always always<\/em> music. The radio was always on, my family was always singing, practicing, humming something. Growing up I do not remember a time when music was not a simple day to day fact of my life. I came home from the hospital to a full big band rehearsing in my living room, I grew up listening to my Mum singing while she cleared up the kitchen, to my Father practicing in the upstairs bedroom, to my \u2018Uncle\u2019 strumming a guitar in the guest room (though that happened rarely, he wasn\u2019t exactly the practicing type). I didn\u2019t learn<\/em> music, I absorbed <\/em>it. It was all around me. And in the evening, we used to sit in the sunroom and Dad would hook up the stereo; at first it was records, later CDs, and he would put the giant heavy \u2018tin can\u2019 headphones on my head. Those headphones were heavy<\/em>, I remember how the top of them pressed into the top of my head and they almost fell off my ears\u2026but he would put them on my head and he would turn up the volume and tell me to listen. Listen to how the bass felt, listen to which part was which, listen to the vocals. He taught me how to listen with just one headphone so that I could sing properly without learning myself out of tune\u2026forget my hours and hours of lessons and expensive training, those headphones were how I learned to sing. And we\u2019d sit there, the three of us, for hours\u2026for hours upon hours, and just listen. Miller, Midler, countless broadway and movie soundtracks, even 50s classic rock. I traveled the world through those tin-cans long before I ever set foot on a ship\u2026<\/p>\n And then\u2026I don\u2019t know\u2026something happened. A series of things happened\u2026the radio stations went off the air, my uncle passed away, the stereo broke, the record player wore out\u2026I went to England\u2026I came back\u2026.I don\u2019t know\u2026I can\u2019t remember. At some point, something stopped, something changed\u2026.and music the way I\u2019d grown up with it\u2026it just kind of\u2026slowly disappeared. I don\u2019t know when, it seems very important that I should remember when, but I don\u2019t. And I\u2019ve tried, but\u2026I don\u2019t remember.<\/p>\n And sitting in that audience this evening, it came pouring back in on me. What it was like. And I suppose that memory spilled out of my eyes\u2026<\/p>\n Because dammit\u2026I miss my tin-cans\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sometimes things change so gradually that you have no idea they\u2019re changing at all, until you look back and you wonder\u2026when did that happen? Where did that go? When did that stop? The mainstage show tonight was a cabaret style … Continue reading