Scientist Seeking

I have a playlist “movie about my life.” The first two songs are instrumental. The first I feel really sets the tone. “Paperman.” It’s from a Disney short film, I couldn’t tell you now what movie it precedes but the music has stuck with me ever since. Of course, if you watch the short, you understand the way it furthers the action in the story. But if you take the music on its own, you can feel it.

There’s this repetitive light jingle, a recurring cascade of falling star song, that is happy but small. As if it is almost sad. There’s a part in the middle, with a growing crescendo, “bum bum bumbum a bum” that feels like a climax and then—a heavy whisper. A sadness. But then. Oh, god. Then, that little flit of notes pings back softly, slowly—hopeful, maybe still a touch sad. The strings of the violin long and reaching. And then, it grows. Grows until you hear everything, full, running. Sliding wooshing sounds that remind me of the wind at the top of Red Rocks. And then it slows down again. Steady, calm. Finishing on those soft starry notes that skip through out it.

It’s the song I imagine that my older self hears as her life flashes before her eyes. The starry notes that are sweet and a little sad sounding that feel carved into my very soul. (Not that I was a particularly morose child, but certainly an introverted one.) That climax, of finding myself, the drop—that moment(s) when it feels like it’s all falling apart. And then. The growing. The full force of “the moment” when perspective shifts and suddenly everything clicks and it’s right.  And in that rushing sound, I imagine all the love I’ve received and given, a sepia toned reel of laughing with friends, dancing in my car, the view from Sunset Cliffs, spring afternoons on campus reading and writing, falling in the snow, days at the zoo, the many loaves of bread in my kitchen. And every time I hear it, I cry. Because in all the ways I am excited for my life to keep changing and moving and growing; hearing it makes me look back on where I’ve been already. What a beautiful little life and how proud I am of who little Holly grew up to be.

Who cries at holiday commercials and movies with crying dads. Who walks slower, looks up at the shifting shades of autumn tree leaves and attempts to distinguish the nests of squirrels and birds. Who tries to let spiders live in her indoor plants and thanks the trees during hikes.

Keep spare one size fits all slippers in the trunk. Buy waterproof makeup. And then cry. And feel all those big feelings. Because I think the world glistens more vividly through tear stained eyes. Maybe being hopeful and a little bit sad sometimes makes “those moments” fuller.

Stay wild.