on the weight of vinyl records
My birthday is coming up and I can't work out why it doesn't feel like anything.
It used to. The day was marked. People showed up. Now it's a Tuesday with some messages. Nothing bad happened, it just went flat, and I can't say when.
Records are the thing that didn't. I put one on every day, usually during or after work, sometimes twice, and it's the only part of the day I don't have to talk myself into.
I take the collecting seriously. I read about pressings. I care which cut I'm getting and I've paid more than I should have to get the right one, more than once. I have maybe 150 records. Maybe 200. Lost count.
Last things I bought were A Light for Attracting Attention and the There Will Be Blood soundtrack, both off Instagram from some people in Brasília, and they took an absurd amount of time to get here.
A Light for Attracting Attention is Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood making a whole other band after doing the most famous thing anyone in their position could do. It's restless and uncomfortable in places and nobody was asking them for it. The soundtrack is Greenwood too. They posted it the day after I got A Light for Attracting Attention. Really like that movie. Love the score.
I'm finishing my degree and trying to leave for a masters, so this is probably my last birthday in Belém.
I can't make myself lie about this part, because the easy thing to write is that I'm sad about it. I'm not. I'm glad. It doesn't feel like leaving, it feels like a restart. I know that's a shot in the dark. Don't even know if I'll pass. Just ideas.
I keep waiting for the grief and it hasn't come. That seems like the wrong way to feel about the place I grew up in. I don't know what to do with it, so I'm putting it here. Maybe it will come if I do get accepted and get ready to leave.
The records are the only part I'm actually worried about. They're heavy. They warp. Moving them means deciding what comes.
1 comment
This has happened to me as well. For some reason, it doesn’t feel that discouraging. Sometimes, I get the sense that this place is comfortable in every area and in every way, same job, same people, same routines where the possibilities for growth or change are basically nonexistent. At the beginning of the year, I almost moved, and I felt good about it. It seemed like, even with the uncertainty, that change would take me somewhere better. I didn’t feel any sense of grief. Even so, I felt very sad about leaving my vinyl records (my family). Still, it makes me feel better knowing that I’m not the only one who thinks this way. About your birthday, don’t overthink it, just enjoy it when the day comes. Don’t let nostalgia blind you. Appreciate your health and your family’s, hug them as tightly as you can, and be grateful to have them close on an important day. I’ll miss you btw.
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