Alone Again, Naturally

"Take a sad song and make it better"
- Beatles, "Hey Jude"

A movie's final sequence convincingly portrays the protagonist conquering all odds and you leave the theater feeling triumphant over the victory of good versus evil. But you won't pay to watch the same movie again. Same with novels. Once you put them down, you don't find yourself reopening the pages. But with songs, the experience is intense to the point of being spiritual - soul, heart, and senses in one swoop and you find yourself repeatedly consuming the same songs whose representation have not diminished by time.

Two years ago, in the month of July, a 'debasement tape' of sorts to honor a friend's bleeding heart was carelessly prepared. 7 songs consisted that list:

1. Circle (Edie Brickell & the New Bohemians) - Being alone is the best way to be/When I'm by myself/ it's the best way to be/Everything is temporary anyways.

2. Fortress around your heart (Sting) - If I built this fortress/around your heart/encircled you in trenches/and barbed wire.

3. Fact and Fiction (Kristen Hall) – I’m weighing the fact and fiction/Diluting the truth with diction/and empty promises.

4. Fake Plastic Trees (Radiohead) – If I could be/who you wanted/all the time.

5. God Only Knows (The Beachboys) – If you should ever leave me/life would still go on/believe me/the world would show nothing to me/so what good/would living do me.

6. World Before Columbus (Suzanne Vega) – If your love/were taken from me/all the trees freeze/in the cold ground

7. Half A World Away (REM) – This could be the saddest dusk/I’ve ever seen…My hands are tied/my heart aches/I’m half a world away.

An updated list is in order, I decree. Senti.

1. I Eat Dinner (Rufus Wainwright) - No more candlelight/no more romance

2. Hand on your Heart (Jose Gonzales) - It's one thing to fall in love/but another to make it last/You know it's one thing to say you love me/but another to mean it from the heart.

3. To The End (Blur) - You and I collapsed in love/And it looks like/we might have made it.

4. Shattered Like (Rivermaya) - Have you been drinking/have you been messing up your life/as you did mine/not long ago

5. Clever as You (Sheila and the Insects) - I could have loved you more/but my heart/is not as clever as you.

6. Disarm (Smashing Pumpkins) - The bitterness of one who's left alone

7. The District Sleeps Alone Tonight (Postal Service) - And I am finally seeing/why I was the one/worth leaving.

8. One More try (Kuh Ledesma) -It really is quite tough/when love is not enough

9. Fragments of Forever (Nonoy Zuniga) - Now we're left with nothing more/thank God, there's still worth living for/than fragments of forever/we saved along the way

10. Country Feedback (REM) - You wear me out, you wear me out.

I'm tired of this. Get a life - memo to self.