Seven Songs of the Summer of Chaos and Joy

I am kind of refusing to believe that the Summer of Chaos and Joy is coming to an end, but a) the deadline for The Thing (a.k.a my giant binder of tenure and promotion materials) looms; b) institutional demands are making it more and more impossible to claim to people I do not want to see that I am in Prague until Labor Day; and c) nearly everyone on the interwebs and Facebook is reminding me that we are in the last charmed days of the season.

Once I get The Thing done (my self-imposed deadline for the master copy of it is August 27), I will actually be excited about moving toward the Autumn of Chaos and Joy. The boots! The sweaters! My students! Fall excursions with The Someone! The Someone! In sweaters! It's all too delicious.

But until then I am going to revel in the vestiges of the summer and also finally share its soundtrack, prompted by a meme Caro tagged me for a thousand years (or so) ago . . .

List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re not any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now, shaping your spring/summer. Post these instructions in your blog along with your seven songs. Tag seven others to see what they're listening to.


1. "Blindsided," Bon Iver, from the fantastic and amazing For Emma Forever Ago, which I discovered in May during my separation from The Someone and which is good both for times of angst and times of joy.

2. "Viva La Vida," Coldplay. This song was playing in my head virtually all of the time during the month of June right up until the date of the album release. How did they do that?

3. "Oh My Sweet Carolina," Ryan Adams. The album Heartbreaker is an old favorite but is now forever associated with The Someone, as we listened to it on one of our first dates.

4. "What Ever Happened," The Strokes. I am the only person I know who loves the film Marie Antoinette without reservation. I obsessively listened to the soundtrack this Spring. This song made it out of the loop into my regular summer mix, because of two lyrics: "I want to be forgotten and I don't want to be reminded," which has to do with tenure and being under scrutiny, etc.; and "I want to be beside her; she wants to be admired," the first part of which I like to mishear and inaccurately sing at the top of my lungs as "I want to be besotted" (as in wildly drunk with love) and all of which for various reasons, including the fact that I am wildly drunkenly in love, now reminds me of The Someone.

5. "Idiot Wind," Bob Dylan. I realize the song has problems. It's long. It's nasally. It's misogynistic. But for me it somehow works as a magic talisman to ward off the suffocating evil of the Idiot Wind with whom I work.

6. Spirit, Willie Nelson. I gave this album to my father for Father's Day this year. He loves it. I hear it is also Willie's favorite of his records. It reminds me of Austin, one of my favorite places on the planet.

7. "In Love with a Girl," Gavin DeGraw. Heh.

Not going to tag but go for it if you so desire or did not get around to it the first time.