Not Your Average Damsel

BUT I’VE WANDERED MUCH FURTHER TODAY THAN I SHOULD AND I CANT SEEM TO FIND MY WAY BACK TO THE WOOD.

Kenny Loggins is that dude. Before I start down this path, I swear, this site is not going to be blog after blog about Yacht Rock and Yacht Soul. Yes, I talk about them a lot. Yes, they are always on. Yes, I have turned a station into a lifestyle. Adjust.

I repeat, Kenny Loggins is that dude. True tour de forces like I Believe in Love and Heart to Heart just cannot be ignored. And these two are examples of the ones I wasn’t aware of before; so distracted by the This Is Its and What a Fool Believeses (yes, this one is his, too).

Wait, wait- hold the fuck on! Just now, in this very moment as I type this review of his 80s jams, did I put together that he is also the genius behind Return to Pooh Corner! As a woman who doesn’t have and never wanted kids, I have worshipped that song for more than 20 years with tender, motherly adoration. Imagining myself standing in a dim nursery and tearily patting the back of my warm, brown, little son, in his Eeyore onesie. How did I not realize that this was Loggins, too?  

There was originally a different direction for this rave about his music but this lullaby realization just derailed it all. It’s got me lost in naptime memories of the many babies I adopted in spirit while working. And in melancholy memories of the one I made in carelessness and walked away from. Pooh Corner had so much meaning to me at 19. I need to switch gears for a second while I digest that. But. . . Kenny Motherfuckin’ Loggins, man. Shit.

In a totally different vein and genre, I heard the line for the first time today, “It’s a craving, not a crush.” Mind you, on my list, the song is “eh” at best. It has nothing on “Guess”. And I do believe there is an age limit written in the fine print on each of the artist’s album jackets, which I exceed. Nevertheless, that line expertly sums up the space I claim in the Acronym. I have always had trouble explaining to people why I am more the Q and not the B, but Eilish called it. Indeed, ma’am, this will never be a crush. I will crave you and think about you and talk about you. Picture you, want you, have you, and even ask for more. But I ain’t crushing on you. No matter how much I like you- something will be missing. And yeah, not that. Just an important missing piece that has always had me liking and loving men and lusting women. I like putting these new words to it– they sound like me. Ok, like me with a shit-ton more confidence, but still, like me.

Taking a quick detour from music to books, I have made yet another thought-provoking realization (in addition to the Loggins/Eilish Conjecture.)  Technically my first big thought of the week. I was excited about how I have been nose-deep in audiobooks this month after a drought of being Libby Waitlisted for weeks. I have been hearing (note: not reading) some really great stories lately and every day I ache to run home and tell the Man about it. Soon as he hits the door, I start rambling about Klara in her store window and that the Ascans have graduated, and I can’t seem to stop myself no matter how disinterested he must be.

While driving to work Monday and listening (again, not reading) to the latest, I had this overwhelming feeling, at a particularly good part, that I had taken a trip to the land inside the story and the Man didn’t come with. And we don’t do that. We’re codependent. I go, he goes. Him not coming with me on these “trips” is what feeds the feeling that I must bring him up to speed on all the new friends I made and the thoughts I thought while I was away. And he listens. And smiles lovingly at me. And tells me how much he loves that I am so into my books. Passing the Bird Theory test every day, huh?

I’m sorry- he’s mine.

/damsel