Purple Collection 6 (Streets of Your Town)

This song came into my life via Claudia’s sister Meg. She sent a Big Sister Care Package to the Okmulgee dorms -I’m guessing winter 1993- and in it was a cassette with The Go-Betweens 16 Lovers Lane on side one and Nick Drake Pink Moon on side two. I borrowed it that day and have yet to return it. It was just one of those tapes that really becomes part of you. I call them Albums Without Which—you know, the ones that you can’t envision your life turning out right if you hadn’t ever heard them. Different people have different criteria for deciding which songs they like, but for me it’s the ability for a song to become relevant to whatever I’m going through. Some people listen to music and they hear key changes and time signatures and all kinds of math; I’m not like that. Music is emotion for me. Music is friends I’ve had and road trips I’ve taken and cars I’ve wrecked and beers I’ve spilled. Music is the time we had to hide the pet ferret because the hotel manager was knocking; the time Luke, Claudia, and I hung upside down from the monkey bars at the playground in the middle of the night and talked about religion. Every song I love is the memory of something that I don’t want to lose. And this is the song of the last days of my childhood: leaving home, making new friends (most of whom are still with me, some of them reading this), and finding confidence in myself.