What’s the soundtrack of your life? Here’s what I can remember of mine:

“She Loves You” The Beatles: The first song I can remember being aware of. I was around four or five. I remember riding in the back of a station wagon with a friend with that playing on the radio and constantly belting out the refrain . It must have driven my friend’s parents nuts, because it would drive me nuts today if kids were doing that. That’s the one and only time I can remember singing in public in an entirely unrestrained way.

“You’re So Vain” Carly Simon. Second semester, 7th grade. We had a jukebox in our school cafeteria, and this song blared through every lunch period. I had 7th grade reading class that period, and our classroom was just outside the lunchroom. One day our teacher asked us if anybody knew what the word “vain” meant. Deafening silence. He proceeded to explain the meaning and counseled we should strive to know the meaning of words instead of blindly parroting them.

“I Am A Rock” Simon and Garfunkel. This was a staple for years in my teen angst years and beyond.

“Desperado” The Eagles. See above. This was a mainstay until I was nearly thirty.

“Black Water” The Doobie Brothers. 9th grade. The album played on a portable record player through the entire JV and Varsity girls basketball practice. The song I remember hearing over and over was “Black Water.”

“Bad Company” by Bad Company on the Bad Company album. Had to be sometime during high school, but I don’t remember when. I just love the alliteration.

Fifth Dimension Greatest Hits on Earth. This 8-track* got a lot of play. There were just so many good songs.

Boston. You’ll laugh. This was hard rock to me. Hubby’s ringtone on my phone? “Let Me Take You Home Tonight.” Everyone else gets the Pink Panther Theme Song.

“Running on Empty” Jackson Browne. This was a theme of my late teens, early twenties. Certainly the second half of my senior year of high school.

“Mandy” Barry Manilow. I think I knew this one by heart.

“Rumours” Fleetwood Mac. This album spent my senior year on the top of the charts. I had it in 8-track. The song. The album. It was all you heard on the airwaves in 1977-1978.

While we’re on the subject of 8-tracks, the “Feels So Good” album by Chuck Mangione.

“Last Dance” and “MacArthur Park” Donna Summer. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was cursed with coming of age during the disco inferno years. I still have the Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack LP. Only because it might be worth something someday. I never got into it (I don’t dance — especially where humans might see me), but one of my good buddy suitemates on the Olendingy at Ohio State did these up right. Polly Paris? Whatever became of you?

“Against the Wind” Bob Seger and The Silver Bullet Band. More fodder for my teen, twenty-something angst.

Speaking of Seger, who can forget “Night Moves” and “Accompany Me”? Not that anything was going on in my life in that department.

“Dancing in the Dark” Bruce Springsteen. Yeah. You’ve captured the theme of my late teens and twenties. I want today’s state of mind (which I really hope continues to improve) and the health I had in the teens and twenties. I know. It’s asking too much.

I’m up to the mid- to- late 80s now. The themes here are Eddie Money (Can’t Hold Back), Little River Band (Get Lucky), Huey Lewis and the News (Fore), Steve Winwood (Roll With It), and Whitesnake (Here I Go Again). These got me through my divorce and “Driving the Loop” when I wasn’t sleeping. I used to live just west of Loop 410 in San Antonio. If I wasn’t sleeping, I’d “do the loop” by getting on and driving around the loop until I came back to the same exit I’d gotten on at and get off. The other options were driving to Trinity University and walking the walking track or shooting hoops with myself at an outside hoop at Alamo Heights High School.

Then I did a remote tour in Iceland and learned to like country music (which is really what we call classic rock today). I experimented with a lot of things in Iceland. I learned it took 8 shots of Crown Royal before I puked. I learned I had the best time slurping down Diet Cokes — I could get really crazy on that stuff. I even — gasp! — learned to line dance and do the two-step. I liked a lot of country then. I like George Strait, but I’ve never warmed to two of his songs: “They Call Me the Fireman” and “The Chair.” “Ocean Front Property” hasn’t worn well either.

“Here I Go Again” Whitesnake. This was a solid hit the whole year I was in Iceland. Just call it my theme song.

“I Wouldn’t Want to Be A Kennedy” Shona Laing. I don’t know if it was a hit in the States or not, but it got a lot of airplay on Icelandic radio. I loved listening to Icelandic radio. I taped some of it off the air and still listen to it now and again.

Coming out of Iceland, I went on a Dan Seals kick. “Meet Me in Montana”, “Everything that Glitters Is Not Gold”, “Guitar Man Out of Control”, “You Still Move Me”

And Tanya Tucker. Not everything, but “If it Don’t Come Easy” and “Can’t Run from Yourself”

Bryan Adams holds a place in my heart. “Summer of ’69”, “Everything I Do I Do It For You”, “Remembrance Day.”

Nobody can hold a candle to Kathy Mattea for speaking to my heart — and she has a wicked sense of humor that took some getting used to. “Walking Away A Winner”, “From A Distance”, “Come from the Heart”, “Love Chooses You”, Standing Knee Deep in A River”, “Love Travels”, “A Few Good Things Remain”, “Lonesome Standard Time”, “Lonely At the Bottom”, “Seeds”, “Time Passes By”, “Whole Lotta’ Holes”, and on and on. The humorous songs? “33, 45, 78”, “454 Rocket”, and “Harley.”

I’m a little more settled these days. I’ve started to figure life out (which means it’s about to play a mean trick on me). I’m less angsty. The songs I’ve discovered lately run along these lines:

“Unwritten” Natasha Bedingfield. I credit Tambo with calling my attention to this one.

“The Riddle” and “100 Years” Five for Fighting. This comes from switching to listen to XM’s The Blend in an effort to expand my musical horizons.

“Black Horse and the Cherry Tree” K.T. Tunstall. Something about this song calls to me.

There’s so many more: Aaron Lines, Alabama, The Bellamy Brothers, Billy Joel, Bread, Bryan White, Dire Straits, Elton John, Foreigner, Heart, Highway 101, Janie Frickie, Jethro Tull, Jim Croce, Jimmy Buffett, Jo Dee Messina, Juice Newton, K.T. Oslin, Kenny Rogers, Lionel Richie, Lonestar, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Meatloaf, Mel McDaniel, Neil Diamond, Nena, Pam Tillis, Phil Collins, Pink Floyd, Queen, REO Speedwagon, Restless Heart, Sawyer Brown, Shania Twain, The Bangles, The Cars, The Forester Sisters, Willie Nelson, and ZZ Top.

PBW likes Nickelback, and they’ve been getting airplay on The Blend. Not bad. Hubby likes his music sans lyrics — as a musician, lyrics get in the way for him. Lyrics are everything to me. If he reads this, I imagine he would know little, if any, of what I’ve written above. This is one area on The Dating Game or The Newlywed Game where he would be completely clueless. Why? Music is very private to me. I don’t listen to it when other people can hear. And since I know what I listen to doesn’t interest him, I don’t listen to it around him either.

*Don’t know what an 8-track tape is?

What speaks to or has spoken to you?  I’ve been trying to expand my musical horizons lately — I don’t want to be stuck in the rut of only liking what I liked when I was in my 20s and 30s.  If you decide to post, please leave a link in comments.  I don’t want to miss it.