Going for the one

It’s amazing to me to ride on the train and hear people’s ipods blaring music so loudly that I could sing along if I knew the words. Most people listen to what they look like. A Latino punk listening to the Clash. A young office-working guy listening to Modest Mouse. I like the surprises best though. One time I was standing near a young woman who was listening to her ipod at a truly eternal ear-damage level. She looked like she was on her way to college classes--very young art student. The first song I heard was by the Pixies. I tried not to bob my head and sing along, but when I wasn’t cringing from concern for her eardrums, I enjoyed it a lot. What happened next was definitely a shuffle moment. A song by Janis Joplin came on, and the girl turned up her ipod’s volume even louder! While I love Bobby mother-effin McGee almost as much as Janis did, I almost died laughing at innocent art girl.

Here was a song I associated so heavily with my high school years, when I pretended to understand what it meant to be a hippy, screaming from the earbuds of a girl who looked more techno-rave than tree-hugger. And she was jamming out on the packed morning commute train, standing near the doors with her art portfolio. What a cutie. Her anachronistic appearance and love of Janis Joplin made me smile for hours.

I just plugged in my new earbuds for the first time, despite mounting evidence that all of us ipod addicts are going deaf quickly. Apparently earbuds tire the auditory nerve more quickly than traditional headsets, which causes the listener to turn up the music louder and louder as their ear bones grow weary of transmitting sound. That said, my new earbuds are amazing. God bless Sony and their amazing acoustic technology. I feel like I’m listening to a tiny Yes concert in my head to the exclusion of all aural insults in my environment.

Yes is one of my guilty pleasures. Like the girl in the train car, I don’t think I look like a Yes fan. A Yes fan looks like a skinny middle-aged guy that has never been on time with fashion. If I were as unconcerned about my ear health as the young art student, I would jam to Yes on the way to work as everyone sniggered because they were suddenly reminded of that one Yes song that was popular when they were young. They’d try not to bob their heads and sing along, but they’d want to. I hope they’d smile as they thought of me blissing out to Yes.