#467: Maxwell, 'BLACKsummers’night'
Columbia, 2009
The song, “Pretty Wings” opened up an entire world of music for me. I remember sitting in the back of someone’s minivan next to some girls from my church. I pulled my silver iPod and headphones out and played this song over and over and over again.
This week, my sister and I were being casual with our words and opinions and caused real drama and hurt feelings. My sister came to me and sunk her body into mine while we discussed our goal to honor every name better. She leaned into me and cried. It felt like her body was curling into itself. Her shoulder blades were curling into me.
When her transplanted kidney went into rejection three years ago, I hugged her as she was coming out of the bathtub. She was suffering from severe medical ptsd, she was sick and losing weight.
I was terrified she was going to die. She was getting out of the tub in the middle of a ptsd episode, soaking wet. She crawled into the fetal position and I just smothered her and tried to hold her. Her shoulder blades curled into me.
It felt like her wings had withered up.
They had always been such pretty wings.
I know this song is about a breakup but it brings me back to my being a sister and not knowing where to put my feelings about watching my sister in pain.
This was the song that held me in these moments.
I spent a lot of time listening to this on my iPod, in the back of people’s minivans, on the floor in my bedroom, in the hallway at my high school and in sitting in hospital waiting rooms wondering about my sister.
I forgot about this song until this week and it was so healing.
Here is to a 2022 of being a much kinder and more aware woman, less Nora Ephron pettiness and more Joan Didion wisdom.
This should also be a year about playing that song on repeat like I did when I was 17.
Top songs: Pretty Wings, Playing Possum