Melancholy pool playlist

I've been spending a lot of time in my pool this summer and it has been wonderful.  Each summer I have a pool playlist that accompanies my time spent swimming or floating.  Back in 2018, when we first got the pool, the playlist was called my 'Pool Perfect Playlist' and included songs from Journey, the Eagles, Bob Seger, Foreigner, REO Speedwagon, ABBA, and Night Ranger.  It fit the mood of 2018 perfectly!  In fact, that playlist carried over into most of the summer of 2019.  It was hard to beat a playlist that took me back to the days of my youth and was so upbeat - raucous even.  Great fun.  

In 2020 I thought I would spend a lot of time in the pool, but for various reasons, I was only able to get in 3 times over the course of the summer.  For that reason, I really never settled on a pool playlist for 2020. (which is probably supremely appropriate, all things considered...)  :) 

So here we are at summer of 2021 and things are unique... it has been quite a summer so far, but not at all in the ways I had envisioned.  As for my playlist, before I got in the pool the first time I considered my 'Pool Perfect Playlist' and realized that wasn't going to be a good fit at all.  I sat down to create a new one and it all sort of came together.  I found the songs that I most wanted to hear this summer, and instead of filling it with raucous, upbeat music, I felt drawn to moodier songs.  I ended up naming it the 'Melancholy Pool Playlist'.  When I first named it 'melancholy', I truly meant that in the fullest way possible - deep loss; sad and pensive.  But as summer has rolled on and I have spent more time in the pool listening to my playlist I have evolved with that word and the meaning behind it.  Further searching reveals that melancholy can be a route to healing... a way of processing through hard things and holding up the beautiful, the serene - a way of moving forward.  And that is how it feels to me.  

Music and words have always been a balm to me - a comfort.  And I am finding, this summer, that the only real way I fully relax is when I get into the pool and turn on my music.  Dipping into the soft water and feeling it surround me as I gaze across the fields (in pretty much any direction), sometimes spotting my husband or one of my sons out working with the horses, visiting quietly with a friend -  brings a certain peace.  And hearing my 'Melancholy Pool Playlist' allows my mind to wander and clear and even bring back sweet memories.  Healing.  I honestly hope that next summer requires a different playlist... but for this summer, it is a good one.  

"Son can you play me a memory?

I'm not really sure how it goes

But it's sad and it's sweet and I knew it complete

When I wore a younger man's clothes”