Song story- Flashback

So many songs...so many fond memories. Its amazing how something as simple as a song, can trigger it all. It resurfaces the memory...chains me to it and i effortlessly slide  into a refreshing  reverie.

I grew up with a radio set on my desk. Record work or exams, music was a must. We had only one radio set for the whole house, and each one of us took turns. Mom needed it while she was cooking, I used it to soothe the torture of doing my record work, and V used it while he sat for hours together with his engineering books. The radio and the songs soon became a part of our daily lives.

The musical evenings on the terrace when the lights went out, was the best part.  With the pitter patter on the tin roof and hot pakodas, I still remember certain songs from hum aapke hai koun, the way the neighbor kids sung it. It reminds me of all those didi's and bhaiya's who hid behind the water tank and used us   ( 8 year olds) as watchmen.  We were trained to use certain songs from the movie as warning signs, to alert them about an adults arrival. Even to this day, those songs strike a chord and takes me back to those moon lit nights, laced with delicate melody.

Huh! And  the school boys ( read as : lafangas) thought they would sing their way to our hearts.  I clearly remember all of us ( girls) standing in the bus stop  after tution and putting up with the kaho na pyar hai title track and the vroom vroom of their bikes.  Of course there was one intelligent handsome boy we all secretly liked. Every time he passed by and hesitatingly smiled, our hearts would skip a beat, and render the zara zara  behakta hai song in unison. Each one of the girls, assumed his smile was for her, just like how all the gopis thought Krishna danced only with them. 

This song still brings back memories of him.. and i cant help but wonder...whom did he really like?

Remember those songs, you've only heard a family member sing and perhaps never heard the original? Well... mom's favorite tamil  numbers are one of those. Illayaraja and kannadasan's songs would fill my ears, as i left for school. She had a song for every occasion. One for waking me up, one while she shampooed my hair and oh..one for consoling me when i promptly flunked every math test in school. It was only a year or so back, that i actually youtubed these songs and heard the original version.

Then there is I can be your hero baby, sung in the seductive voice of Enrique, which will forever remain as the song that played, when G proposed.  This song for me, will always be associated with that cold January evening in Delhi and my perfect foot popping kiss.

A whole bunch of other songs are recorded in my mind and they instantly take me back to those nostalgic moments. The torture song i was coaxed to sing in college, while i was being ragged....The memory song we sung during a high school trip, on our way to Ooty...the love song which got me waltzing  around my room with a pillow... the break up song i played over and over again and cried myself  to sleep...the favorite song i requested on MTV most wanted... The addictive song i air guitar to in the bathroom and pretend to be a rock star...The crazy song that got me and my cousins jumping up and down on the bed, till it broke.......Its a whole collection!

All of us can narrate our story through songs. Apart from  the lyrics, music and voice, we all have our own associations with these songs. Perhaps that's why its so important to us. They shed light on those memories which are so personal.

Even as i am being jostled around in the crowd...the song playing on my ipod, has the power to take me away. I love songs, for the same reason i love books- Time travel:)

So whats your song story?