Odds and Ends

As children, we are taught to endure uncertainty. As adults, we learn to endure certainty.

Do not pelt me with olives, people. I’m just going to say it. The Wizard of Oz is definitely in my top five movies. Yes, I know I have said this about at least…well, more than five movies. In all honesty, this one (and Good Will Hunting) could not be dethroned.

This isn’t just childhood nostalgia, though that is part of it. As a girl I had always loved when Judy Garland sang “Over the Rainbow”. At the time it conjured all of the feelings of a fairytale. I was a sucker for fairytales. Adults often think of fairytales and shake their heads at children for being naive. I believe that is a lazy take. It isn’t that children are naive at all. It is that we have designed stories to train them on how to tolerate heartbreak. I ask you: When have children not been accustomed to heartache? They face the loss of a pet or a loved one. Friends move away. They experience embarrassment. Yet, we give them these fairytales and say, “Look for the happy ending. The cool breeze. The break in the clouds.” And the song, “Over the Rainbow” is the soundtrack to that thesis. At least, I thought it was.

On our first Thanksgiving after moving to South Carolina, we made the trek to see my family in the mountains of North Carolina. I had just found out I was pregnant with my fourth child. I was sick. All the time. The drive was incredibly hard. Five hours stretched into almost eight. We missed our normal family traditions: my (famous) homemade cinnamon rolls, and the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. We got to our hotel and settled in with cold, leftover pumpkin pie. The Wizard of Oz was on television, and my daughter was thrilled. I sat there picking at my pie, feeling like my insides were going to end up on the outside, and that’s when I heard it. Over the Rainbow. As I sat there willing my pumpkin pie to stay inside of my stomach, the lyrics landed for the first time.

Somewhere over the rainbow, way up high
There's a land that I heard of once in a lullaby

I realized right then that this song wasn’t a happy ending song. The land that she was longing for was a place she had never seen. She had only heard of it once. In a lullaby. And then, perhaps, the most devastating line:

If happy little bluebirds fly

Beyond the rainbow

Why, oh why, can’t I?

That was the moment that I realized that music often smuggles in heartbreak using a beautiful voice and a melody. And this wouldn’t be the last time. Years later another devastating song would reveal itself to me. And this time it wasn’t disguised under a story and ruby red slippers. Instead, it came as Norwegian synth music, only stripped down to acoustic.

You have most likely heard the song “Take on Me” by A-ha. There is a specific version that they performed on M-Tv unplugged that sent my soul into mourning for at least a month. Instead of the catchy beat and chipper 80’s sound, they performed the song as an almost ballad. You can watch it here. In this format the lyrics reveal what the rhythm and synth texture conceal: heartache.

The line: I’m odds and ends, but that’s me

“Odds and ends” He is saying that he’s leftovers. Fragments. Scraps. He’s telling us that he’s been reduced, but that’s him. Where Over the Rainbow asks, "Does this place exist?" Take On Me asks, "Even if it does, does it last?" This is the difference between childhood: “Is it real?” And adulthood: “Will it last?”

Over the Rainbow asks “will I find this place?” Take on Me doesn’t ask. It arrives with, “I’ve done the calculations, the cost is acknowledged, the pursuit continues.”

I’ll be coming for you anyway.

He knows this is going to cost him something. The calculation has already been made.

“Take me on anyway.”

The very good news is that I did not throw up the pumpkin pie. I didn’t finish it either.

This is the difference between being a child and being grown. As children, we wonder whether the beautiful thing exists at all. We stare toward the horizon and ask whether there really is a place beyond the rainbow. Whether the promise is true. Whether the story is real. Adults ask different questions. We know the place exists. We know love exists. We know beauty exists. We know joy exists. We have touched them, however briefly. The question is no longer whether we will find them. The question is whether we can keep them.

That is the heartbreak hidden inside both songs.

Dorothy looks toward a place she has only heard described in a lullaby. The singer in Take On Me looks toward something he can already feel slipping through his fingers. One is longing for discovery. The other is longing for permanence.

Perhaps that is why both songs endure.

As children, we are taught to endure uncertainty. As adults, we learn to endure certainty.

We learn that love exists. Beauty exists. Joy exists. We find them.

And then we spend the rest of our lives learning how to live with the fact that they don’t stick. It’s the reason we find ourselves saying, “I can love you better now” after the person has already walked out the door. It’s the reason we run headfirst into something, only to find a trap door before the finish line. You can fall in love with someone that will never love you back. You can put all of your eggs in a basket that has no bottom. Beauty fades. The thing didn’t work out. You didn’t get the window seat, or the job, or the diagnosis you wanted. No one is coming. You can’t negotiate life. You have to take it on anyway. And stay goddamn composed while you’re doing it.