Another blog and another title focusing on my continued obsession with The Wonder Years. Most of my blog titles are lyrics from some of my favourite songs and generally I go through phases where I use the same band a few times.
So in the past while I started listening to Aaron West and The Roaring Twenties (Dan Campbell’s side project). The album got me thinking about past relationships as it’s an extremely evocative album, which is typical of Dan Campbell’s songs in general. And naturally being sensitive old me it got me a bit anxious, but it’s tough because I love the album and I want to listen to it all the time. If you’re reading this and you have difficulties with stuff like anxiety, intrusive thoughts, depression, or just about anything that negatively affects your opinion of yourself then you should definitely tell someone, be they professionals or not. I think The Wonder Years and Aaron West affect me as much as they do because of how harsh some of the honesty is in the music. In Teenage Parents, Dan sings: “My mother wore a sundress on the day that she got married/They held the wedding in a backyard near the city/I was just one then. I would never remember it/But I heard the voices and implications/Telling me who I could never be.” I think this line can resonate with people for two different reasons. The first being that people from economically poorer areas are made to feel as if they can’t go as far in life as people with money behind them. Jason Isbell evokes the same kind of sentiment in Children of Children (which is a brilliant song). There’s a burden of expectation on people to be like what has gone before and that burden can come from a family member, or, like in Teenage Parents, it can come in the form of societal pressure. In fact in Teenage Parents it seems as if the parents try to convince the singer that he has more potential than anyone else seems to think: “And you always said it would get better”. The second reason that that song can resonate with people is that the thought process in the song can be viewed as distrusting and paranoid. Dan Campbell sings about a time when he was only a child and about how his parents couldn’t afford a fairytale wedding. I’ve always fought with this idea of not being good enough, I’ve always felt that pressure. I’m fairly certain that pressure has always been intrinsic but I generally attribute it to extrinsic factors. It’s funny I generally don’t blame other people for my problems. Like if a group project failed for example, I’d be worried that it was all on me. If a relationship fails it takes me a terribly long time to see that I wasn’t the only one to blame. Maybe people did imply that Dan Campbell could never be anything, or maybe he used that idea to motivate himself to avoid the poverty he grew up in.
Generally I’ve been better in terms on anxiety and stuff but I realised lately that I really need social support, at least for another few months. I’m on placement at the moment and I’m away from my friends and with that there’s less time for conversation and more time for negative thoughts to pool and bother me. But placement is brilliant, and I am really enjoying it. I can’t really say much about it other than that I feel like I made a really good decision in picking Speech and Language Therapy as my course a few years ago.
Quick catch-up on other things I’m excited about: Super Bowl on Sunday (Go Carolina!), Jose to United? NFL Draft coming up. Basically woo sports!!
I watched Room last night and I hope Brie Larson wins the Oscar. I’ve been a big fan of hers since seeing The Spectacular Now, and speaking of that film I’m a big fan of Miles Teller as well. Everyone seems so focused on Jacob Tremblay’s performance, which was fantastic, while Brie Larson put in one of the best female lead performances that I can remember. I’ve seen Carol, and I can say that Brie Larson’s performance is much more deserving of an Oscar than Cate Blanchett’s. Larson conveys so much emotion in every single line. She does such a great job of showing us how happy a fractured person can be in a moment, to how low they can fall the next. She genuinely seemed like a woman who had been through the wringer.
Other quick notes: Life is Strange is honestly one of the best games I’ve ever played. Really blows Telltale Games out of the water. Also, if you’re one of those people who has completely given up on The Simpsons (I don’t blame you it has changed) I would recommend checking out the episode Barthood. It is absolutely fantastic. It’s hilarious and full of sentiment, and I would consider it a classic episode.
And hey I made a playlist of cool new music and not so new music. So if you want something cool to listen to, by all means listen to this!
Desperate To Entertain 