Two songs remind me of my teenage years and neither are from the twenty-first century.
I can remember on numerous occasions when—as my mom put it—"my attitude problem" had hit an all time high. My dad would walk into my room and say "come into the garage I want you to listen to something." I knew what would be waiting for me in this garage—laughter, mockery, the occasional "I really want you to listen to this part"—and yet, I still joined him every time.
And there he would place one of his outdated cassettes in his large "record player" that did not play records, and stream one of these two songs: "That's Life" by Frank Sinatra or "Get Over It" by the Eagles. This was my dad's idea of comforting me when I was sad or angry or full of angsty attitude. And somehow the lyrics demanding me to get over myself were comforting... in the most non-comforting sort of way.
Although I would never admit it then, (hard-headed—another quality I picked up from my father) I always realized he was right. Whatever I was going through was not the end of the world. My dad knew it wasn't, and deep down so did I.
I have to thank him for not letting me give into those feelings of self-pity. Because of him I am able to say "get over yourself" to myself. He taught me that things happen in life whether we like or not—if it is something I can change then stop complaining and do something about it, and if it's something I can't change, then hey, that's life.
Now when I get caught up in situations that seem to consume my life, I hear those songs playing in my head and I laugh. I can't help but think, just get over it.
The other day I was discussing this with my Grandma and she told me that as much as she loves seeing the opportunities I have, she also feels bad for my generation because we seem to have so much more stuff to worry about. As a young woman I worry about which path I should take in my life; as a young woman, she worried about being able to eat.
Our lives have become much more complicated since the time my Grandma grew up, for better and for worse. Sometimes it seems like everything around us is moving so fast and we are not equipped to catch up and that leads to worrying.
But do we really need to worry about all this stuff? Why do we try to do everything so fast when it doesn't make us any happier than if we were to take things slow?
We comfort ourselves with things and to-do lists, and the more we do, the further we get from facing the truth of what life really is—a complete mystery to everyone—and that seems to transcend every time period.
