Playlist Storybook.

I have a playlist that has been 25 years in the making.

Here’s how it works: Every time a song makes me cry, I replay it—maybe once or 27 times. I roll it over in my head and pay attention to when my lips start to quiver and what words hit like gut punches. If I continue to get a similar reaction a couple of times,  I click “add to playlist.”

Now this accumulated playlist is now about 7 hours long now and is creatively named “Jody Car.” This signals to me that I do not listen to this particular playlist unless I am alone in my car.

And that’s how it works.

Well.

I recently dropped the last of my 6 kids off at college. I had a 22-hour drive home, alone in the car.

And yep. 

I made it home in three full Jody Car playlists. And nearly 15 sporadic hours of full-on tears. 

It was a musical storybook of my entire life. 

It’s how this song makes me think of Gabe in high school. Or this one of Kora after another, repeat setback, crumbled up on the pavement in the track parking lot. Or this one that captures how I felt the moment Quincy was born, reaching for him as they whisked him away. This one hearkens to the move from Iowa. This one reminds me of Dawson’s wedding. This one takes me immediately back to Max and his high school basketball days. In this song, I can feel Zeke in my lap, asleep, in the back of a Freetown taxi. This is the bathroom floor song. This is the worship song that I have returned to ever since I was a teenager. This song from this movie makes me want to run in fields of wildflowers and sing at the top of my lungs while throwing off all the baggage of my entire life. You know. Etc. Etc.

You can bet that “Boston” is in there too.  

To a random listener, it would take some explaining and would be a total nonsensical collection of musical genres and themes.

But for me. I feel every beat of those songs as my mind flashes through the scenes of my life. My innermost aches and pains and longings. The most vivid memories of each of the kids. And not just of them, but how I felt being their Mom in that particular moment. 

I laughed a couple of times, imagining that there was a camera in this rented car carrying me home. Oh, the tales it would tell. Me. Alone. 22 hours. And three times through the Jody Car Playlist. 

It was a lot.

I kept thinking: "That just happened. All that just happened.”

And here we are.

I needed to get home because not only are we an empty nest…but we are an empty nest without a nest. Our long-loved rental home is going on the market, and I needed to go through all the stuff that these six launched children left behind. I needed to pack it all up, move it to the garage for a quick move, and find us a place to live.

For the first time, we need only two bedrooms, I guess. School districts do not matter. Extra parking is not necessary. One bathroom is sufficient. 

However, the three beloved pets that launched children left behind do significantly make such moves challenging. 

And yet.

Here we are.

It all happened.

I try to imagine myself meeting new people at this stage in life. How will I ever be known?? How will I ever tell them about all this life that was lived and so much a part of me, but also not really anymore. 

Because I will be a lady…living with her husband and three pets in a 2 bedroom apartment.

And yet. 

That all did happen. 

It was a whole thing.

I guess I’ll invite the brave ones on a drive.

With a song-by-song explanation. 

And ask for their playlist too. 

Kleenex provided.