❌Monthly Song Challenge: Archived🎵

Day 17: A song for feeling sad

So Big/So Small - Dear Evan Hansen

I have talked on this musical before on here and other threads. It covers a lot of heavy emotional topics and mental health issues.

This song though is the only one that brought me to tears not only when I first heard it, not only when I saw it live, but also any other time I listen. As a child of divorce who had my mother try to explain different things to me throughout the process and years, this song hits so hard. I don't know anyone actually who it doesn't hit hard or resonate with.

It's sad. It's heart-wrenching. It's emotional. It's gutting. It's the love of a parent for their child trying to be told in an honest and gentle way after the child explains the fear of that parent hating them for something they've done.
This one always hits hard, because I remember that day, that conversation. I was six. I remember the way the couch felt, the warmth in the room. My sister and brother, both younger, not really understanding it. And me, for a variety of reasons, thinking it was my fault. I don't revisit this song often, maybe because of that, but it still evokes that, over fifty years later.

Good song.
 
Day 17: A song for feeling sad

I had a multitude of ways I could go with this because I love sad music. Ultimately I decided I had to go with the prince of sadboys, Conor Oberst.

This is my favorite band and has been since I was a teenager, but there are times I can’t listen to their music because I know it will drag me right into the hole that I’m standing at the edge of.

And I'm sorry about the phone call and needing you
Some decisions you don't make
I guess it's just like breathing and not wanting to
Yeah, there are some things you can't fake


Bright Eyes - Happy Birthday to Me (Feb. 15)
 
Day 17 - Song for feeling sad

There were a lot of directions I could go, such as a song to play when i was sad and didn't want to be, or a song that makes me sad for whatever reason, or just a sad song. I went with the last.

I like sad songs. A lot. But this one? I like this song, but it isn't on any of my playlists. I do not want it sneaking up on me. I will not argue it is the saddest song ever, but it hits me so very hard. I am a softie, but it hits hard. And knowing what it was written about makes it far, far worse.

Warning: This is brutal. You have been warned.



On July 3rd, 2005, 7-year-old Katie Flynn was overjoyed to be the flower girl in her aunt's wedding. She loved all of it, and told her father that it was "the best day of my life," as they were riding home from the reception in a limousine.

Martin Heidgen had consumed at least 14 drinks that night, and had a blood alcohol level three-and-a-half times the legal limit when, after driving down the freeway the wrong way for two miles, he struck the limousine, killing the chauffeur, Stanley Rabinowitz, and decapitating Katie. Her mother cradled her head in her lap as the rescue workers tried to extradite the family from the wreck. Heidgen was sentenced to 19 years for second degree murder. He was paroled last year.

The start of the song is sung from Katie's mother's view point:

"And I've one more night
To be your mother"

The second from Heidgen's:

"
Hey, beauty supreme
Yeah, you were right about me
But can I get myself out from underneath
This guilt that will crush me?
And in the choir
I saw our sad Messiah
He was bored and tired of my laments
Said, "I died for you one time, but never again"

And the last line is Katie's:

"I should be laughing right now"

Hug someone you love. I just hugged my kid, but she doesn't know why. I'm okay with that.

"Limousine," Brand New

 
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Day 17: A song for feeling sad

Not to get too real but I try not to listen to sad music very often. I'm plenty sad and it's always a struggle to ignore and push past it. Dido is one of my favorite singers but if I want to shuffle her work I have to be absolutely miserable and wallowing or happy enough to not get sad from listening too long. This one is lovely and hopeful.

And you probably don't want to hear tomorrow's another day
Well I promise you you'll see the sun again
And you're asking me why pain's the only way to happiness
And I promise you you'll see the sun again


Dido - See The Sun
 
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