30 Days of Gratefulness: Day Five.

Well hello there dear readers! We are nearing the end of the first week of this challenge. What does everyone think thus far? Are you enjoying what I have to say? Are you inspired to write about what you are grateful for? Have the prompts been thought provoking for you? I didn't have any lofty goals of inspiring others with this. But if you are feeling the urge to write, DO IT! Share it with me! I would love to see what you've got to say! 

I want to take minute to say thank you for all the views and feedback I've gotten. I am always surprised at the amount of people who take time out of their busy day to read a piddly little blog that I put together. And not to brag, but it really is a lot of people. So yeah, thanks for reading, sharing, and liking!

Day five is about sounds. Like what specific sound you are grateful for. Can I just say music and use that as a blanket term for the vibrations that our ears sense? Is that cool with everyone? Yes? Okay, good.

So, music. Everyone I have ever met in my short little lifetime has been closely tethered to music in one way or another, whether they realize it or not. For me, music has always played a large part in my creative process. When I started writing I was an angst filled 13 year old who was fueled by tunes by bands like Good Charlotte and Evanescene. While I have since grown up and lost the majority of my moody sadness, I am still continually inspired by lyrics and melodies. Specifically a group called Purity Ring. If I want to write I just hop on YouTube and listen to a mix of their work and the words almost visably flow out of my fingers. It's like magic. Music has that power over pretty much everyone. It is as if music is the audible version of emotions and thoughts intensified by like a million. I'm sure there is some scientific mumbo jumbo behind why songs have such a great impact on humans, but I don't know it so I'm not going to cite it here. 

Moving right along, let's delve deeper into why I am so grateful for melodic noise. It brings people together, much like food. Little known fact: I love to sing and when I was in high school, I desperately wanted to be on Broadway. I was a talented dancer and my singing voice was pretty damn good. Now that I've grown up some and realized the stage would have eaten me alive, I belt out show tunes and twangy country songs at people for enjoyment. I do this so frequently that my two year old has started joining in the fun. Cameron has even been known to sing along on occasion. But he mostly waits for a Disney song to pop up. Who would have thought that the act of sliding my voice up and down the scales while speaking words has caused my little family to become closer knit? It's something we can all do and have fun at. And who doesn't love it when your family is getting along and not fighting over the Roku remote because half of you can't stand to watch another episode of Yu Gi O while the other half thinks it's the greatest show ever written?

I know you all have the same problem. Damn that Yu Gi O.

Music is also a decent sized chunk of my memory. Cameron used to call me a walking jukebox. But I'm not mentioning that here because I hold some knowledge about billboard topping hits. Instead, I am talking about my childhood and adolescence. I seem to have hazy memories of standing in my grandmother's kitchen while she cooked. She would be humming one song and then would start singing something else, probably from Elvis Presley, to herself. I always thought Grandma had a wonderful voice and looking back on those days gives me great joy now that she is gone. My mother also likes to sing. And she does it often. She used to spend countless hours in FYE combing over CDs with me. She's taken and sent me to loads of concerts. And she's given me one of her vintage tour shirts. But my favorite musical memory has less to do with music itself, and more to do with the atmosphere and the person I was with. But if it wasn't for the actual music, we would have never had this experience. My very best friend and I go to concerts together as often as life will allow, and this started sometime around our senior year of high school. One specific time she heard that Jeffree Star was playing a small local venue and that there were still tickets available. So we went and had the time of our lives. We danced, sang, touched J Star's leg, took pictures with him and another band. It was AMAZING. Since then, my friend and I have been to numerous shows together and we both cherish those memories deeply. 

I'm sure that I could continue writing about why I am so grateful for music but I'm going to leave it at this; music is at the heart of all of the important parts of my life. And without it I just wouldn't be the same Alex.