Music and Rituals

I have decided to use more personal experiences in this blog rather than talk about music and rituals in other cultures. 

One thing that my family does every year is that on the day after Thanksgiving, we go out and buy a tree (however due to the state of the economy we decided to skip that part this year and buy a fake tree), bring it back to the house, and decorate the house as we wait for the limbs to drop. Every year while we decorate, we listen to the Carpenter's Christmas Portrait album, which is my mother's favorite collection of Christmas music. I am not exactly sure how this tradition started, but this has been happening every year for as long as I can remember and definitely as long as my sister has been alive, and she is 12. 

My two favorite songs on this album are "Medley: Winter Wonderland/Silver Bells/White Christmas" and "My Favorite Things". I like the medley because it is a combination of faster and slower songs, and I like "My Favorite Things" because I love the piano in the background. I enjoyed hanging the ornaments on the tree with this happy tune in the background. 

Another ritual in my life that was strongly accompanied by music is the last day of school. The last day of school was always a joyous occasion. All of us kids were so happy to finally be out, to have the summer ahead of us, and finally, be able to sleep in or chew gum whenever we wanted. While my memories of getting out of school are clouded by being happy, I always feel like it was a sunny day. Throughout most of the school after the 2nd grade, I rode the bus home. The sense of giddiness most of us felt was heightened when we were all together, and we were all feeling and enjoying everything, even the bus driver. Because it was the last day, there were things we were allowed to do that we normally wouldn't have been able to, like play incredibly loud music in the halls and on the bus. One such song that was normally played was "School Out" by Alice Cooper. 

We all knew school was not out forever, but we liked to pretend. Even during the times when I did not hear the song at school or on the bus, I would go home and play it in my room or in the living room as I danced about. Even now, when I know summer is not really a vacation because of work and other responsibilities, I still like to play this song on the last day of school/semester.