Sparky’s Dream

Wake up feeling a little sheepish. Not quite clicking in to gear which is quite often the case for me. Right leg is feeling a little better than a useless stick and the hand is not quite gripping the way it should. It’s Monday and for once I will be working but not until the afternoon. Not sure if I should cycle or not. It’s warm, lovely, but can occasionally be a struggle, as it can be for everyone on a slow morning. My small struggles may be partially related to MS but there is a lot that is just… there! For everyone. So I put the radio on.

And everything changes.

The opening guitar riff, the rest of the band coming in and then that first, happy lyric. ‘If she lived in space, man’. Sparky’s Dream. The 90’s coming back to me. Teenage Fanclub. Everything is suddenly up in the sky, feeling wise. My hand feels better, even if it probably isn’t. It just feels better.

Sparky’s Dream

Sparky’s Dream is just one of those songs that can lift me up. I do like Teenage Fanclub and saw them live recently. The voices are still good but a little older and the lyrics wiser, more reflective. The youthful energy in a song like Sparky’s Dream is a little gone but that’s allowed. It is thirty years older, they are thirty years older and I am thirty years older. But that feeling, recorded long ago and first heard on a small FM Radio? That is still there and the little jump in my heart on hearing those opening chords is just what it always was.

I have written before about how important music is to me, even if I will never be a great musician or anything like that. Not my target! But songs like Sparky’s Dream can have such an amazing effect. At least on me. Something lifts me up, takes me over the hurdles I have that day. Puts a smile on my face.

Imagine if The End by The Doors had come on instead?

You Know It’s A Good Day When…

FM Radio is perhaps a memory and, although I do have qualms about streaming and the how the money it raises gets to the artists, I do hypocritically take advantage of that. I use a playlist to capture those songs that give me that up feeling. A mixed bag and possibly outside of my usual Indie/Grunge/Punk/PostPunk type thing. That doesn’t matter. They are the songs that make me just feel… good! Unapologetically good! George Michael, The Replacements. A bit of a different mix.

Have a listen here if you have Spotify and see if there are any that you like. Maybe they make you feel the same way? Maybe they make you cringe. It doesn’t matter. If everyone had the same opinion it would be dull!

In the meantime, my hand is feeling much better! Better get a ride in!