That one song...

I've heard that the part of the brain that processes smell connects directly to the hippocampus, the part of the brain that deals with memory. This supposedly means that certain smells can very quickly evoke powerful memories. I have experienced this a few times, but never quite that strongly, and I only ever noticed it after I heard that about the hippocampus. What does really bring me back are songs, but only certain songs. I noticed this listening to the song "It's the End of the World as We Know It" by R.E.M. the other day. There are certain songs, and that's one of them, that somehow manage to transport me to a different time, and have a certain quality about them that seem to connect me to something greater than myself that's simultaneously very powerful and completely illusory. What's particularly remarkable about that song, and many others like it, is that it's not a song I've ever had on CD or on my iPod; it's not one I ever listened to regularly at any point in my life, and yet it seems incredibly linked to my past. I wish I understood what this quality that certain songs have is, but all I know is that it exists: there is some bizarre way to make a song seem like it was part of my life even though it never was.

I've indicated elsewhere in this blog that I've tried songwriting and failed miserably, but whenever I hear a song like the one I just described, I wish that I could write just one song like that in my lifetime.