The Playlist

I remember when the girls made them. Or when their friends did and gave them as gifts. I’d find them all over the house, compact discs of indeterminate vintage, with titles like “Pump Up” or “Race Day” written in marker ink.

 I came late to the playlist, the homemade CD; came late to the careful choice of music, to plotting it out in my mind before putting it together. To walking with it, seeing how it flows, then tinkering some more and burning it to a disc.

But once I did, I began to see the value of it. The playlist reveals both the giver and the recipient; it shares what can’t be touched or seen but must be felt. It is the gift of music, of course, but more than that. It is music personalized. 

You don't give a playlist to just anyone — just as you don't knit a sweater for a stranger. There is an implied intimacy there, an understanding of interest, an appreciation of taste.

I came late to the playlist, to seeing it as an act of love. But that’s what it is.