Because today is such a beautiful day, I don’t really want to think about being sad, but I guess it’s an unavoidable thing that we get sad sometimes, and so when that happens to me, when the blues rush on out of nowhere, I often find that there’s only one solution. Today I’m going to post a song that I can listen to when I’m sad and it’ll replace the sadness with a nice melancholy warmth instead. But if I listen to it on a day like today then it seems like the happiest song in the world. It’s a song that can lift you just a little bit above however you’re feeling while you listen to it, and sometimes that can make all the difference.
To be honest, I could have picked any Joni Mitchell song really, since Joni is the one I turn to when I’m feeling a little bit down, because she seems like she’s feeling a little bit down too, and maybe we can talk about it for a while. Mostly when this happens I tend to wallow in her masterful Ladies of the Canyon album, but each song on that album seems equal to me so I couldn’t pick just one. Instead I went with this one, Amelia, which is just as beautiful and just as good at turning me around.
I like to listen to Joni Mitchell because she can turn me in on myself; she can make me quiet and introspective without really trying, yet still she can offer comfort and consolation when I need it. Even though I’ve never met her, and don’t really know her at all, I feel like she’s an old friend, someone I can turn to in a time of need. Or maybe she’s more like an old aunt, who’ll give you strange teas (and maybe a little spliff) when you go to her house, and tell you all the crazy stories of the amazing life she’s had, and when you go home you feel better because somebody gave you the time of day.
That’s what it is with Joni: she’s personal. It seems like she’s written these songs just for me and is in the same room singing them to me right now. She’s always happy to see me, and even though I maybe don’t visit as often as I should, I always get a warm welcome and say to myself I should really do this more. But I don’t, because if I do I think the magic would be spoiled. It’s the fact that I don’t visit so much with Joni that makes it so powerful. If we saw each other all the time, we might get bored.
If it weren’t for Joni Mitchell, I reckon I’d be a very different person now. From listening to her music, I’ve been able to let things wash over me, to let anything that doesn’t matter just slide. Without Joni, I wouldn’t function in the world as I do. It’s not that I consciously thought “Oh, this situation reminds me of that Joni Mitchell song, so I should act accordingly.” No, it’s deeper than that, more of a soul thing (because Joni’s the only person who could come close to convincing me that people have souls). It’s more like she’s shaped me, that I just go with the flow because her music got inside me.
Her music got inside me because I don’t think I could fight it. Joni’s not the kind of musician you can hate at all (unlike Metallica or the Black Eyed Peas), because she doesn’t push. She doesn’t force herself on anything or anyone. All she wants to do is to play her songs and to paint her pictures and if people like them, then so much the better. She’s not angry or belligerent, she doesn’t spend her time shouting over other people’s music, she just does her own thing, like the 60s never ended. Live and let live, that’s what Joni’s taught me. Live and let live.
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