"All For You"

Although Sister Hazel made it big with "All For You" on their second album "Somewhere More Familiar" it actually debuted on the first.  I loved the song when it came out and went out and bought the CD.  Yet even back then, after I had heard all of the other pieces on the album, "All For You" did not place among my favorites.  Nowadays, this song is usually the one I'll skip over on my I-Pod, to get to one of the more under-played.

"It's hard to say what it is I see in you,

Wonder if I'll always be with you,

But words can't say, and I can't do

Enough to prove, it's all for you"

After contemplating the mortal limits of language I can look at the song in a slightly different light.  I tend to see it as a relatively straightforward love song, and it is for the most part.  Yet it also points to some of what was touched on in "Sometimes": that it is impossible to fully capture our experience with language.  Words are not quite rich enough. This is song of a deep and passionate love, and of the frustration of not quite being able to convey it fully.  I imagine the singer asking that his beloved simply rest in faith in his love.  Despite his inability to completely prove its depth she can be comfortable knowing his love is there.

"Sometimes"

One night in 7th or 8th grade I slept over at one of my best friend's houses, out on the couches in her downstairs living room.  To this day, if left to our own devices, we can talk for so long that my throat ends up hurting.  This night was no different, and we were up absurdly late, continually announcing that we really should go to sleep, only to keep talking for another two hours.

Somehow in our late night ramblings, we stumbled onto the idea that the color I see as red from my eyes, might not look at all like the color she sees.  In fact, her sky might be magenta, and her grass bright yellow- but because somehow people have decided to call grass green, we assume we are seeing the same colors. We will never be able to discover if we really see the same shades or not, because we can never step outside of our own experience and see into someone else's.

Sister Hazel describes this conundrum of incomplete communication, the frustration of never quite being able to construe our accurate experience:

Well I'm stuck within the mortal framework
Of having to use words
And I ... - I've never been one -
I've never been one for incompleteness

In my undergraduate study of psychology, one professor proclaimed that our ability to communicate is what sets humans apart.  We are experts at seeking contact and connection. And yet as Sister Hazel points out, words have finite power.  Just as I will never know if my red is the same as my friend's red, I cannot know if I am truly understanding another's story or viewpoint.

So much of my own journey is about trying to get inside others' experiences as deeply as possible.  Therapeutic empathy is all about being able to really walk in someone else's shoes and see through their eyes.  Even writing a blog is an attempt to express my own life, my own thoughts, as clearly as I possibly can.  Yet within the mortal framework of language, I really never know if my point has been understood.  I may be describing red, while everyone around me is seeing blue.

"Feel It"

I have to admit, I didn't actually buy Sister Hazel's first album, the self-titled debut of 1996, until sometime after college.  I liked Sister Hazel in middle school, along with virtually every other kid in my class, and bought their hit album "Somewhere More Familiar" with the naive assumption that the famous album was their first.  I didn't even discover their true beginning until many years later, when seeing them live in Myrtle Beach sparked my interest in their more recent music.

I bought the debut album largely with the intention of fulfilling my complete collection, and originally it was actually my least favorite of their many CDs.  It is less polished, and is slightly more country and less rock than everything that has followed.  Yet gradually it has grown on me.  I have found that while their sound has matured, their heart has always been the same.

The first song on the first album is "Feel It".  Looking over the lyrics early this morning, I was delighted at how very fitting they were for a counseling student on her blog:

But now I can't hold it - hold it
Flash a frozen smile when it boils down inside.
No now I can't hold it - hold it
Just a little crack...
And then the walls come tumblin' down
And I Feel It,

It's my time don't try to steal it.
Feel it. Reach inside
Feel it.

If you ask well I won't conceal it.

In my program much of our focus is, of course, on feeling.  I read recently how important it is to "feel your feelings"- not repress or over-express.  I have found that in school many people assume that feeling means over-expression, which I tend to react to antagonistically.  I am irritated when someone cries in every class, anticipating praise for their "openness". Yet in the same vein, others have interpreted me as 'repressed' because I tend to speak out so rarely.

Sister Hazel's lyrics seem to speak to the beautifully healthy version of expression; not pasting a smile over a breaking heart, and allowing oneself to simply feel what is true in the moment.  In my recent hospice training I heard that every loss we do not fully grieve compounds onto the next loss.  Imagine a child whose beloved dog dies when she is three years old and she is told "big girls don't cry".  Then her parents' divorce, and she is too afraid to hurt them to show her sadness and rage.  By the time she is twenty-five and a good friend dies, her grief will be ten-fold, because she will be simultaneously grieving all of those losses she could not grieve originally.  How much more painful that death will be when complicated by all of her past hurt. The key to healing is to feel the suffering in the first place.

As for myself in this moment, I feel charmed and grateful that in their very first song Sister Hazel was already offering up lovely pieces of wisdom.  Who needs a Master's to become a therapist when Sister Hazel can fill in quite nicely?  

On Obsession

In 3rd or 4th grade I had a pair of hideous bright pink stretch pants I wore nearly every day without fail.  Even after they developed an enormous hole in the knee, I maintained my loyalty to the pants and continued to wear them.  Eventually, I graduated to a dubiously even uglier outfit: a bright rainbow-colored poofy jacket with matching purple pants that swished when I walked.  I probably wore this delightful choice every day of 6th grade.


As I have gotten older my capacity for fierce adoration has moved beyond very ugly clothing.  I have yet to meet anyone whose love for the state of Iowa quite matches my own, despite the fact that in the fifteen months I spent there I nearly melted to death in July, and could not spend more than 2 minutes outside without risking frostbite in February.  Before I went to India in 2009 I read absolutely every related book I could get my hands on, from the complete tomes of the Mahabharata and Ramayana to a 500 page history of modern India, and an introductory children's book about Indian food.  I will wax lyrically about the benefits of kale to anyone who will listen, and try to include the green in any recipe possible (it's 1000 points on the nutritional scale at Whole Foods!!!!). 

Yet anyone who knows me well at all, and certainly anyone who has braved the Colorado-Iowa road trip with me, knows of my Ultimate Obsessive Love: Sister Hazel.  The band had one mega-hit back in the late '90s, "All For You", and a few other songs featured on soundtracks like "10 Things I Hate About You" and "The Wedding Planner".  Since they left the Universal label their fan base has grown smaller, and many uninformed people often ask me if they still make new music.  To which I usually reply with contempt for someone so out of the loop about the world's best band, "Of COURSE they still make new music!  They've had a new album almost every year since 2003!".  And I own every single one.  That Iowa road trip?  I listen to all of their albums, including band members' solo albums, the Christmas CD, and live compilations in chronological order.  At this point, Sister Hazel dominates over half of the 14 hour road trip.  My ever-patient boyfriend (who recently created an exclusively Sister Hazel i-pod shuffle), my brother, and multiple friends have had the true privilege (or curse, depending on who's talking) of listening to every Sister Hazel song ever produced as we make our way through the plains of Nebraska and into the rolling hills of Iowa.

Recently, I have been thinking about my penchant for obsessive, unmoving, deeply loyal love, particularly for all things Sister Hazel.  Unlike writing in my blog, which I have warily attempted only five times since its creation; my passion for Sister Hazel is unwavering.  So it occurs to me- what better way to post more often on my blog, than by upping my level of Sister Hazel love to beyond epic proportions?

As the chronological presentation of all Sister Hazel music during my road trips suggests, I like things to be orderly.  The idea of writing one post for every single Sister Hazel song, by order of album appearance, appeals to me immensely.  Obsessive?  Yes.  Agreed.  Completely Awesome?  I may be the only one who thinks so- but as the author of this blog, I suppose that's all that matters.  So, as of today, the blog will shift a bit from the entirely miscellaneous posts of the past, to following a connected thread.  Whether it be a few lyrics that remind me of my own experience, or an essay on the true genius of a particular song, Sister Hazel will be my muse.  Given my deep loyalty to the music, and my equally obsessive dislike of unfinished projects, I believe this will commit me to write more eagerly, and more often.

"So here's to you, and here's to something new: Give it up for love, cause it'll be enough for you" ('All About the Love', 2004)