My music speaker keeps going missing and it’s kind of spinning me out. I find that happens when I can’t do the things I like to do for me, and there aren’t many of those things. I don't meditate, nor colour nor do breathing exercises, but music, singing into my microphone and having a bath each day, now those are my magic moments, I just like the way they make me feel. But here’s the rub....I need my speaker for all of them. But as I said, it keeps going missing.
I like to be able to listen to my music when I want to and that is at no set time, just when I want to. I am very particular about what music I like, and at any one time I have a specific play list that has just a few songs which I play over and over again for a little while. The songs have meaning for that particular moment in time in my life.
But since lockdown .... not anymore. Middle son seems to be in the bath just as I plan to run it, and he has also decided to take ownership of my speaker. At first I was calm, a cool mum, but as the weeks passed, and the sound of silence grew louder, looking across at the shelf where the speaker lives, not to see it there yet again, started to become an issue in my mind.....
There is something special about the sound a speaker gives out. It’s a kind of distributed surround sound and one that is compatible within the home environment. I can still hear the doorbell, talk on the phone and have full awareness of what’s going on around me. AirPods (or EarPods as I prefer to call them) on the other hand (which I did initially try out as a replacement for my missing speaker), aren’t any of those things.
EarPods are great if you want to talk on the phone, or listen to music or an audible book when out and about, but in the house, to me it feels more like I am wearing ear plugs. I find them disorientating because I can’t hear what’s going on around me, not properly, only in a slightly muffled way and so they render me partially deaf, because they block sound out as well as in. EarPods basically seem to impair my communication skills.
There’s too much of the “Sorry, what did you say?...’No I still didn’t hear you. Just say it one more time." But as well as becoming hearing impaired I turn into this embarrassing person who talks too loudly. The thing is, I can’t bear it when my oldest son doesn’t hear or respond to a thing I say when he is wearing his. and I have explained how annoying it is when I have once again found myself talking to myself, and so it just isn’t good for my credibility in the household to do just what I tell him not to. So ultimately, after the initial period of calm, the alternative strategy not having worked for me, I just really wanted my speaker back!
And so it was warpath action, stamping up the stairs demanding to know who had my speaker, although more often than not the rapping blaring from middle son’s bedroom would give the game away. But the insults that would then hurl from his mouth when I tried to reclaim aforesaid speaker would soon have me in retreat, "I can do without it for a bit longer” I found myself saying as I backed quickly out of his room, feeling guilty about daring to want to use my own speaker, but sometimes it’s just easier to keep the peace.
Anyway, give my boy his dues, because usually before too long the speaker would be delivered to the kitchen with a sheepish “sorry mum, I love you, I didn’t mean to say that, it just came out.” And I’d say, “that’s OK sweetheart, just don’t do it again!” And we’d have a hug and he'd mooch around a bit, before disappearing back up to his room.
But I will confess there are the times when aforesaid speakers gone missing, and after I have made my accusations, and they all deny taking it, maybe even blaming each other, I find speaker in my very own bathroom where I must have left it the day before. It's kind of funny in a way, outing yourself as the culprit in your own crime investigation, but I do admit the error of my ways, and at those times apologise for daring to suspect them, after all I do like to be a good role model. But oh how they laughed at me on the occasion when a little too loudly I demanded to know the whereabouts of my EarPods, only to have it pointed out that they were in my ears.....
At such times, admittedly, I do feel a brief moment of guilt at the unjustness of my outbursts, ....but soon it passes. None of us are perfect after all. But I know what I will be buying middle son for his birthday next week.....