winter of 1973 (or 72 or 74) i can’t remember now
whatever year it was
it was cold
so very cold
that was the year my dad accidentally set the house on fire trying to thaw frozen water pipes with a propane torch

a lot got burned up
including my brand new pioneer se 505 headphones i’d gotten for christmas
it was kind of a new thing for me
headphones

i had not had much of a chance to really discover what i thought about them yet
and i imagine now that if those headphones hadn’t been burned up
i might have really latched onto the experience
eventually
i might have made listening to music with headphones into a thing in my life

but when dad told us all to list everything we lost in the fire
and that the insurance company would either replace our items or reimburse us for part of what they were worth
i took the cash

it was the most money i’d ever had in my life

much later (pretty sure it was 1979)
when people started wearing their sony walkmen all over town
i didn’t get it
people walking around with their own personal soundtrack in their heads
i didn’t like it
seemed stupid to me

now everyone has earbuds in their heads
now a whole generation wears earbuds so much they’ve practically become part of their bodies
they listen to music
the news
and podcasts
they talk on the phone looking like they’re walking around talking to themselves

the me of 1979 would think everyone was crazy to cut themselves off from their immediate surroundings like that
the me of 1979 would definitely never believe that i would ever do such a thing

perhaps i’d have felt differently if only i had the insurance company replace my cool new headphones instead of just taking the money

hmmm….

m(___)m