February’s fragments with Duaa
Returning to childhood comforts in the cold and chaos.

Stories have always played a huge role in my life. It is a bit cliché, but as a kid, I always formed stronger connections with books than with my peers. When I was not reading, I was thinking about what I had read. Narratives that ended on paper continued to flourish and grow in my mind. 

The music I listen to always connects back to this. When someone asks me to describe what kind of music I like, it is always hard to answer. My only criterion is that the lyrics and music resonate with something I have read. In a way, the songs are like fragments of a narrative, capturing a character, scene, or mood. Some songs, such as Boyce Avenue and Kina Grannis’s “Fast Car” cover, directly tell a story. With other songs, such as Taylor Swift’s “illicit affairs” or Jasmine Thompson’s “Mad World” cover, it is the complex, haunting atmosphere that has stayed with me long after I first heard them. 

I am not always big on trying new things. I like structure and familiarity, and I can cycle back to the same songs every few weeks. This is especially true in situations where I feel overwhelmed or out of control in my own life. If I temporarily cannot understand the real world, it is relieving to lean on a fictional one.