Mattie McDougald

If you ask me for my single favorite movie, book, show, artist, or whatever else people ask for your favorite of, I often don’t have an answer because I am too indecisive to function properly most days. Be that as it may, two songs that could be named upon my favorites if I were to actually conclusively make that decision are “Young at Heart” by Frank Sinatra and “Vienna” by Billy Joel. The messages behind these two songs have been mantras I have held closest to my heart and have kept me sane (mostly) throughout my adult life thus far. I am an incredibly artistic person and also earnestly enjoy the arts of literature, photography, drawing, and theater. However, music speaks to me on a deeper level than most. Identifying with the emotions and experiences being portrayed in song is such a raw, vulnerable form of human connection that I find the most beauty in.

My dad introduced me to “Young at Heart” before I could walk - that was his choice of lullaby song for both me and my sister as kids. Of the memories I have of him playing this song, 95% of them end with him in tears and getting all sappy about how the message behind that song is what he wants for us in life. Sometimes the song serves as a reminder to me that you have to actively choose to find the little, innocent joys in life. Sometimes it’s a reminder to go out and do something to embrace my inner child because she needs extra love the older I grow.

“Vienna” by Billy Joel has been my mantra specifically throughout the chaos that is one's twenties. When life gets more overwhelming than usual and I need a reminder that I am exactly where I am supposed to be in the course of my story, “Vienna” is what ends up blasting through my room or in my headphones as I take deep breaths and reassure myself that I am doing a good job “adulting”. My parents went to a Billy Joel concert before I started listening to his music in my teenage years, and there is not much I wouldn't now give for them to have taken me with them so I could hear “Vienna” played live and sink into its comfort.