She tries to understand the things that I do (Edgar Winter Group)

I really really love the shuffle mode on my ppod. It spins me off into many forgotten corners of my music collection.

I was doing a workout on The Beast yesterday (our cross trainer) and I love it when a song emerges from the shuffle which is perfect for a workout and reminds me of great times.

Round and Round by The Edgar Winter Group came on and I smiled and smiled.



It's a gem from the big selling They Only Come Out At Night album released during 1972 (the one with Frankenstein on it).

I played the song three times back to back and charged into my workout.

The song always has good connotations for me and it pops up in my life when I most need it.

During the second and third listens I began to listen to the lyrics more and I focused harder on various bits while bopping on The Beast.

I tried to love her but she changes everyday
Wouldn’t be much fun if she was any other way
One day she’s warm next day she’s cold
One day she’s young and then the next day she’s old

I puzzled over this and especially the last line of this opening verse. Okay I get that the lover he's talking about can be hot or cold, but young and old? Just a convenient rhyme or something deeper?

Then I remembered a section from Hermann Hesse's novel Siddhartha when Siddhartha is talking to his old friend Govinda about the potential hidden Buddha that lives in all of us.

The world, Govinda, is not imperfect or slowly evolving along a long path to perfection. No, it is perfect at every moment, every sin already carries grace within it, all small children are potentially old men, all sucklings have death within them, all dying people - eternal life.

Intentional or not, I read the song slightly differently at this point. The lover is whole, fully evolved with (maybe) a glimpse into something deeper.

Weird how a song can do that - shapeshift after many listens and in conjunction with other stimuli (Siddhartha) take on another life.