Boy meets girl, girl falls in love, blah-blah-blah.
Let me be clear with you from the beginning. This is not that kind of story.
My name is Cait, and I live in the great city of New York. Okay, so maybe I've only lived here for a week and a half...
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By the time I finished my shift, my feet were killing me but I was jittery from the three iced coffees I downed during the eight hours I worked. Val stayed on, picking up a few extra hours so one of our coworkers could go home early, and she shooed me out of the store when I volunteered to wait for her.
"Go enjoy your orchestra," she urged me, untying my apron and pushing my keys into my palm. "Be careful. I don't like you staying in the park at night by yourself."
I nodded, "I'm always careful."
"Right," she snorted, lifting the two dollars sticking out of my back pocket and waving it in front of my face. "Because you would've noticed if I'd taken this."
"Yes!" I snatched it back, stuffing the wadded up bills back in my pocket. "That's my food money."
Val laughed, shaking her head, "You and those damn hot dogs."
I grinned and lifted the apron over my head, hanging it on a hook in the breakroom. I was working the next morning at 5AM, so I didn't want to worry about remembering it in my sleep-deprived haze.
After saying goodbye to the rest of my coworkers, I headed out the coffee shop toward the nearest subway station. It was rush hour - 5PM on a Monday - meaning the trains were bound to be packed. Luckily, most commuters were heading home from Manhattan to the outer boroughs instead of vice versa, so I wouldn't be slammed with too many sweaty bodies.
I shoved my earbuds in, plugging the cord into my iPhone, and opened Spotify as I navigated the busy street. Clicking through my playlists, I decided to go contemporary instead of classical so I could properly savor the orchestra in the park tonight. Not that there's such a thing as too much classical music (there's not, if you were wondering), but I haven't listened to any since this morning. You know what they say, right? Absence makes the heart grow fonder. In this case, it's completely true.
I don't really know when I fell in love with classical music. It wasn't like my parents played Mozart for me when I was in my mother's womb or anything like that, but I just heard it and knew it was for me. It's so intricate yet powerful, and it continually baffles me that people - human beings like you and me - create this stuff with their bare hands. And mouths.
That sounded really awkward, but I didn't mean it like that.
I'm not one of those purists though. There are some people who hate artists who create all of their music electronically, musicians who can't actually play an instrument. It's a shame, yeah, because I actually enjoy the human element, but it's still music. It's still difficult to compose, emotionally compelling, and beautiful.
I love the rawness of live music, especially with the orchestra. I crave the feeling you get when your emotions are pulled back and forth along the strings of a violin, the swelling of a crescendo pushing you further, further, further...only to have it shatter in the blink of an eye. My favorite music relaxes me, invigorates me, saddens me, and comforts me all at once. That complexity is unlike anything else I've ever experienced. Sure, art draws out your emotions. Books and paintings - they're powerful too - but there's nothing like closing your eyes to the sound of Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 in D Minor and being drug through all four movements by sheer force of sound.
