I Fell in Love 12 Years Ago Today...




...with Stevie Wonder!

Here's a little #MemoryMonday post to recount how it happened.

12 years ago yesterday (the 26th), my parents accompanied me and my Latin class to Chapel Hill for the annual Latin convention. I was in 8th grade, and it was one of the happiest years of my life. The Latin convention was always so much fun. That's how I came to love Chapel Hill, especially in the spring.


The next day was a Sunday, and I remember eating at Sanibel's seafood with my family and then my mom taking me to Oak Hollow Mall (God rest its soul) to use my FYE gift card (in case anyone forgot, FYE stood for "For Your Entertainment" and it was a store where people used to buy ancient things like cds, etc. And they used to have one in Oak Hollow Mall. When they actually had stores. :( ).
I wanted to use my FYE gift card on a Stevie Wonder cd because I'd seen the Cosby Show episode that he appeared on, when the whole family sang "I Just Called to Say I Love You" and I was like "OH MY GOSH I LOVE THAT SONG I HAVE TO HAVE IT!!"
(Ahh, the days when you had to get in your car and go to a store and buy a whole cd to get one song instead of just downloading the song to your phone instantly... we are so spoiled now!)

So we got to FYE and I miraculously found a Stevie Wonder greatest hits collection. I got it home and popped the first disc (there were TWO!) in my pink and red boombox because "I Just Called to Say I Love You" was the second song on there. But the FIRST song captivated me. It was "Part-Time Lover." So appropriate for my 14-year-old self, I know. But the intro to it was all dance-y and awesome and very quickly, I had the first two songs on repeat for the rest of that sunny Sunday afternoon.

Before I knew it, my mom was using that cd to wake me up in the mornings. She'd let it play from the beginning, and if I wasn't up by the fourth song ("Sir Duke"), I was gonna be late for school.

The rest of my family got used to hearing all four of those songs in the same order every day at the same time at the same loud volume, and it became an inside joke as everyone memorized the lyrics against their will and eventually came to love the songs.


The songs on Stevie Wonder's Greatest Hits are such a huge part of my last month and a half of one of the best school years of my whole life. I played that cd so much for the rest of my 8th grade year that I'm surprised it didn't break. For that reason, any time I hear any of those songs, I automatically go back to 8th grade. To being 14 and carefree and exposed to a whole new world of friends and experiences that I'd never had before...
to Hanging Rock State Park...
to having my first boyfriend...
to getting interested in fashion again (hello Abercrombie)...
to having a whole new circle of friends that would last forever...
to eating at Libby Hill the night before every EOG because my mom calls fish "brain food"...
and hearing Stevie Wonder play IN Libby Hill!...
to Carowinds and Celebration Station (I had been to those places before, but this new outlook that I had on life made them like new experiences)...

I was finally comfortable and even flourishing at Southwest Middle School. The transition from private to public school had been so hard but SO worth it. I ended that wonderful 8th grade year with a bang.
And Stevie Wonder.

To this day, I still listen to those cds and I even paid $1.25 for "I Just Called to Say I Love You," "Part-Time Lover," and "Uptight (Everything is Alright)" on iTunes so that I can have those songs on my phone and gym to them. They are more than songs - they are links to my childhood and so many wonderful memories.

































eBa

Comments

  1. I love Stevie Wonder, too and I remember that episode of the Cosby Show. It was really funny. I thought Theo was so cool when he said 'Jamming on the one,' even though I wasn't exactly sure what that meant. I'm not sure I can even name a favorite song because there were just too many Stevie Wonder hits that I loved.

    I hope you're having a delightful week... :)

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