Crowded around a chair on the floor of Ms. Hilts' class as she cracked open a brightly coloured book, my first grade class would yell out in unison without fail: "My name is Junie B. Jones. The B stands for Beatrice. Except I don't like Beatrice. I just like B and that's all!" Barbara Park passed away in 2013 and I did not know until several years later. I was heartbroken when I found out and was immediately transported to happier days in primary school; of sitting in my first grade class yelling I was Junie B. Jones with my classmates, searching for her books in the Scholastic Book Fair even though I hadn't been given any money to buy them, and reading all the copies my school library and local city library had. I'm still in possession of a copy. :) Nothing takes me back to happy school days than that bright yellow cover of "Junie B. Jones Has a Peep in her Pocket".
Several years later in both junior and senior high, sitting in a classroom when the teacher came in late pushing a cart with an old TV—you knew what was about to come on the screen and you were clearing your throat, ready to sing at the top of your lungs. When I heard Netflix was going to remake The Magic School Bus I remembered sitting in junior high science classes and senior high environmental science classes and crowing badly along with the words of the song. It didn't matter if we were pushing 17 and 18; you hear that bus horn, you start singing.
Billy Joel's discography, especially his album The Stranger from 1977, brings me back to the end of my tumultuous teenage years. I was listening to his music heavily between 15 and 19; I was depressed and cutting and suicidal and lonely and trying to come out as transgender and deal with the emotional fallout with my mother over it. I felt like a burden, I felt like an idiot. I was in therapy and my school grades were shit and I didn't care to take care of myself. My room was a mess, my first and only boyfriend was living four hours away from me, I kept fighting with him and I knew it was always my fault. I'd listen to Joel when I was upset -- and I was upset a lot.
It is cathartic to listen to him now and not have those angry and sad feelings inside me. I enjoy the music and the lyrics with happiness because I know not too long ago I was listening to these same songs in pain, and I made it to the other side.
