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A rainy day in Davis. Chinese delivery, or maybe we picked it up. It could’ve been summer, or maybe spring break. This is about all I remember about the day, nothing to do with why I was there or when.

Just the relentless rain, the warm glow of the lamp on the table by the recliner, and the lemon chicken we ate, sitting on the unfortunately-colored carpet that looked dirty even though it was clean. Jim Croce on the record player, photographs and memories. My brother’s beautiful girlfriend at the time, now his wife of a dozen years, sharing one of her favorite things with his tagalong little sister.

A window into someone else’s world through music that meant something to her, with no pressure for it to take on that depth of meaning in my life. It was a relief before I had any idea I’d ever need anything of the sort.

That experience was not to be equaled until I was introduced to the music of Mason Jennings, and Huckleberry Flint. Though those introductions involved quite a bit more raucousness. Also fire, as I recall. Possibly there was dancing, too.

In between, I went off to college with a multitude of ideas about myself and musical tastes that ranged from the Dropkick Murphys (to be cool with my brothers) to a proprietary medley of Sarah McLachlan and Enya that I listened to while hanging my head off the edge of an extra-long twin bed. Increase cerebral blood flow, nourish those neural networks. Who can say where the road goes?

A lot of different directions, most of them dictated by whoever I was spending my time with. None of them serious, until one came along that was very truly serious, one of the ones you want to share everything with. Or think you should. Music, books, movies, food, deepest secret thoughts and feelings – all ours, in what soon seemed like the single source of everything that mattered most.

I saw his David Gray and raised him Patty Griffin. He saw my Patty and raised me Kathleen Edwards. I thought I could really rock his world with my treasured Tom Petty and that was the first hairline crack in the facade.

It didn’t happen overnight but its course was set from the first raised eyebrow (his – I can only do both) and the first hint of exasperation (mine) with the ever-twisting threshold for what we might consider enjoyable. From barely-restrained giddy awe to barely-civil tolerance of eccentricity.

And all of that soul-baring sharing, that one-becoming, made for a wrenching process of extrication. For a while I felt like it was better to clean-break it, even if I left behind some things I’d always loved or come to love because of him.

But that’s ridiculous, I came to realize. I just needed time. Only time, imagine that.

And music that comes into my life unexpectedly and moves me, so much so that I can’t coherently express my feelings about it. That type of conversation is something I’ve never been good at, and might never get to be. Keep on trying, seems to be my answer to that. Or maybe just listening is a better way to go.