I’ll add more when I decide if I’m actually going to stick with this. I made a blog, or some other website (most notably/embarassingly a Minecraft fanfiction Google site) countless times before, but I never stuck with it.

I finally got a friend of mine to watch some anime last night, and I was talking to them (more at them really, although I appreciate them entertaining my rambling) about the ending songs. Specifically ‘Lithium Flower’ from the end of Ghost in the Shell S.A.C. and ‘Ride on Shooting Star’ from FLCL.

What struck me was how much those songs tugged at my heartstrings, far more than they should. I’m a fairly emotional person when it comes to media I suppose; I cry damn near every time at the end of Gladiator and from Aragorn’s speech at the Black Gate to Sam closing the gate of his home with his children in the Shire I’m reduced to a blubbering mess. But it’s been so long since I’ve actually sat down and watched anime that I forgot how it’s tied to my youth.

FLCL in particular was a perfect storm for me; a show about coming of age when I myself was in the midst of a rather solitary puberty. I remember the silliest things I used to do to emulate some form of friendship; from cooking horrible cakes with too much food coloring to celebrate watching all the lineup of Adult Swim (truly one of my worst decisions) to recording and rewinding a party scene from Ed, Edd n’ Eddy so I could pretend I was there too.

So for me, when I got into anime around that time in my life–after the start of puberty, and in the center of my awkward solitude–it was so easy to get drawn into their perfect, yet dysfunctional worlds. Naota’s cooped-up life, having an older friend that really was only using him resonated with me (even if I didn’t have that exact childhood myself), and Haruko swinging her guitar at him was the perfect bit of slapstick comedy to keep me engaged before I got too thoughtful about my own place.

It may sound like I’m about to criticize the show, anime as a whole or myself. The truth is, I was just feeling rather melancholic after listening to those two songs I mentioned a lot this morning. The entire discography of The Pillows does that for me; it’s as if it’s condensed ‘teenagers on the cusp of adulthood’–something that I feel I passed up on. But -that- is for an entirely different post, If I decide to keep up with this blog. About fifteen years too late to start a blog, but as they say, better late than never.

So yeah, my first blog post is about songs that make me sad. Next one will be about that cute boy in 8th grade who totally looks like, OMG, Aaron Carter!