Another Word for Goodbye

This song is dedicated to the little girl I saw at the stoplight. I wish I knew who you were.

You know what siblings talk about when their mom leaves  them in the car while she’s shopping? They’ll sometimes narrate the passers by, maybe name a few of them, comment on their clothing, all the while trying to keep strangers from noticing them, especially the strangest of the strangers. Often the conversation in the car looks something like this:
“Woah, look at that lady’s hair! It’s so long!” “I hope my hair looks like that when I’m old…”
 “Yeah-hey what?! Did you see what that kid just did?” 
“What? No, where?”
 “Ugh, he’s behind that car now, he stuck his tongue out at our car and then smiled!”
“What?! How old was he!” 
“I dunno, probably 13, just one year older that you! He’s perfect for you!”
“Oh, don’t say that! I’d never like someone so annoying.”
“Oh look! There he is!! Look at his flowing golden hair!”
“Ugh, he’s doing that stupid hair flip thing boys do to look cool.”
“Oh, but he IS cool! He’s the man of your dreams!!”
“Ughhhhh…”

Really, sitting in the parking lot can be very entertaining. Of course, it’s not always funny, especially when you just stay in the car alone. Alone, I usually just wonder where everyone is going, why people choose to define themselves by angsty car stickers, think about how hard it would be to take your 6 year old to the store.
And then, I imagine as hard as I can what it would be like to be someone else. A lot of the time I end up thinking I’m probably a spoiled brat for how easy I have it in comparison with a lot of people. I typically go through life just thinking and worrying  about what makes me happy, hoping for the next thing in the endless, pointless list of things that are supposed to satisfy me but don’t, because they’re materialistic things that don’t matter in the long run. But whenever I finally shake myself of this selfish stupor for just a moment, and try to really care about another person as much as myself, which (I really hate to say) is rare, the facts get clearer in my mind:
I’m just another person. I’m just the girl in the front seat of the sketchy van who you wouldn’t know, just a slight variation in the background of your life, just another stranger you’re never going to talk to, who will live her life hopefully without intruding on yours and die sometime that doesn’t concern you. 

Perspective.

It’s weird that other people  feel the way we feel. 
It’s weird that the person the car behind you may have been your best friend under different circumstances.
It’s weird that the person who was rude to you at the four way stop was once a little boy who probably scraped his knee while playing tag and whose favorite color is the same as yours. 
It’s weird to know that you will never know. 
It’s weird to see the girl in the back seat of a random car wave to you and smile.To wave back and know that you will never know why she did that anyway. To watch the light change green as your wave of hello becomes a wave of goodbye. And then you can’t see her car anymore.

Weird? It’s just sad.
But it’s life. What choice do we have? We can be more selfless, we can pay more attention to what’s going on around us, we can smile at each other. 
We can wave. 
So anyway, I wrote this song because this was on my mind. My dad helped me some with it. He’s awesome and I’m glad it turned out the way it did. I hope you enjoy listening to it as much as I enjoy playing it.
Also, you may notice I’m wearing a “The Sundays” shirt—that band is so inspiring! You should definitely go check it out if you like my style of music. They’ve influenced me a lot.
Well, goodbye.
-Rosanna
P.S. My friends call me Rosie, just so you know.

Also, I recorded a podcast with my mom recently. Click here to listen.