As Long As You're Mine

Today's Twisted Mix Tape is... Cheating Songs.

I apologize for the lack of intro. I've been sick, so I'm a bit listless. Let's get into it, shall we?



Maybe the definitive cheating song. In case you're unfamiliar with the incestuous background of the Mamas and the Papas, here's a quick breakdown: the Papa who wrote this song abandoned his wife to run off with one of the Mamas. Then, once the band was together, the Mama in question started sleeping with the other Papa. So the Papa who was being cheated on wrote this... to make the cheaters sing it publicly, directly humiliating them night after night as the song became a huge hit and they performed it constantly.

Ouch.



This song and I have a long and complicated relationship. I know, picking songs from musicals is kind of cheating. It's so specific. That said, I'm not going with "Send in the Clowns" next. In this case, Elphaba and Fiyero have sort of secretly been in love with each other for years. On the day Fiyero got engaged to Glinda, he and Elphaba ran off together. This is them confessing their love to each other for the first time, completely aware of how wrong it is that they've betrayed their best friend, and at the same time that they're now both wanted by the law. I ADORE this song. And it's the opposite of most cheating songs- I can sum that up with one of their shared lines: "And though I may know, I don't care." Most cheating songs are from the perspective of somebody who's been cheated on, somebody who WANTS to cheat, or somebody who regrets cheating. This is kind of... different.



Case in point. I LOVE the psychology in this song. "I know I'm being used, that's okay man 'cause I like the abuse." Anybody who's ever been cheated on kind of gets this. The idea of losing a person who is actively hurting you is more painful than what they're actually doing to you. It's a fiction, it's fear based and it's WRONG, but it's the way a bad relationship feels. Another thing I love about this song is the lack of anger. It's all sadness, resignation, and frustration. But no sense of the rage that fills so many cheating songs. I have a huge affection for emotionally complicated songs. "The more you suffer, the more it shows you really care, right?" Dead. on.



As I was saying...emotionally complicated. Oh, how I miss the days of hidden tracks. How it felt like you were truly discovering something. That's something you just can't do with a playlist- everything on the list is right there for you to see. And what a hidden track this gem was. So sad. So beautiful.



How different this song is from the last one. Another song about the moment of discovery. Only instead of a heartfelt soliloquy, this song drops off at that moment. It's a shock to the system. Just like the information. What a great sense of humor this song has about such a depressing moment. Jill Scott is amazing.



I am so thrilled to have a chance to include one of these tracks in a Twisted Mix Tape. If you're not familiar with the Verve Remixed albums, go out and get all of them NOW. Verve got the original takes of some of the greatest classic blues and R&B tracks of all time and handed them out to their best DJs and producers. Oh. My. God. Wow. Really.



And we're going to end here because, let's face it. If you don't include this in a mix about cheating, you're kind of missing the point. Classic.

"My Friend"

What follows is my entry for last week's Blogger Idol, which I'm proud to say won the top honors from the judges.

I won't ask you to enjoy it.



My Friend

She was slender, dainty, refined. The sight her filled me with calm, regret, and a sense of freedom. She was sharp, but not to sharp. She gleamed in the dark, cold but present. She hurt me, and I wanted her to. She was the four inch gravity knife I kept in my pocket.

I'd been bullied horribly as a kid. My family moved just in time for me to start middle school in a new state, and I knew from the moment I walked past the flagpole things would be worse. I roamed the halls in silence, knowing with every step how much I was hated, how far I was from fitting in. Angry stares and taunts and attacks echoed inside me, as though I were being hollowed out until I was nothing but an empty girl-shaped shell.

One day I bought a knife. Functional and feminine. For protection on my late night strolls.

...that's what I told myself.

But instead of walking through the darkened neighborhood I sat on my bed, staring at the wall and feeling nothing but the dull throb of old pain coursing through my limbs. It didn't make sense. There was no reason. Nothing should have hurt the way everything did.

I heard her whispering from my pocket. I squeezed her, my thumb resting on her hilt, terrified and thrilled all at once. Flick! The silver blade sped out of its handle and I bit my lip, resting it against the back of my arm. Flick!

I watched the tiny line form beads of blood, watched them connect slowly, watched them dry.

And the pain was gone. I breathed a sigh of relief and gratitude. I laughed. I slept like a baby.

By the next summer my left arm was a mass of scars. Faint white lines that showed brightly after an afternoon in the sun. The occasional cluster of scratches that could have been from one of our cats. They were never deep. They never bled for more than a minute. They liberated me, I never felt the need to hide them.

In groups I felt utterly alone until I slid my hand into my pocket and wrapped my fingers around her.

My knife helped me, I told myself, helped me cope with depression that bordered on suicidal every other day.


They were scrapes, really. She didn't want to hurt me. She was my friend.

On one of my midnight walks the police picked me up for being out past curfew. They took me to the station and made me empty my pockets.

I knew the law. I was old enough to carry a knife. My knife was small enough, wasn't spring loaded, wasn't even really sharpened.

They took her anyway. There was no question where I'd gotten the little red lines on my arm. No cat, no blackberry bushes. I didn't fight for her.

For months I didn't cut, and the pain inside me just grew. I didn't know how to let it out, how to feel it without feeling consumed by it without my friend.


I experimented with other knives. Using my childhood Swiss Army knife felt perverse, like I was polluting something beautiful. Using a kitchen knife seemed like a violation of my mother.

I found a razor blade at the bottom of my box of painting supplies, and hid it in a wooden box in my room.

I feared that blade. I never cleaned it, secretly hoping it's rusting corners would carry some horrific infection, kill me and put me out of my misery. And the razor blade cut deeper than my knife ever did, than my friend ever would.

I watched my skin part from itself, gaping at the pale, bloodless color of my own flesh, watched blood pool down my arm thinking to myself, Dear God what have I done? But I'd been cutting too long, it was too late to ask for help.

Everyone knew I was doing it to myself.

I used that razor blade four times. Six slices. And after each slice I felt no relief. I felt no weight lift from my shoulders. Only fear and emptiness.

After each cut I wept. Because it didn't hurt, nothing hurt, and all that was left was the shame and fear of knowing I could not stop.

I lay awake in bed, darting terrified glances at the ornate box on my shelf, mourning my knife. I squeezed a slender cigarette lighter in my pocket, almost the same size, pretending as hard as I could they were the same. I threw the razor blade in the trash.



But the pain and fear didn't leave. Instead I watched the six ugly scars pucker and bulge on my bicep while the countless white lines on my forearm grew ever fainter, leaving no trace my friend was ever there.

The hurt inside of me began to fade to numbness, and I refilled the wooden box. This time with sleeping pills, amphetamines, aspirin, anything I could get my hands on that could be lethal.

Each time I dropped a fistful of narcotic painkillers into the box, the weight lifted a little. The sight of the box filled me with gratitude. As I drifted to sleep, I smiled towards it.

My new friend.