….it turns out, is a mix tape in a thrift store.  I never realized this until I found a stack of them at my local Goodwill.  I was intrigued by the one called “Wedding Music/Favorite Love Songs #1″, so I picked it up (What happened?! Was the wedding cancelled?).  I glanced at the list of songs only long enough to see Mariah Carey well-represented, but then I felt compelled to put it down.  It was too much like reading someone’s diary.  I couldn’t do it.

Ah, mix tapes.  Our kids will never know the magic of a mix tape.  They will craft digital playlists, I’m sure.  But nothing so time-stamped and permanent as a mix tape with their handwriting on it.

I freely admit that I am a sentimental hoarder.  I’ve got all of my old tapes, even my earliest mix tapes made with my sister and cousin (if you can really call them mix tapes… really it was just us talking into a Panasonic tape recorder, telling stupid stories and singing songs).

Another gem is the “Workout Mix” tape that I made in college, with appropriate-tempo songs for a routine of exercises.   Given that it was 1989, of course the lineup included INXS, Prince, and Neneh Cherry.  The last song, the “cool down”, was – what else – “Nite & Day” by Al B Sure.

Then there was the mix tape trilogy made for a post-college road trip (“Driving Tape #1, #2, and #3”, of course.)   Number 1 has got you covered with your basic R.E.M, Pearl Jam, and U2, with some Naughty by Nature thrown in for reasons I don’t recall.  Number 2 was the mellow tape, with Luther Vandross and Johnny Gill – you know, for when the road asked you, “come on, let’s bring it down now….”.   Number 3, sadly, is no longer with us.  But it’s quite possible that it contained country music.

My favorite mix tape, though, is one that my long-distance boyfriend sent me in college.  Oddly enough, I only remember one song on it – “Cars that Go Boom”, by  L’trimm (wasn’t he romantic?).   But what I love about that tape is that, inter-mixed with songs, my boyfriend talked about what was going on in his apartment, or what he was studying.  He introduced each song like a DJ. “Cars that Go Boom” reminded him, he said, of me and my best friend/roommate (were we like “Tigra & Bunny”?).   I haven’t listened to the tape since then, but I love the idea that his 1989 voice is preserved on it.  I can’t even remember what his voice sounded like then.  I’m saving the tape like a fine bottle of wine.   Someday the time will be right, and he and I will listen to it with all the reverence it deserves (through a series of twists and turns, we ended up getting married years later.)

I really hope that the mix tapes I made for others never made their way onto a thrift store shelf (in the garbage = fine!).  And now I’m feeling like I should have purchased those thrift store mix tapes and given them a proper burial.  I need to think more about that one.   As should you — what mix tapes do you treasure, and what mix creations of yours might still be floating around out there?

In the mean time, though, welcome to McMahon Hall, and enjoy the mellow grooves of Al B Sure (closing your eyes and pretending that it’s on a cassette tape, of course).