The Eclipse
The music begins with gentle piano drifting through the air, and I feel as though I’m replacing Bonnie Tyler in her original music video, walking alone in a dark hallway until the words, “Turn around,” echoes in the background and Bonnie’s voice flows mellifluously. As the music continues, Bonnie’s voice grows stronger, and the light sounds of various musical instruments become heavier. I feel the adrenaline of the music rush through my veins like the blood that streams to my heart. Right when I think I’ve reached the chorus, Bonnie continues the long verse after the words, “turn around bright eyes, every now and then I fall apart.” The song continues building up a second time. I am washed with a second wave of emotion, and I grow anxious with anticipation. I feel as though my heart is about to explode due to being over saturated with too many secrets that I have kept to myself for many years. But when I hear the clashing of the drums, the gates holding back my hidden truths fly off their hinges, and I can feel the music taking over my soul.
“Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler is a song that many people would overlook as a romantic song, but to me, it’s a song about where we have all been at one point in our lives, and will continue to stumble upon in the future. Eclipse of the heart is when darkness fills our world like being in a cave. In order to escape, you must find the light, which is truth. However, it takes time to build truth. For example, finding and identifying your own identity to fit into society is often a difficult thing to discover, and may be a lonely journey. When I listen to the song, I think about life and how we embark on this journey, to find what captivates our heart and imagination. I hear the words, “every now and then I get a little bit nervous that the best of all the years have gone by.” This relates to the video about music and life by Alan Watts, which tells a true story about how many people have narrow visions of life. It’s as though many people are living a life of tracing over the same exact lines of an old drawing.
And when the drawing is complete, you don’t even care to look nor admire it because you’ve seen it already.
But life shouldn’t be this way. Why should we eclipse our heart with this loneliness? This can be a lonely journey when you are stuck at a job with people who don’t share the same interests as you have. As a result, you are gnawing away at your own truth and happiness. Many years may pass by and you may end up just wanting to scream out loud. This song starts out slowly, which makes me think about how lonely the journey is, but when it reaches the chorus, it’s like pouring your heart out. One particular line in the chorus that sticks out to me is “we’re living in a powder keg and giving off sparks.” The powder keg is just a symbol of all our great potential and capabilities contained in a cave. Trapped inside, the natural gifts and talent we possess might never be known to us.
But for some people like me, it takes someone special to help bring guidance. After I met my boyfriend Jonathan, I became a much stronger person. He encouraged me to do things that I normally wouldn’t do on my own, such as to dig deep into my true desires in life. Since I was a child, I enjoyed visiting my pediatrician, and loved how she would chat with me while she was performing a physical examination. I thought how lucky she was to meet lots of kids everyday just like me, and help make them feel better. Growing up, I started to believe that only people who came from rich families who could afford private tutoring have the best chances of getting in to medical school. Like the song, “Every now and then I get a little bit helpless and I’m lying like a child in your arms,” I felt like I was leaning to Jonathan for support, and found in him the genuine belief that he had for me. This has given me the drive and the courage to believe in myself.
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