The song “The Night We Met” by Lord Huron came up on my playlist today. I’ve heard the song before, a haunting composition included in the soundtrack of 13 Reasons Why, which, based on other lyrics depicts lost love and wanting, but either not knowing how or more likely not being able to, take that love to a permanent resolve. The scene in which it played in the tv series was at a high school dance where boy meets girl finally seems to come together, but spoiler alert, girl doesn’t make it to graduation, which the audience is well aware of at this point. That scene though is idyllic in vision of youth about to come to fruition, of nurtured life and all its possibilities ripe, of love and promise and the actualization of so many things so close to reach.
Even still, the song itself can be internalized differently based on one’s current disposition. The title lyric is ‘Take me back to the night we met’, which for some would present the opportunity to avoid heartbreak or perhaps right a tragic wrong, but to others, with its slow-song draw and serene arrangement, would better signify the ability to experience again what may only come once in a lifetime. To be able to go back to the start, to have that first kiss, the first touch, the fulfilled longing for none but one…we often don’t realize or appreciate the best moments in our lives until they are over and memory is our best connection to time since past.