Tapestry, the Carole King album of greatness, was released 43 years ago this spring…I bought it on cassette when I got my first car in December of 1984, and the songs have traveled with me as I’ve grown from a 17-year-old girl, thinking she was ‘all that’ with her Aqua-Net hair, and her Pontiac Sunbird, and her Calvin Klein jeans, and her high-heeled shoes, to the 46-year-old woman I am today with the occasional grays, sometimes tired eyes, and frequent bouts of “this is all there is?”

…and sometimes when I listen to great lyrics like this album, I am astonished to think, ‘YES! This is all there is!’  It takes just one listen through, either from start, I Feel The Earth Move,  to finish, You Make Me Feel Like (A Natural Woman), or shuffled, or mixed in with other singing ladies in an assorted playlist, to feel grounded and okay.  Every song has at least one line that speaks to me, so clearly, and effortlessly I am rebooted, restored, revived.  The album makes me think of new love, good love, lost love, friendship, longing, endings and beginnings, home and hearth…it makes me feel connected to everything and everyone and everywhere…which might sound silly, but it’s true.  When I listen to these songs and sing them, badly, but with my whole heart, I feel like it’s something of a soundtrack for a life fully lived, and the words to the songs are so pure that it could be a soundtrack for any one of us…

…I still have SO MUCH I wish I could do, and want to do, and am annoyed that I can’t do, but when I feel grounded in the words of these songs, I recognize how much I have done, have achieved, have survived…it’s strange how somebody else can write words that can mean so much to so many, but she did.  Her words make me feel good, make me feel beautiful, make me feel like I am a good friend and have great friendships, that I have loved well and to the best of my ability, that I have been the best woman I can be, despite all the uncertainty that comes with living a life…I don’t know, do men connect with the songs on this album too??  Rolling Stone has listed this album as #36 in its top 500 greatest albums of all time…and it is one of the best selling albums ever on the planet, so one would assume that men find her poetry to be powerful too…if you do not own the album you can’t very well listen to it today, but if you do own the album, you should listen to it today and think about how remarkable it is that words written 43 or more years ago are still so compelling…that’s a good song, or poem, or story, isn’t it??  Words that stand the test of time…to write one sentence that lasts forever would be amazing, can you just imagine writing a whole album?  Timeless goodness right there, in your cd cabinet, an old milk crate of cassettes, vinyl albums in your attic…