How Carly Simon's song "You're So Vain" helped me keep my resolution to "Contemplate the heavens."

One of my principal resolutions is “Contemplate the heavens.” It comes from one of my favorite quotations, from Boethius: “Contemplate the extent and stability of the heavens, and then at last cease to admire worthless things.”

It can be hard to contemplate the heavens during the tumult of everyday life. And what does it even mean to contemplate the heavens?

I had such a moment today.

I was working in one of my favorite diners, Pisa Pizza, and Carly Simon’s song You’re So Vain began to play over the loudspeaker.

I’ve heard this song a million times, of course, but this morning, for some reason, I remembered a very specific moment of listening to it.

I was a little girl. My mother was driving us to Milgrim’s grocery story. The song was playing as we turned into the parking lot, and I distinctly remember looking at the big blue apartment building across the street, as I listened.

The interesting thing about the memory is that I remember what I thought about the song at the time. I remember not recognizing the word “gavotte” (which remains fairly obscure), I remember being puzzled about why the man’s horse would have “naturally” won, I remember thinking that the line “my dreams were clouds in your coffee” made no sense at all.

Why did this memory make me contemplate the heavens?

It made me feel very deeply, for a moment, the passage of time. Once I was a child, now I am an adult. I understand things better than I did.

It makes me think, once again, that only the fact that life unfolds very slowly preserves it from being unbearably poignant. The days are long, but the years are short.

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Via Kottke, I found David Wilkes's article in the Daily Mail, Bottom-ranked school shoots to top after introducing Harry Potter-themed curriculum. Is this true? As I've seen over and over with my Happiness Project, enthusiasm DOES matter.

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Comments

[Sharyn]

Gretchen, I almost got chills when I read this post.
I'd never heard the "contemplate the heavens" quote before, but I had that same song-induced definitive moment.
The song was the Beatles "Long And Winding Road" and my memory was of hearing it on the radio for the first time while on a car trip through Monument Valley, Utah as a child. I was bored, it was a haunting melody, and you could see the long and winding road for miles ahead. When I hear the song now, I fully understand the nuances of it, and the pain in it, but I see my child-self with her nose pressed to the car window, innocent to the meaning of the lyrics, but simply seeing the beautiful long and winding road we were traveling down.
It's amazing to hear a quote that explains that experience.

[Chris]

Would that Milgram's have been near the corner of Wornall & Meyer Blvd? That's the only big blue apartment building I can think of in KC. If so, for a few years I lived in a house literally a block from where that Milgram's would have been. Ahhhh, Milgram's. That definitely takes me back to childhood. Remember Janie (?) from the commercials?

[Brothajohn]

Gretchen, first the quote by Boethius is wonderful. Thank you for that. Secondly, I too have always enjoyed the song by Carly Simon and the "clouds" line wierded me out as a kid too, so of course now it is my favorite moment in the song and never fails to have an emotional impact on me.

but the song that created the effect you described was "once in a lifetime" by the Talking Heads. As a teenager I saw the "video" on a Midnight Music show that aired about two years before MTV was even invented. The film was so strange, David Byrne so wierd, and the song so catchy that the message went in one ear and out the other. Years later, driving home from a breakup it all made sense.

[TasterSpoon]

Ha, I second everything you said about You're So Vain. I remember being a little girl and asking my mom what it meant and her explaining something about Warren Beatty that didn't really help me understand the lyrics at all.

Also, that enthusiasm thing. It makes me lean way in favor of Montessori schools or even home schooling when I eventually have kids. Your blog focuses a lot on things adults can do to increase our happiness - I wonder if you might approach ways we can improve our *children's* capacity for happiness by our choices for their education, activities, etc. We can't tell them how to feel, but can we set them on a positive path?

[TasterSpoon]

Ha, I second everything you said about You're So Vain. I remember being a little girl and asking my mom what it meant and her explaining something about Warren Beatty that didn't really help me understand the lyrics at all.

Also, that enthusiasm thing. It makes me lean way in favor of Montessori schools or even home schooling when I eventually have kids. I want learning to be a joy, not a burden.

Your blog focuses a lot on things adults can do to increase our happiness - I wonder if you might address ways we can improve our *children's* capacity for happiness by our choices for their education, activities, etc. We can't tell them how to feel, but can we set them on a positive path? Maybe that'll be your next book.

[TasterSpoon]

Oops, I think I double posted.

[anemone]

Wildness! I have a nearly exact recollection about hearing this song in the car as a young girl. The 'clouds in my coffee' line was what I asked my mom about.

Gretchen - I love this blog. I keep reading your postings to find your daily experiences so often mirror mine - it's freaking me out (but in a good way!) Thank you so much for what you do here.

[delia]

gretch

a bit late on this but apropos of this post, I listened to "puff the magic dragon" ths a.m. w/isaac on you tube (he is learning it on his violin) and began weeping. must now run out and get the new book version (w/cd) for allie for hannukah so can savor this bit of childhood a bit longer....

[mj]

Wow, that's weird. I had the same experience once about 10 years ago with "Come Monday." I had heard the song probably hundreds of times since childhood--as a matter of fact, the time this happened I was listening to it on a CD that I owned--and I remembered hearing it once when it was a hit, right after my father left and moved to LA. I specifically remembered that as a child I found the song very hopeful, but my adult brain could see the irony in that. I also remembered thinking that all of LA was covered with a brown haze. :-)

Re: "You're So Vain," I knew "gavotte" from that episode of "Gilligan's Island" where for some reason (I don't remember if it was a dream sequence or one of their theatrical productions) the castaways are all dressed as 17th century French courtiers and they do a number of different dances, including a gavotte and, IIRC, something like the monkey or the frug. I couldn't understand why he would watch himself do it, though.

[TasterSpoon]

So anemone...what does the clouds in my coffee line mean? I think that's what I asked about, too.

[anemone]

TasterSpoon - you know something? I can't remember what my Mom's explanation was at the time, though I know she had one. And I'm still not 100% sure what those lines mean. I just chalk it up to artistic license....

[Sharyn]

It got my curiosity up, too - it's amazing what you can google and answer in thirty seconds!

Clouds In My Coffee

Can you tell me what the meaning of the phrase "clouds in my coffee" has in the context of your song "You're So Vain"? I can't quite pin down the metaphor. What are the "clouds" in your coffee?

"Clouds in my coffee" are the confusing aspects of life and love. That which you can't see through, and yet seems alluring...until. Like a mirage that turns into a dry patch. Perhaps there is something in the bottom of the coffee cup that you could read if you could (like tea leaves or coffee grinds). Carly Simon 5/17/01

[Gretchen Rubin]

Hey Chris -- yes, you're right! that's exactly the apartment building I meant. And it's still there. Ah, Kansas City...I love it.

[anemone]

Sharyn - thanks for googling that and posting the answer! I guess it makes sense to a degree, now that I know.

Could I have known back then that the answer would have been 30 years in coming, and in such a fashion?