My Reflections playlist - Part 1 (1982-1991)

 My brother recently created a playlist that represented his life, and I loved the idea so much I had to make my own "mixtape." I only started today, so it's still in process, but it provided lots of food for thought. Diving into my past to identify specific songs opened a floodgate of memories--both the good and the bad. And floodgates of memories lead me to want to write, almost always. So I'm going to tell you what songs I put on my playlist and why. After I've gone through the whole playlist, I'll post the Spotify link, but until then, here are YouTube links.

1. "Sing" by The Carpenters - This is probably one of the first songs I ever heard, and I'm almost positive I heard it on vinyl. We had a record player when I was little, and in nursery school and Sunday school, we sometimes got little kid-sized records of church songs to sing. This song brings back happy memories of being a little kid and being surrounded by music and singing.
2. "He Will Not Let You Fall" by the Worship Community (formerly Maranatha Music) - This is a song on an album we had called Psalms Alive! It is literally psalms from the Bible put to upbeat music. I don't know any of the words to this song except the chorus, but it reminds me of being little.
3. "1974" by Amy Grant - My siblings and I grew up on Amy Grant's early albums, and while this isn't necessarily my favorite of her songs, it's the one that takes me back to first hearing Christian contemporary music. Even just the first few beats of the song sweep me away to our apartment in Los Angeles circa 1989.
4. "Luke and Leia" by John Williams - The first movie I remember watching is Return of the Jedi (aka Star Wars Episode VI). My brother had a little stuffed animal Ewok (Wicket), and I adored Leia's hair in the scene of this song. It was so long and wavy and perfect. I wanted hair like hers, but I wasn't good at brushing it, and my mom hacked it off. So little Sara lived vicariously through Leia in this scene and its song.
5. "Are You Goin' to Narnia" by the 2nd Chapter of Acts - One of our family favorite albums was Roar of Love by 2nd Chapter of Acts. It uses music to tell the story of C.S. Lewis' The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and I have loved it for as long as I can remember. I heard this album well before I read the book, so in some ways, this is more beloved.
6. "Gabriel's Oboe" by Ennio Morricone - I saw bits and pieces of this movie from the place just inside the hallway where my parents couldn't see me from the couch. I was probably 7 or 8. It wasn't long before I got to see the full movie, as it's one of our family favorites, and this song has haunted me ever since. It is why the oboe is my favorite wind instrument. 
7. "So You Wanna Go Back to Egypt" by Keith Green - Keith Green died just after I was born. We had a 2-disc album of his greatest hits, and this was my personal favorite because I found it hilarious. I mean, you can imagine how funny "ba-manna bread" was when I was little. I loved that the song was about the Bible but was also funny. 
8. "Love Crusade" by Michael W. Smith - Like my token Amy Grant song in these early years, this is not my favorite MWS song. But it's the first song for which I consciously made an effort to learn the lyrics. My older brother learned the rap part in the middle, so of course I also had to learn it. This wasn't the first MWS album I listened to, either, but I have very specific memories of learning this song in our L.A. apartment when the album was brand new in 1990.
9. "The Man from Snowy River Concert Suite" by Bruce Rowland - This is another of the earliest movies I remember watching and a family favorite. It was also my first exposure to Australia. Little did I know that we'd soon move into a house with Australian neighbors.
10. "African Sanctus: 1. African Sanctus" by David Fanshawe -I can't fully express how this song makes me feel. I guess in the context of this list, I consider it my introduction to the idea of moving to Nigeria. It's so much more, but that's all I can say for now.
11. "Leaving on a Jet Plane" by Peter, Paul, & Mary - Last but not least in this section, this song was our family theme in 1991 when we left the U.S. to make our home in Nigeria. (For the record, I know this is a John Denver song, but I didn't even hear his version until I was 17. I always associate this song with Peter, Paul, & Mary.) So OK, the whole song doesn't fit our situation at all, but we'd sing the chorus together. It was our song.

So that brings us to 1991 when we moved to Nigeria. I was nine years old.