Stay | Lisa Loeb
I wonder if I didn’t hear this song first on the show New Girl, what my impressions might be. They are so strongly attached to the image of Zoey Deschanel’s Jess slow dancing with her prom date in the episode where each of the character’s share their first sexual experience, it is almost all humor. I’m sure Loeb didn’t write this song to be paired with a comical entertainment and it makes me wonder how artists feel when their work is linked to something very different from its original intention.
Musically, it’s not quite my jam, but I appreciate Loeb’s conveying of romantic hardship against the acoustic guitar. The strun is the melodic strain of a discontented heart. I feel for her, and am reminded of love’s strife in my life, deeply webbed and cemented in memory by music.
What if my break ups and deep longings for lovers never to be was webbed by “Stay”? Perhaps then I would watch that New Girl episode with great insult because the emotional attachment to words like “I know that I was wrong, because I missed you…” is pretty damn strong.
[Book of Delights pg. 104 | “Stay,” by Lisa Loeb]