John Phillip Bogulski & Tarrah Lee Curtis

…And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead – “Wasted State of Mind”

This song always takes me back to the first time I heard it, which was during a hookup. Saying that up front in case, you want to stop reading. If you’re still here, I’m not really into music during anything sexual. it gets me distracted. And I’m pretty sure music is not the thing you are supposed to be focusing on during a sexual encounter, but to each their own. Well once during a hookup with an ex, this song was playing. I use the term ex loosely. While he was basically my first relationship, it was very short lived. Yet still long enough to seriously fuck me up. It further complicated my sexuality and put me in a very vulnerable defeated mindset when it came to dating. That being said, we still hooked up three times after our breakup. Once a month after the relationship ended, once a year after that, and a final time years later. This song was playing during the 2nd time, so a year after anything had happened, and I was in a mindset where I thought things would never happen again. I was just hanging out with him and his roommate. Then his roommate went to bed, and it was just the two of us alone for the first time in a year. We went to his room, and it was happening. He was playing some Pandora playlist, and at some point this song came on. While the song is not the most depressing song in the world, it’s pretty sad at the heart of it, especially in the context of hooking up with your ex. It really highlighted for me just how bad of an idea it was. While the other hookup was awkward and came lots of depression and regret after, this was awkward and had the regret baked right into the moment. And I couldn’t help but listen to the song, studying the lyrics, and remembering as much as I could of it (because even then, I knew I would need to know this song.) The song just encapsulated so much of what I felt. I was depressed for pretty much all of college, and hearing this song I was in the process hooking up with one of the many factors that contributed to that depression. This song to me just defines putting the animalistic nature in front of what your brain is telling you. That’s what I was doing in the moment. And since I remember the song way more than the actual act, it’s clear giving into that is not always the smartest thing. So I learned a little something in that moment. I guess not totally because I hooked up with him again years later. But I did at least learn not to play this song during any kind of sexual situation.