I Am Being Stalked

I am being stalked. It is an unyielding situation. She ambushes me every week, if not more often. The bombardments are almost always in the same place, and so I’ve come to expect her appearance. But now that I am waiting, whenever it doesn’t occur, I am left wondering, fearing, and then become lost in the void. It is a surreal experience. I would be terrified if it wasn’t so funny.

You will know the perpetrator. In 2013 she was impossible not to know. Throughout her life she has never not been known. But across this expanse of time she has gone by many names. She is most known as this one: Miley Cyrus.

Unfortunately for the story I am not met by the physical presence of Ms. Cyrus. If that was the case I would have taken this story to a newspaper, or at least one of the social media websites. No, because these are disembodied accounts, the tale is only being thrown from me via this route.

I should explain the situation with more clarity. My girlfriend and I travel to a medium-sized Sainsbury’s every now and then. On the drive back, at the first set of traffic lights we encounter, we are met by the sound of Miley. She’s singing from the speakers. The radio has brought her to us. It is her latest single, Flowers.

As I mentioned earlier, this almost never doesn’t happen! It is a bizarre reality. I would say that we are visited by Flowers on 85% of our journeys to home from the medium-sized Sainsbury’s. And 80% of those trips feature the song playing when we are around those first traffic lights. What does this mean?

Because it has to have meaning, right? Or we have to give it meaning, at least. We feel the need to give a story to those moments that venture slightly beyond coincidence. And so, what is this story?

Perhaps I need to buy some flowers. Perhaps I need to dive into Miley Cyrus, read her Wikipedia page slowly, steadily, and dissect it fully. Maybe it’s a way to call attention to the drive, and maybe Life wants me not to drive to medium-sized Sainsbury’s anymore. These could all be true. These are all fictional.

Whatever the case, the song has been meeting us for weeks, and the song hasn’t let up yet. Songs live forever, but a song’s lifespan on the radio is finite. Extremely finite in our saturated world. This one is living a strong life. Like a persistent weed in a garden. (The song is less of a nuisance than a weed). Flowers lives in the airwaves for now. It won’t have a home there forever. Another song will take its place. This is radio. Which song will stalk me next?