With a song in my heart (or head)

So, while I was ill, I had a couple of the world’s worst earworms. When I first got sick, the Christmas season was just ending, and I had a Christmas hymn stuck in my mind: “Break forth, O Beauteous Heavenly Light.” That’s the first line. The second line is, “And usher in the morning.” That’s as much as I know by heart.

But! Not only did my brain keep replaying just those first two phrases, it kept getting the second part wrong. So I would be lying around, thinking things like, “Ugh” and “Bleah,”and my brain would sing to me:

Break forth, O Beauteous Heavenly Light,
And take away…no, wait…and usher in the morning.

“Stop!” The sane part of my brain said. A few minutes later:

Break forth, O Beauteous Heavenly Light,
And take away…and usher in the morning.

No, nooooo.

Later, when I felt better, it was a different song. From time to time I would get chills, and even as I thought, “I’ve got chills,” my brain would belt out (inside my head):

I got chills!
They’re multiplying.
And I’m looooooosing control.
Cause the power
You’re supplying—
It’s electrifying!
(It’s electrifying!)

As my brain tried to move on to “Better shape up. Cause I need a man, and my heart is set on you,” the sane part of my brain would shout (inside my head), “Shut up, shut up, John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John! I don’t want you right now.”

Now that I’m well (or better), my brain has reverted to my current long-term song, “Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken.” At least with that one, I know all the words and even three verses, so if I become aware of the song drifting through my head (it usually happens in my car) I can sing the whole thing.