Every so often, I catch myself trying not to ask the question.
“What’s your favorite song?”
It feels too simple. Too obvious. Like something you ask when you don’t know what else to say.
But the longer I’ve paid attention to music—and to the people who carry it with them—the more I’ve realized that favorite doesn’t mean best, and it definitely doesn’t mean most impressive.
A favorite song is usually something quieter than that.
It’s the one that stays with you when trends pass.
The one you don’t outgrow, even when you outgrow parts of yourself.
The one that survives new phases, new tastes, and new versions of who you are.
For me, one of those songs is “Drive” by The Cars.
It takes me back to eighth grade in seconds. Not in a vague way—in a transportive way. I can feel the era immediately. The mood. The sense of not knowing much yet, but feeling like everything ahead mattered.
What’s stuck with me is how the meaning of that song has shifted over the years.
Back then, it felt distant and mysterious, like a question being asked into the future. Now, it lands differently. More reflective. Maybe even heavier. The lyrics haven’t changed, but the life I carry into them has. And somehow, the song still meets me there.
That’s when I realized what I think a favorite song really is—not the one you play the most, but the one that keeps pace with your life. It doesn’t stay frozen in time. It changes quietly, right alongside you.
And that’s what I’m curious about.
Favorite songs aren’t always about melody or lyrics alone. They’re about timing. Memory. Geography. The person you were when you first heard them—and the person you are when they show up again years later.
So I want to open this one up.
What’s your favorite song—and why do you keep coming back to it?
Not the song you think you should say.
Not the one you’d put on a list.
Just the one that keeps finding its way back into your life.
If you feel like replying, I’d love to hear:
the song, and
what it pulls you back to—if anything at all
Short or long. One sentence or a story. There’s no right way to answer.
Sometimes the music we return to tells us more about where we’ve been than where we’re going. And sometimes, it just reminds us we were there at all.
—
Six‑String Travels