I do things on repeat a lot. I’ve been told it could be a symptom of my ADHD, but I like to think I’m just a creature of habit.
I watch the same television shows and movies over and over, I read books more than once, and I listen to music on repeat.
During a vacation to the Smokey Mountains, I spent the 10 hour drive to Gatlinburg listening to “Oh, My, My” by Blue October on repeat while I typed away on my laptop, working on my second book.
This is not an isolated incident. I love music, and sometimes music speaks to me in ways I can’t explain. While I wrote my third book, I listened to the album “Dark Sun” by Dayseeker over and over again because it was the only thing that got me to write creatively.
I’m sure I’m not the only person who does this. Since I was a little kid I liked to do things repetitively. I learned how to work a VCR at a young age to watch movies, but did not know how to rewind them, so my mom had to rewind tapes for me every time so I could start the movie over. I had mixed CDs that literally wore out because I would play them so much, and I still remember every word to every song on the first CD I ever owned (Avril Lavigne’s “Let Go”).
Every time I got a new book in a series, I would start over at the beginning and re-read the whole series. And if I found a video game or computer game I liked, I would play it over and over.
To be quite honest, my repetitive nature is one of my favorite things about myself.
I know a lot of people that don’t like experiencing a story more than once, be it a story in a book, in a movie, in a song, or some other form of media. But I think that’s one of the best parts.
I once read a book called “I’ll be There For You: The One About Friends” by Kelsey Miller. The book is a lengthy analysis about the TV show Friends (one of my favorites), and in it she analyzes why the show has stayed so popular, and comes to the conclusion that it makes people nostalgic twice. They watch it and not only remember the first time they watched the show and that point in their life, but they also remember their 20s and 30s and the time they were figuring out their lives like the characters on the show.
I think that’s why I can do things so repetitively. When I experience a piece of media like that, I can remember the first time reading that book or listening to that song, how old I was or where I was or what I was doing. Everything about it is a good memory.
And good memories don’t get boring.