I think it’s my way of stopping my brain from thinking about things too much. When I’m stressed, I hum. I have to stop myself from humming when I walk through airports, or I get strange looks. When I’m writing a book and my brain is hyper-creativity mode and I want to take a break I hum too. Because the thoughts don’t whirl around my head as much when I hum.
My father was a whistler. You'd always hear him coming by the whistle. My son-in-law ditto. John dislikes this so much that my son-in-law made a CD for him one Christmas called The Royal Family Whistles the Classics. The numbers were all whistled by Tom including "I'm Dreaming of a Different Son-in-Law, Son-in-Law is Coming into Town" etc. We still have it!
So, fellow Reds, do you hum, whistle, have a tune in your head that won’t go away? Have a default tune that hums around inside your skull when you are stressed. My current one is Puff the Magic Dragon. Don’t ask me why. I can’t analyze that one.
HANK: I just burst out laughing! I don't hum, but there is often a song in my head, and I agree, it comes from somewhere. And it's fun to figure out where. Puff, for instance. Anyone you know live by the sea? And it's autumn, right? Anyone bring you string, or sealing wax, or other fancy stuff.
And thanks a lot , sister, now that song is in my head. And I know exactly where it came from.
(Sidebar: I'm told that if you have a song in your head--called an "earworm," by the way--you can get rid of it by singling Jingle Bell Rock.) (And, they say, Jingle Bell Rock does not replace it.)
Worth a try.
DEBORAH CROMBIE: Rhys, that is so funny! I don't hum, and I can't whistle (one of my many failings.) I do occasionally get a song stuck in my head, especially when Rick is learning something on the guitar and plays it over and over, lol. And, Hank, if Puff the Magic Dragon wasn't enough, you started me on a Joni Mitchell earworm (it was the sealing wax...) so now I'm going to try Jingle Bell Rock. Which I hate. If that sticks I will never forgive you.
LUCY BURDETTE: I am not trying the Jingle Bell thing--the cost could be too dear! I don't hum, but I do sing. Mostly to my animals. The song in my brain today goes like this: T-T-Tonka, beautiful Tonka. You're the only d-d-dog that I adore....
HALLIE EPHRON: I am not a hummer, mostly because I'm so off key I make myself cringe. When I sang my daughter a lullaby she'd ask me to stop. I do sing along with the radio, turning the radio up loud enough so I can't hear myself. And I get tunes stuck in my head all the time. Like the music that goes with the opening titles of NCIS? Aaaggggh.
JENN McKINLAY: Hummer, here! Hub and the Hooligans say I have my own top 40 countdown which includes Me & Bobby McGee, Someone Like You, Redbone, and Love Like a Bomb, just to name a few. I also sing and whistle and had no idea I was doing any of it until my men clued me in. Thankfully, they just ask me to turn it down instead of asking me to stop. LOL.
INGRID THOFT: I do not hum, and honestly, it drives me nuts if someone around me is humming. Or whistling. I'm like Debs in that I can't whistle. It's part of the family lore that if you ask me to whistle a tune, one long, dissonant sound will come out of my mouth. Interestingly enough, I actually have a decent singing voice and can carry a tune, but it doesn't translate to whistling. My hubby is the worst when it comes to ear worms. He'll often say, "you know what song I can't get out of my head?" and then proceed to sing a few lines, which lodge themselves in my brain. The ear worm that reoccurs often? "It's a Small World." Ugh!
JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Ingrid, the penalty for lodging "It's a Small World" in someone's ear should be death. Swift death. I would drive you crazy, though, because I'm another hummingbird. The girls and I will often sit together of an evening: the Smithie reading, Youngest doing her homework, and me on my laptop. Humming. They ask me to stop, and I will...right up to the point where I lose awareness of "not humming" and begin again. I've caught myself humming while in an airplane, and I'm always embarrassed! What could be more obnoxious than being forced to listen to your seatmate humming the same three bars of Brandenburg Concerto No. 4 over...and over...and over again.
Actually, I know something more annoying: the Sailor, who's been a percussionist since age 11, beats. He jiggles his leg, taps his foot, thumps his fingers on the table. At least with unwanted humming, you have the option of putting in earbuds and listening to your own music to escape. With percussion, you FEEL it.
RHYS: Julia, I'm with you. "It's a Small World" is the most earworm-likely song in the universe. When we took the kids to Disneyland when they were small that pesky song wouldn't leave my head for weeks, nay months! But I'm not sure I want to try Jingle Bell Rock either. That wouldn't exactly induce a calm state of mind!
So readers and friends: who hums? Who whistles? Who hates it when others do?
