Ear Worms

You have likely experienced “Ear Worms” or “Stuck Song Syndrome” which often occurs after listening to a catchy piece of music. The tune then gets stuck in your head, and it is difficult to shake it off.

Psychologists refer to this phenomenon as “Involuntary Musical Imagery”. Whatever you want to call it, for most people this is usually a minor annoyance. 

For Tim, however, it was something more.

For starters, he had no idea where he had first heard the melody. He did not know the words to the song or if it even had any. He had simply started humming it in the shower this morning and the tune had been playing repeatedly in his head ever since then.

At first, he really didn’t think it was a big deal. However, by lunchtime the melody had stubbornly persisted, and it seemed to have actually gotten louder in volume. By mid-afternoon it had gotten to the point where he was unable to focus on his work in the office and he made the decision to clock out early claiming he was ill.

Not sure he could handle the noise of public transportation on top of the increasingly loud tune playing in his head, Tim decided to walk the 30 blocks home. It was a beautiful day, and the spring sun was warm on his face. He might have even enjoyed the walk if it were not for the incessant music that had taken up residency in his brain. 

Tim picked up the pace hoping the fresh air and exercise would somehow help to get the song out of his head.

Five blocks into his walk he passed the neighborhood park. The park was an oasis of trees, fragrant flowers and green grass set in the middle of the bustling city. It was as he passed this park that the music grew even louder. It almost seemed as if it were coming simultaneously from both inside and outside of his head now. He was almost certain that he could hear it coming from somewhere within the park. Curious and hoping for an answer to his problem he veered off the sidewalk and through the park's iron gates. 

It occurred to him that in his ten years of living in this city he had only been to this park one other time. He thought about how very little time he had spent exploring the city in general. Work had always been his primary focus and he was an introvert and homebody by nature.

He followed the music all the way through the park until he exited onto a street with which he was not familiar. The music continued to build in volume and now it seemed to be coming from a building across the way.

The faded sign on the building read “Curiosity Killed the Man” and below that Tim could barely make out the words “Comedy Club”.

 Resisting the urge to cover his ears with both hands now as the music relentlessly assaulted him, Tim hit the pedestrian call button at the crosswalk and waited impatiently for the walk signal to flash. The instant the signal indicated he could cross he all but leapt off the sidewalk and hurried across the street. Not caring how he looked at the moment he briskly brushed past people eager to make his way to the comedy club. The pounding in his head was almost unbearable now.

Half expecting the door to be locked this time of day, Tim reached for the handle and pulled hard. The door opened with surprising ease, almost knocking him off balance. Straightening himself, Tim stepped inside. Much to his relief, the music in his head seemed to fade to the background as the words of the comedian on the stage reached Tim’s ears.

Collapsing into a seat near the back of the room, he took a moment to glance around him.  He was the only person in the audience. Tim wondered if perhaps he had stumbled in on this guy's rehearsal.

The comedian on stage was an older fellow dressed in a black suit and tie. He was seated on a dimly lit stool in the center of an otherwise dark stage and was sipping frequently from a glass in between his telling of cheesy jokes. “Why don’t skeletons fight each other? Because they don’t have the guts!”

The comedian took another sip from the glass before locking eyes with Tim. “Did you hear the one about the man who couldn’t get the song out of his head?” The comedian paused expectantly.

Tim froze. The man smiled at him, his blue eyes twinkling mischievously, “you’ve come to the right place”.

The comedian slid off the stool and made his way toward Tim, “Got yourself an ear worm, do you?” The man was now standing uncomfortably close to him, and Tim was fighting the urge to spring out of his seat and escape the hall.

Tim felt a wave of nausea wash over him as the strange man reached toward Tim's ear and came away holding a long, thin, wriggling, brown noodle of a worm. Tim stared for a moment in horror and disbelief before the room spun around him and everything went dark.

Tim woke up on the living room floor of his one-bedroom apartment. Holding his throbbing head, he sat up and pushed away the soggy, cold pile of Chow Mein noodles that he had apparently rested his head in after spilling them on the floor when he passed out last night.  Gross. Rubbing his eyes, Tim slowly recalled the events of the evening.

A rare night out to a comedy club with some friends from work had been followed up with a few too many drinks at the local piano bar and Tim had come home and devoured some left-over Chinese food before evidently passing out on the hard wood floor.

Tim dragged himself to the kitchen to get some much-needed water.  A single soggy noodle clung to his cheek and as he plucked it off, he could not help but laugh at himself. He decided he was quite content to be a homebody and he did not think he would be craving noodles again anytime soon.