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When I hear Joni Mitchell sing the River song I can't help but wish I had someone to hold me while I listen to it. Every time. It's the kind of viscous sensual song whose words and notes pour through one set of ears into another pressed inches apart in bed until the song is the only thing between one body and the other. When I hear it I'm sitting at my hand-me-down dorm furniture wooden desk staring at sexual impulses in an abnormal psychology book. There are always cartoons in psychology books. The authors commission someone to draw squiggly lines and thought bubbles hoping it will somehow distance the reader from what they're really seeing, which is themselves, in black and white print. I look at a comical drawing of a man walking down a long winding road and see relationships as sort of a quest. Relationships are the worst kind of quest because instead of having a leather bound journal filled with maps and clues leading to some dark cave where you know you'll find the object of your desires and be blessed with eternal life (or eternal damnation and face melting if you choose poorly), you have nothing. You have nothing to start from and you have nothing to look for. Not only that but there is no guarantee that the quest will end happily or even end. Harrison Ford had better odds when he slept with the Nazi.
Worse yet, the quest has rules (damn society). Rule #1: You may never (ever) engage in a crusade for the former pursuit of one of your friends. This applies to people your friends have dated, been interested in, and (especially) been hurt by. Rule #1 becomes glaringly apparent when you are woken up at 3:00 in the morning by your best friend's (adorable) ex-boyfriend. He's drunk but he's damn cute and you realize that even though at every lunch and dinner conversation he's referred to as "Guess who I saw today" (grimace), you have yet to experience the pain of losing him yourself. But of course the quest isn't worth losing your friendship, a friendship which may have started over the agonizing chronicalling of this very ex-boyfriend. Instead you're cursed to remind yourself of this irony repeatedly and in quick succession as he runs his drunken fingers over your face and down your back. It isn't flirting if he's drunk and won't remember it. Of course by that logic it doesn't matter each time you glance over at him in the corner of a different party and see him against the wall with a different girl. Instead of the River song its Back that Ass Up, and she does. Somehow you know the object of your quest isn't to be pressed against a wall but at the same time you can't help but feel confounded by Rule #1.
This brings up Rule #2. You must always (always) be attracted to people who are bad for you. The nice guy never gets the girl - this my friends is sad but true. I was dating a nice guy once and thought I had vanquished rule #2. I thought that until I broke up with him because he was just too damn nice. If the River song played while we were together he would say he liked it for me. That he would learn to like the same music I did. The guy I picture floating in front of my psych book when I'm daydreaming doesn't say anything. He doesn't have to like the song, he just holds me. But I'm attracted to jerks and this is the fact of my life. The guy I swoon after says "This song sucks, what is this?" when he hears the River song. Maybe from now on I should play the song in my head instead of on the radio.

Then there's the platonic friend. The guy who knows all the background on Joni Mitchell and has an original album with the River song on it. He knows exactly what you're saying when you say soulful but you cant listen to it with him. It just doesn't work. Damn these rules. I think sometimes that I just cant help but think too much. That if we just threw out the rules we'd all be a lot rougher around the edges but a lot happier in the meantime. Sitting at my desk with the shiny silver lamp staring me in the face instead of piercing blue eyes, I think about what I've gained by having long analytical conversations with objects of my quest instead of, well, questing. I can't find much except a stronger peace of mind at the time and then a deep seated regret later. I never know which emotion is more reliable though I suppose peace of mind is healthier. For now I just sit and over think my over thinking, waiting for someone to interrupt me and sit next to me while the River song plays, holding me until all I can think of is their arms.