Sad Girl Hour: A Playlist

Image: Gina Kiel mural for Wipster

“What is the saddest song you can think of?” 

It must have been the glare of the August sun, but I thought I saw my boyfriend roll his eyes from the driver’s seat as the rest of us began queuing a Sad Girl Hour playlist with completely unrelenting control of the aux cord.

Bless his heart, honestly; he was spending my birthday chauffeuring me and my three best friends home from a day trip to Rehoboth Beach, crossing the Bay Bridge slower than molasses on one of the hottest days on record. 

Sad Girl Hour was the answer to our inexplicable urge to deeply emote on the car ride home, because isn’t that what cars are for? If not to get you from point A to point B, cars are solely meant to hold you and your flooding emotions in between the scalding leather seats and your sweating, sunburnt thighs while you let that big lump in your throat do a little show-and-tell? 

My therapist likes to use the term “holding spaces” to mean people, places and spaces that make you feel grounded. My car is one of them. 

I am a huge crier, yet nothing is more embarrassing to me than crying in public (luckily I haven’t been out in public much lately). In a previous life where I commuted to an office or rode the metro home from a social activity, I’d hold on to the sadness building in my chest — whether something actually made me sad, or just a bad brain chemistry day — until I could express it in private. If I didn’t, I’d just feel increasingly heavy as the day goes, like clutching a helium balloon that’s getting harder and harder to hold onto. 

So in any given Big Sad Moment, I’d scurry out to my car where no one could hear me, queue up a devastatingly sad song, video, quote, etc., and consume it while having an ugly cry for, like, 2.5 minutes. 

I also keep a small makeup bag in my car, because that’s showbiz, baby! 

Point is, there’s no reason to make yourself hold onto your sadness, whenever it comes. Inducing tears the way one might induce labor might actually help you get everything out on the table — or dashboard, if your car is your holding space, too — and return to your day feeling lighter, freer, clearer. 

“Big Cry and Reapply” is probably what I would have called this playlist, but I haven't worn makeup in months. And now that I won’t be commuting to work until 2021, Sad Girl Hour has truly become the sole purpose of my car (can I get a discount on my insurance?), and I kind of expect that’s the case for many of you, too.

So I present to thee, Sad Girl Hour: a collaborative Spotify playlist for whenever you need a Big Ugly Cry, or if you have a song to add. (Bonus track is Solange’s Mad for when you need to angry-cry!)