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By Mary Oves

On Tuesday I saw an email from my satellite radio inquiring about my mood.

How nice, I thought. I clicked on it.

“What’s your mood today, Mary?” it asked. “Let us help match music to your mood! Just click here!”

“Well, to be honest,” I thought to myself as I clicked, “I’m feeling a bit bemused. Befuddled. Quixotic, at times. Disgruntled earlier, and smarmy a little while after that. Now I am settled into a nice solid mood of disorientation.”

Wondering if there was a playlist for any of those moods, I scrolled and was disappointed to see that none of my moods was represented in the list.

There was “Nostalgic,” the winner at 28%. “Totally Chill” at 26%. “Mixed-Up” at 23%. And “Pumped” with 23%.

I clicked “None of these.”

“Ok,” Sirius said. “What would you like to be doing right now? Sitting at a beach bar, wandering through an empty museum, sitting in a quiet room with a book or dancing on a loud dance floor?”

Normally either the empty museum or quiet room would win, hands down. But Tuesday gave me a touch of spring fever, and I found my mind wandering to thoughts of my favorite beach bar in Cocoa Beach. You can walk off the sand, walk up a set of stairs, and in a matter of minutes be holding a mojito and listening to reggae.

I’d love to be there right now, I thought. I clicked “Sitting at a beach bar.” Sirius told me, “Mary, here is your personal playlist!” I clicked “Play,” and settled in to work and enjoy some music.

The playlist began innocently enough with some Luke Bryan and older upbeat Josh Turner, like “Why Don’t We Just Dance” and “Hometown Girl.” Then came Jack Johnson’s “Banana Pancakes” and some Michael Franti and Spearhead. Good vibes.

Then Jason Aldean showed up, that musical sorcerer, with “Dirt Road Anthem” and “Laughed Until We Cried,” compelling me to pull out my high school yearbooks and my sons’ baby books to mourn the passing years. I also called my 93-year-old father for the third time that day, to see if he wanted me to bring him a milkshake.

Then Trace made an appearance and pummeled me with “You’re Gonna Miss This,” and Rascal Flatts dropped in to drub me with “Bless the Broken Road” and “My Wish.” I group texted my sons, telling them I made a tee time for the four of us after Easter brunch, and cleaned all of their rooms and made their beds.

Before I knew it, Kenny was warning me to not blink, Garth was telling me to enjoy The Dance, Tim was reminding me to stay humble and kind and live like I am dying, and Carrie was suggesting I let Jesus take the wheel.

Then out of nowhere that little angelic-faced Hunter Hayes walloped me with “Wanted,” and the dreamy Mike Reid crooned “Always Gonna Be You” in that sexy, flinty way he has. Unable to work and already tied into emotional knots, I figured Mike was the worst of it.

But the playlist wasn’t done with me yet. Beautiful Miranda still needed to rip me to shreds. By the time she finished “The House That Built Me” and “Tin Man,” I was curled into a fetal ball of angst on the floor, completely destroyed and reevaluating all of my life’s choices.

This is a playlist for a beach bar? A beach bar where, in the Siberian Arctic? In a Gulag prison? On a Yemen archipelago? What drinks are being served, Rum Runners with antifreeze floaters?

Waaaaahhhh, I cried on the floor. I’m so ungrateful, I don’t appreciate the elderly and the young enough, and I miss my mom and my dog and my childhood house and my babies and my high school friends, and high school and college were the greatest times of my life why didn’t I know it at the time, I loved my childhood so much, why oh why didn’t I appreciate what I had when I had it????!! What is wrong with meeeeeee waaahhhhhhhh!!!!!

I crawled across the floor, despondent over not having taken enough videos of my boys’ birthday parties and pictures of my dad, ate peanut butter with my fingers and bawled. I wished that my sons would marry for love, give more than they take, show the cold world the warmth of their smiles, and never need to carry more than they can hold. I wished they were home so I could hug them and kiss them and put them in footie pajamas and make them banana pancakes and tuck them into bed in the house that made them so they would always be warm and loved and comfy.

When the time came to leave for golf, I felt undeserving of pleasure and recreation, so I decided to sit in the house, look at old photos and atone for my life’s sins while staring despondently out the window.

Super fun playlist, thanks. At the prompt “Mary, name your new playlist!” I typed in:

Self-flagellation.

— Mary Oves

Mary Oves lives at the Jersey shore with her three sons: twins John and Dustin, 22, and Tommy, 18. Oves is a widow of four years and a professor of English at the local college. She devotes all of her spare time to travel and working on her blog, the-not-it-girl.com.