When feeling bad was so blissful

When you work alone for long stretches of time, you can be forgiven for indulging in various minor forms of antisocial behaviour, not all of which one might want to mention in this forum.

For my sins, I listen to the National Programme. I've waxed lyrical at length in the past about my obsession with Nine-to-Noon and Morning Report. But it's Afternoons with Jim Mora that lights up my life (lame, I know - but obsessions often are).

As the 1pm news ends, Jim's comfy, warm voice echoes through my studio and I settle in for the rest of the working day feeling as though I'm with a friend.

My favourite part is right at the start; Jim chats at length to an "Everybody" character, a Kiwi battler going about their day in an ordinary way and talking, finally, about what they think is the best song ever written.

On a whim and seeking momentary procrastination this week, I emailed in my own song request and was fizzing with excitement when, the following day, the producer of Afternoons rang me and said I'd be speaking to Jim about my favourite song that day.

The interview was groovy. I talked about my life, he oozed with apparent interest as he always does and then I introduced my song.

It was I Know It's Over by The Smiths. It was morbid. It was melancholy. It reeked of self-pity and heart-breaking hyperbole, as does almost any song involving Morrissey. It was awesome.

As I listened to him wail about his tortured soul, I had a happy heart knowing that, across the nation, thousands of others were listening to him, too, and relating.

As a teenager, I played the song on repeat so often that I used a permanent marker to identify where on the cassette tape it started so I could rewind and relive the agony of whatever overrated teenage boy I was mourning at the time.

Thankfully, I haven't had to resort to self-pity for quite some time, and Morrissey and The Smiths have been filed semi-permanently in the back catalogue.

But reliving the wrist-slashing soundtrack of my youth did remind me what it used to feel like to indulge in undiluted self-pity ... to climb under the duvet for a couple of days, to eat junk food and neglect to wash.

Why is it that feeling bad can sometimes feel so blissfully good?

Is it part of the human condition that now and again we need to indulge in sorrow? The rash of "poor me" love songs that populate the airwaves proves that all of us are happy being sad at various times.

Adele would just be a chubby, anonymous singer crooning in the corner of a greasy English pub instead of an international phenomenon if we didn't enjoy the odd wallow.

Like icecream and central heating, introspective misery is a distinctly first-world luxury.

In Ethiopia, they are far too busy trying to stay alive to bother wailing about broken hearts. If they had the means and spare kilojoules to write music, the theme would doubtless be about dreams of lush green fields of rice and being let loose in a supermarket after dark.

But in a world where every physical comfort is catered for, our damaged hearts are the only things left to whinge about.

And from that, an industry has spawned and Morrissey is unquestionably its chief. Hearing him for the first time in a long time, I was reminded how delightful it once was indulging in a broken heart. And so, with a quiet afternoon ahead, I turned off Jim and tuned into my Smiths collection instead, determined to drag up some ancient angst to moon over until five o'clock.