Baby, We Were Born to Run

While I’ve always professed to being tone deaf, the great musician, Michael Hinton, assured me that technically, I was not. After all, I can indeed tell the difference between Happy Birthday and The Star Spangled Banner. But give me a lesser known rock song and I often can’t identify it until the lyrics chime in. Which is not to say that I haven’t enjoyed the marks music has left in my life. 

I’ll forever equate You’re my blue sky, you’re my sunny day with Morgantown, West Virginia. Perched on the sloped roof of 204 Grant Avenue Fran, Linda, Kevin, and I would wave to the passersby as they sang along to the Allman Brothers blaring out of our 2nd floor window those first days of spring. Helen Reddy’s Delta Dawn will be ever reminiscent of Karen Shea’s first my-parents-are-out-of-town high school party. I can’t hear Lay, Lady, Lay without thinking of Emily, Margaret, and Todd Nuttall and giggle knowing that Todd would have zero frame of reference, nor would he likely remember any of us, except of course, Margaret. 

 

I do know every Taylor Swift and John Prine song and would like one of each played at my funeral 34 years from now – requesting Dave Moyer for Souvenirs, and anyone can do Taylor's Long Live just as long as they sing with sincerity. 

 

Which brings me to the hungry heart of this story. Bruce Springsteen. I’ve never been a fan. Never been a hater. I just kind of threw him in the same pot as say, Journey, both have a couple of songs I could belt out at a bar but neither have been on my personal playlist nor on my bucket list to see live in concert

 

But alas, I had seen Bruce live. In 1974 I went to visit my sister at the College of William and Mary. 

 

“Want to go to see this guy play tonight?” Emily asked. “His name’s Bruce something. Springsteen maybe?”

 

“Never heard of him,” I said.

 

“Me neither.”

 

So we went. And there was nothing memorable about the night except that I remembered it once he got famous. 

 

Fifty years later, my ever-loving spouse propositioned me. 

 

“Want to go see Bruce Springsteen in Baltimore with Gary and Chuck and their brides?” 

 

“Absolutely not,” I responded. “You go and have a good time with your high school friends.” 

 

“I think you should come. It will be fun.” 

 

As pointed out more than once by the daughter, I have a habit of defaulting with NO. Rarely will I say, "I'll think about it," or a simple, "No, thank you." More often than not an emphatic NO followed by a tirade of something akin to "Why would ANYone voluntarily do ANYthing like that?"  or "In what world would you think I would actually consider what you have suggested?" 

 

Then I ruminate over it, obsessively, usually feeling guilty about my extreme reaction. But every now and then I surprise us all and reverse my decision, saying "OK, I’ll do it." Mind you, not "I’d LOVE to do it." Just an "OK. I’m in. But I warned you, I didn’t want to do this."

 

Which is what I did a few weeks ago. 

 

After all, I have a 50 year-history with Bruce. 

 

Along with the unmemorable concert in the college pub, my friend Patty and I had our own Bruce Springsteen incident. We were on the first of our many annual cruises together and stopped in the ship casino. Neither of us had any idea how to play craps but we moseyed up to the table anyway. My Patty somewhat resembled Bruce Springsteen’s wife, at least enough for a drunken craps player to whisper to her cohort, “I think that’s Patti Scialfa!” 

 

Mind you, we were on a Carnival Cruise. An old, yet-to-be-refurbished ship. The kind of ship Patti Scialfa may have boarded in her youth, but considering her current net worth, it was highly unlikely that would be how she’d choose to vacation. 

 

Naturally, we went with it. 

 

“I’m so happy Bruce let you come with me!” I said really loudly.

 

“You’re just happy he paid for your cruise,” my Patty replied. 

 

As word of a celebrity sighting spread like a norovirus through the ship, my Patty smiled and finger-tip waved to countless cruisers in the buffet line as they nudged each other, mouthing, “That’s her!” 

 

I felt I owed it to both Patty, who is no longer with us, and Patti who has been diagnosed with multiple myeloma, (and to my ever-loving who thought it was such a nice gesture to buy the tickets) to go full circle and attend the concert. 

 

Which isn’t to say I was excited to finally go to a mega-concert as a senior citizen. I know, I know, I went to LA to see Taylor Swift in an arena almost twice the size of Camden Yards, but hey, that was Taylor. And I was a full year younger. 

 

I did prep though. I downloaded Bruce’s set list and crammed for a week prior to the show. After googling lyrics and playing his songs on repeat, I knew I could endure the three hours – and the three-and-a-half hour drive – but still didn’t get the hype. 

Let me reiterate. If I’m in the car, I listen to books on tape or sports on the radio. If I’m at home, I choose silence. Music for music’s sake does not move me. But I was certainly moved when Bruce took the stage at exactly 7:30 pm. It wasn't lost on me that he considered our time valuable. Or maybe it's just that he's 75 years old and couldn't stay up that late. I looked at my watch. Great. We’ll be out by 10:30. I can do this. 

 

Of course he opened with Hungry Heart.  Got a wife and kids in BALTIMORE, Jack and the crowd went wild. As did I.

 

I was absolutely mesmerized. The band, even to my self-professed tone-deaf ears was amazing. The energy was infectious. And perhaps best of all, most of the audience was just as geriatric as I. 

 

I was still amped up the next day and we listened to Bruce the whole way home. We watched Springsteen on Broadway on Netflix the next night, and I devoured his memoir in two days. But the point of this story is not to detail my transformation to Bruce Trampdom (yes, I googled to see what Springsteen fans are called), or a testament to how easily I am star-struck. But rather a reminder for all of us to open up those too-often closed minds and to every now and then embrace the things in life we thought were unembraceable. 

 

Though my father’s words will always ring loudly in my head, “Expect the worst and you’ll never be disappointed,” the worst is rarely as bad as expected. Sometimes it can be life-changing, I say as these words pour out of my once silenced computer speakers:

So you're scared and you're thinking
That maybe WE AIN’T THAT YOUNG ANYMORE
Show a little faith, there's magic in the night
You ain't a beauty, but hey, you're alright

To put my money where my mouth is, I’m off to Portugal on Monday for a What’s Next? retreat with a bunch of women I’ve never met. 

Why? 

Because Baby, We Were Born to Run.