Saturday, February 27, 2016

From Beginning to End.

Driving home from work late one night, I was flipping through radio stations to entertain myself with so as not to fall asleep. I landed on one that I have recently started listening to. It's one of those stations that plays music from the eighties. There used to be a number of them years ago when generation X began to hit their thirties. I think people grow tired of hearing the old songs and move on, ending the market for that period. Now as the older X'ers approach their fifties, I guess this station wants to take a run at the generation again. ............................................ The station was playing a song called "Video killed the radio star" a pop song, certainly not the greatest song to come out of the eighties but it has special significance for me. I was about to go to my very first dance, I was really excited, it was my step towards adulthood and as I walked into the dance, that was the song the DJ was playing. It's funny how something like a song, sight or smell can be sealed in a person's memory at certain moments in our life. Now whenever I hear that song, I am that shy awkward kid, walking into a dance, my first step towards my teenage years. It had me wondering about the other side of this life moment, what was the last song playing as I left my very last dance. ...........................................I would know that answer or be able to take a really good guess if I finished my high school years in the country because every dance in my country school ended with "stairway to heaven", I think it was a law written down some place. I loved to dance, I was ok at it, at least much better than most of the other guys who only did the white boy left right shuffle. It was not that fun at the dances in the country, the guys lined up along the walls and watched as only mostly the girls danced. Surprising for many of you to hear but I was not that popular, the girls I feel had a sixth sense that something was not up to standard with me, I feel women's intuition was telling them I was gay even before we understood what that meant. Dances were very structured in our minds, people were to dance in pairs only, girl with girl, girl with guy who likes them or sometimes girl with male friend but that was frowned upon because it could make the girl look unpopular. ............................................ I moved to the city for my last two years of high school and dances were a blast, it was everything I hoped for, everyone danced together guys, girls and there was no boring structure to it, just one big party. I wonder however what was the last song playing, I didn't pay attention to that mile stone in my life, when high school ends, teen years would soon end and I would be an adult. I don't remember the last dance, did I stay to the end, was the last song one I liked, was it something I hated, was it maybe even stairway to heaven, I guess I will never know.

4 comments:

Ur-spo said...

Hold onto the parts of the past that are good; forget the rest; stay in the present; keep dancing in your latest moves.

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Some days I look into the mirror and wonder who is the middle aged man staring back at me. I feel nostalgic for the past a lot lately. Maybe I need to stop listening to eighties music.

Anonymous said...

I loved that song too. Ooh Wa Ooh Wa (doesn't have the same effect here). We must be the same vintage. All those dances were the same no matter where you grew up. I've erased them from my brain. You'll need to get a "new" song...
JP

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Oddly I don't get attached to songs anymore. Yes we're roughly the same vintage JP. It's not my favorite song or anything like that, just it's attached to a memory, like there are some really great songs out there but I hate them, because they are attached to a sad memory. Example maybe what was playing when I found out someone I love died, that type of thing.