At the end of a long day at work today, I faced the prospect of a long commute to get home. It always seems like getting to work takes 15 minutes in the morning, and getting home takes an hour in the evening. Some of that is psychological–does anybody look forward to work more than home?–and some is because I don’t take the tollway on the way home. When the tolls are doubled, as they were here some time ago, it makes taking the tollway each way seem like an extravagance.
To pass the time on the way home today, I had a CD filled with hits from the 80s. Songs that, whether I loved or hated them back in the 80s themselves, are now a treasured part of my past. It’s very bizarre to think of Billy Squier as being a treasure, but two minutes of FM hit radio in 2012 is enough to make me start singing “Everybody Wants You.”
At one point, about five or six songs into the CD, a song started to skip, and I wasn’t able to listen to it. What surprised me today, and probably would have disgusted the teenager I once was, was that I was disappointed when I couldn’t hear Spandau Ballet’s “True.”
Back in the 1980s, I listened to Def Leppard, Judas Priest, the Scorpions, Quiet Riot, Night Ranger, and pretty much any other “hair metal” band that was on the radio or on MTV. I listened to some other things too, like Prince, Bruce Springsteen, and Run-DMC. So I wasn’t locked into just one type of music, but I did have my preferences. And Spandau Ballet wasn’t among them.
But things changed over time. I was once a simmering cauldron of confusion, anxiety, frustration, insecurities, bravado, and stupidity, with a thick outer layer of smart-ass holding it all together. I was waiting for my life to start back then, oblivious to the fact that I was already living it, and once those teen-aged days were gone, they weren’t coming back again. I actually wanted that to happen back then, but now I wish I had found some way to enjoy the moment a bit more than I actually did.
So the me that once hated Spandau Ballet, because they didn’t have long hair and guitar solos, is gone. In his place is someone who’s lived enough to know more about how the world is, and how people are, and how things turn out the way they’re supposed to, whether you see them coming or you don’t. Someone who can appreciate a catchy melody and a nice sentiment in the lyrics. And someone who is a lot more comfortable in his own skin than that kid from three decades ago.
The next song played without a hitch (“She’s a Beauty” by the Tubes), and before too long I was back at home, living a life that the teen-aged me might find interesting, or boring, or perhaps someplace in between. But at least there’s now room in it for a song by Spandau Ballet.
Blue Batting Helmet 
Billy Squier was the first cassette I ever purchased for myself. Just saying.
My wife and I listen to 80’s in the car (it’s the only genre we agree on) and it’s funny how even after 30 years, you still remember all the words. I can’t name any other generation of music that does that. I don’t know if that’s because those were my “impressionable” years or just because of the music. It certainly takes me back anytime I hear certain songs.
I never had Billy Squier on cassette. I think I had a couple of his on vinyl, though. But I know what you mean. A lot of the stuff on the radio back then wouldn’t get made today. But hearing “Come on Eileen” or “Who Can it Be Now” and even “Do They Know it’s Christmas?” at the end of the year never fails to take me back. If you haven’t seen “Rock of Ages” yet, you might enjoy it. I did.
I plan on renting it, I hate paying theater prices anymore. I figured if anything, I’d enjoy the music.
I never thought I’d see my teenager singing “We’re not gonna take it.” The power of the movies, I suppose.