As I was driving yesterday, I was enjoying the Eighties station on my two week trial of SiriusXM radio. Sometimes I listen to the Seventies station as well. The Eighties station has been my personal favorite of late though. I grew into young adulthood during this time. It was simpler then. No huge responsibilities, freedom, and fun. Last years of high school, college, girls, heartbreak, fun times and not so fun times. But it seems that most every song brings a memory flooding back. Funny how sometimes you can't remember things, but yet when a certain song comes on, it's like television episode of your life comes on.
I remembered riding with my father in the car, whether we were going to the barber or somewhere else, he would always have WECK radio on. "The music if your life" was their slogan. Of course, it was a lot if Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra, Hank Williams, Bing Crosby and many others. He would love listening to the music and usually had a story to tell about some event that it took him back to, or traveling into Chicago to see them or playing them on some Juke in a bar. Sometimes I would get bored of the "old time" music, wishing to hear some Elton John, or Wings, or anything else a little "newer." But many times I would enjoy the stories, seeing a different side of my father. A younger man. A guy who liked to do the same type of things I would do at times in my own adolescence.
So as I drove, listening to Pat Benatar, or Duran Duran, Wham!, Journey, or any of the bands of that era, it occurred to me that I had now become my father in that sense. This was my WECK radio. The Police had replace Glenn Miller, Doris Day was now the Go Go's, U2 and not Sinatra. That's probably what my kids think when I listen to my "old stuff." They want Lady GaGa (who I DO like) not the Bangles. But that's okay. Someday maybe they'll understand and realize the same way I did.
Now I have to get back to The Eurythmics and a certain girl I knew in college.
