Time After Time

I got sucked into the VH1 "Top Songs of the '80's" series this week. I didn't catch it all but now wish I had because golly, that was a great decade for music. It was a happy time, when MTV was brand-new and actually played music videos. The music was so boppy and great, everyone was young and beautiful...big fun.

These sorts of shows can be a little depressing, too, because not everyone ages well and then you start wondering if that's what people think of you when they see you after 20 years. (Happily, Simon LeBon and Jon Bon Jovi are among those who still look fabulous. Cyndi Lauper, too, Lord love her. Nina Blackwell, one of the first MTV VJs, however? Mercy. Rather reminded me of Sally Struthers' Babette character on "Gilmore girls"...without the charm).

So back to the Top 100. I was getting rather excited by the time they got to the Top 10. There weren't any disagreements on my part. "When Doves Cry" by Prince was #5, a Duran Duran song was 4 or 3...this was trending well. Then there was some hair band which made me go "meh" but just because I wasn't into that sort of music didn't mean it shouldn't be represented. It was a part of the 80's for many people. Fine. But fraking Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer" was number 1. I barely know that song. And despite the general fineness of Mr. Bon Jovi that just seemed so, so wrong. There's nothing wrong with the song or Bon Jovi, it just that when I think of 80s music it's not Bon Jovi or Whitesnake or any of the rest of those sorts of bands that come to mind.

The 80s for me is Cyndi Lauper, The Pretenders, Roxy Music, Prince and Michael Jackson, when he was still black. It's the Bangles, the GoGo's, Talking Heads, Gang of Four, U2 (lots of U2), REM and all those wild little synth groups and Europeans who hit with one really truly great song that you still remember and sing to this day, even if you can't recall another thing they ever did - Thomas Dolby, Aha, Nena and her adorable 99 luftballons. I'm remembering the Fixx and Modern English and Flock of Seagulls. Of course, Flock of Seagulls.

Here's what I was doing in the 80s. I graduated from college in 1979. For a couple years I worked on campus and then got a hankering to do the starving artist thing. I worked as a seating hostess in a Greek restaurant for a while and then became a nanny. I didn't make a lot of money but back then I didn't need a lot, either. Days were spent in flexible, low stress jobs so nights could be devoted to hanging out in clubs listening to great music and writing lots and lots of really bad poetry. Good times.

My first nanny gig was with 3 little kids. The patriarch was heavily into music of all kinds. He brought home albums (they were still albums) on a daily basis. He had so much music, categorized and organized in a room all it's own, that he couldn't even listen to it all. The compilation tapes I made in those days - man oh man. And they had cable. I was there when MTV was born and because it was a gentler, more innocent time, I had it on a lot. There was nothing on it in those early days that would damage the young things I had in my care. It was all Cyndi Lauper wanting to have fun and Michael Jackson moonwalking (I didn't let them watch the "Thriller" video, though. Too scary). And our favorite song? The one that would get me and all three little ones into the middle of the room and dancing? "Come on, Eileen". Absolutely. Good times.

The soundtrack to that part of my life is full of Springsteen, Lauper, Psychedelic Furs, the Clash, the Violent Femmes and U2. I frequently blew out the fuses on my very large stereo speakers.

I will now inflict on you 2 random stories from that era:

1) One night I invited my friend Marcia to dinner. I had really wanted to go to a movie or something but we were both broke. Late in the evening we started to smell smoke and discovered that the headbanger who lived in the other half of my shabby little duplex had left home with a fire burning in the grate (crappy apartments but we had fireplaces). We were still standing around with a very angry landlord and the fire fighters when said headbanger returned home. Marcia and I sat up until dawn with the poor, rattled fellow, drinking beer, watching MTV and making jokes about the big hole burned in his floor, mostly because it wasn't all that funny. All of a sudden I realized what might have happened if I'd gone out instead of being at home and it made me feel sick so I went home and, inspired by a night of watching Pat Benatar and Chrissie Hynde, I cut off all my hair into a very choppy, cool, punky do.

2) Another time I had a really intense dream about my college boyfriend, who I'd finally dumped for good. In the dream he was begging me to take him back and out of nowhere "Every Breath You Take" came on. It all felt very tragic and sad but the song played in its entirety while he was pleading with me not to give up on us (even though in real life I was so seriously over it). The second the song was over I woke up and, feeling just a wee smidge sad that life had to be so complicated, I rolled over to turn on the radio. "Every Breath You Take" came on for real and it made me cry. Swear.

Girls just want to have fun but this one also needed a purpose. As the decade wound down all my friends had careers and "security". Most of them even had marriages and babies. I realized I was never going to be a poet (having not yet figured out what sort of writing I did want to do) and even if I was a good poet it was never going to get me above the poverty line.

I got a job working for a real estate development company. I started shopping at Nordstrom instead of thrift shops and grew out my hair. Meanwhile, a lot of my favorite bands of the 80s were breaking up and the ones that weren't were playing stadiums instead of clubs. Things were changing, including my realization that a lot of my fun and frivolity was, at least partially, an attempt to avoid facing some big holes in my life. I wasn't very happy or peaceful. I wanted to be loved but didn't much love myself as evidenced, at least in part, by the succession of boys who couldn't or wouldn't love me back. My life had become a lot more about form than substance. This was coming rather late in the game but late is better than not at all.

As the decade folded over into a new one I was still listening to REM, U2 and Prince (the classics endure) but also figuring out how to be happy in my own skin. I made peace with God and myself. And then, when I wasn't even paying attention, everything I ever dreamed of started to come to me. (This includes but is not limited to The Spouse, The Child and my calling).

And that, I suppose, is why they call shows like "The Top 100 Songs of the 80s" a retrospective.