One of my all-time favorite singers is Billy Joel! He hit my radar in the late 70's . . . when I started buying my own records. The first album of his I owned was The Stranger. The reason: a boy dedicated the song "She's Always a Woman" to me. I was all about romance; I suppose I still am to some extent . . . always will be a romantic at heart.
No, I don't remember which boy it was . . . I was 14.
I eventually bought all of his records as soon as they hit the stands . . . back then you could buy an album for less than $10! The covers were usually works of art too! That disappeared for a while, but vinyl records are making somewhat of a comeback.
Nearly every song Billy Joel wrote brings back a very specific memory for me . . . some of the details are pretty fuzzy, but I can almost tell you where I was or who I was with when I hear one of his songs! If they didn't apply to a "who" or "where," they applied to a defined moment or turning point in my life.
I Am an Innocent Man was probably my favorite album. A Christmas present to myself, it came out in 1983 . . . the year before I made a LOT of really important decisions . . . life defining decisions. I would turn 21 in February of '84 . . . it would be the year I quit college and moved to Florida . . .
Storm Front hit the shelves in 1989 . . . October . . . and the song "We Didn't Start the Fire" was on it. It won a Grammy for Song of the Year. A fast-paced song chronicling historical events from WWII through 1989. It's sung in a way that simply lists these occurrences in order.
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| The cover depicts the maritime "storm warning" flag indicating wind forces 10-12, the highest intensity on the Beaufort Scale |
Billy Joel was born a bit before I was, so his memories go back just a little further, but the events showcased in this song are things that happened during my lifetime . . . significant events! Even the things he mentions that came before me had impact on my existence in some way.
Starting in 1960 (the reason I start here is that my dad was involved in The Bay of Pigs incident, and President Kennedy was shot the year I was born):
"Hemingway, Eichmann, Stranger in a Strange Land
Dylan, Berlin, Bay of Pigs invasion
Lawrence of Arabia, British Beatlemania
Ole Miss, John Glenn, Liston beats Patterson
Pope Paul, Malcolm X, British Politician Sex
JFK blown away, what else do I have to say?
Birth Control, Ho Chi Minh, Richard Nixon back again
Moonshot, Woodstock, Watergate, Punk Rock,
Begin, Reagan, Palestine, Terror on the airline
Ayatollah's in Iran, Russians in Afghanistan,
Wheel of Fortune, Sally Ride, heavy metal, suicide,
Foreign Debts, Homeless Vets, AIDS, Crack, Bernie Goetz
Hypodermics on the shores, China's under martial law
Rock and Roller Cola Wars, I can't take it anymore"
But the verse . . . the verse was all telling:
"We didn't start the fire,
It was always burning
Since the world's been turning
We didn't start the fire,
No, we didn't light it,
But we tried to fight it."
In your lifetime there will be significant events that take place . . . will change the course of history . . . change your views of the world . . . bring disillusionment or elation . . . in some cases you'll be able to make a difference . . . in others, you'll have no control over . . . or even a say-so in it.
Life happens. Every generation claims the one before it had it much easier. Sure, it's always different, but then life always throws curves!
You either get caught up in it, or you learn to take it in stride. One thing I can tell you is that if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything! Be strong and courageous boy!
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