Total recall...

So there I was, driving home from hula class tonight, windows down (mind you, this doesn't happen most nights, but it's surprisingly balmy for July in San Francisco...meaning it's in the 60s and there's no fog), radio on... when I was instantly transported back to my teenage years in SoCal.



First, it was because of a little Van Halen. And I had to turn up the volume. Totally reminded me of all those warm summer nights when my friends and I would just get in my car and drive aimlessly for hours because we were bored out of our gourds in suburbia but didn't have any money to really do anything. (Clearly, gas prices were much lower then.)


Up next on the radio tonight? This song by Heart (the part you'll recognize starts about 1:12 into the clip). Oh, man, how I adored them. I wanted to be Ann Wilson all through my adolescence. They kinda lost me in the big hair years, but in the 70's and early 80's? I loved no one more, and I still love this song. How is it that I still know all the words, nearly 30 (gulp) years later?

I couldn't believe it when the next song up was by Cheap Trick. Suddenly, I was 15 again, seeing them in concert with my friends, escorted by one of their older brothers and some of his friends. It was so cute how over-protective they were of us that night. I think I developed crushes on each of them. Except my friend's brother; he was kind of a dick. (And look how adorable Robin Zander is in that video. Sigh...)

Next? This ditty by The Cars, and I was back in my neighbor's Jeep, getting rides to and from school, along with three or four other kids who lived on my street, including the boy with whom I had the most chaste romance ever (largely because, as I later learned, he was fucking some other girl from our neighborhood. And since I was a Good Girl, I was long way from fucking anyone. Ahh, youth). I didn't even like The Cars; I still don't, but I do stop and listen from time to time because they remind me of Randy's blue Jeep and the laughs we had while he drove us around like a maniac in his completely unsafe vehicle.

Good times.

Man, I'm old.