MY COVID-19 SOUNDTRACK, TRACK 5: I STILL CAN'T DANCE

A picture of a picture.

I had great hair in high school.

That's my first impression when I look at my senior picture. I mean, damn! Those waves! They looked like they popped right off of John Taylor's head and on to my scalp. It would be interesting to hear today what my classmates thought of me then, if they can recall any impression of me at all. I really didn't embrace everything high school had to offer. I mean, I dabbled. I wrestled (poorly) for two and a half seasons, went to a few parties. I devoured every art class I could take. But I wasn't in any clubs. I rarely went to any dances -- not even prom -- and I didn't date a girl who went to my school, not seriously at least, until after I graduated. 

So when people posted their senior pictures on social media in support of this year's seniors, I only kinda got it. I think those people looked back at their time in high school, saw the things they did and the stages they crossed, and they got sad because today's seniors have had their last year mutated by the coronavirus. But not every kid consumes school the same way. This was true for these guys, it was true for me, and I'm sure it's true for today's students, too.

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I think I was more wallpaper than wallflower as far as Eldorado High School was concerned, an amalgam of each of the stereotypes represented by The Breakfast Club. When it came to doing school, I was mediocre, at best, so I retreated to church. Being a shy, lonely kid at church was easier than being a shy, lonely kid at school. I immersed myself in a world where, at least two times a week, I was told how much God loved me. I understand now how that was problematic; but, at the time it meant something. I can't really understand what teenagers are going through right now because by the time I graduated, I had, regretfully, quarantined myself by choice. I can try to relate, though.

Somewhere in the bible it says that each person has to work out their salvation with fear and trembling. I don't know about salvation any more, but I think that fear and trembling does apply to our attempts at making sense of quarantine. As I try to come to grips with how this situation is going to impact the teens in my life, I'll share this song along with my senior picture, knowing full well that it can't change what they're going through, or how what staying at home looks like for them:

"I WANNA DANCE WITH SOMEBODY (WHO LOVES ME)" - ILLUMINATI HOTTIES

"So when the night falls, my lonely heart calls..." 

The seminal version of "I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)" was released in 1987, becoming Whitney Houston's fourth straight number one single. She won a Grammy for the song the next year, when I was a junior in high school -- the same age my daughter is now. I wasn't a fan, but it was hard not to hear Whitney everywhere. The track's upbeat music didn't seem to mesh with its lyrical content, but I identified with the loneliness the words conveyed, even if I thought bands like Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark did it better. I'm sure I would have heard this song at prom that year, had I gone.

My daughter won't be going to prom this year, and when I think about that, I hear this version of "I Wanna Dance with Somebody" by illuminati hotties. Mirren accurately identifies as a younger, better looking version of me. She is much more adept at every aspect of school than I was, and she's doing her best to get more out of it than I did (coronavirus be damned). But I know that this doesn't mean school is any easier for her. Embracing life may come with a different set of risks than retreating from it, but they are still risks. Mirren is a metaphorical juggler with many balls to keep aloft, and I know she worries about dropping even one. If anything, life in quarantine has made things worse. Now she's juggling in an earthquake.

​I think her time in quarantine is lonely, but not in the way it would have been for the teenaged me. Teenaged Tom definitely wanted someone to dance with. My daughter has that someone, only she can't see, let alone dance with him. When we talk about it, it's the indeterminate nature of the situation that frustrates her the most. Where she lives in the northern reaches of New York state, restrictions are being eased, but uncertainty remains, and it continues to shift timelines and alter plans. I know my kid won't be marching on downtown Plattsburgh, carrying a sign demanding that her boyfriend be liberated, but practicality can't cancel the ache that comes with someone's absence.

It's easy for people to try dismiss such feelings from a teenager, but I think that's hypocritical. Even Teenaged Tom felt the searing power of young love; and, more often knew the sadness of its absence. Those memories make this version of "I Wanna Dance with Somebody" mine, in the same way "We Could Send Letters" by Aztec Camera -- which came out 20 years before she was born -- is my daughter's today. Loneliness is not linear. It's a raw, violent thing; a virus of a different sort that -- like love -- has been infecting the star-crossed for all time.