I don't have a favorite song, but there is a song that resonates above all the rest. It's not by Cole Porter, George Gershwin, Lorenz Hart...or John Lennon, for that matter. It's a little ditty by John Cougar (later John Cougar Mellancamp) called "Jack and Diane".
It goes back to a humid July night in 1982. I found myself in some old jalopy with Mark, a “new guy”, about the 10th guy who’d asked me out that summer. My braces had come off a year before, I had transferred to a public school and I couldn’t believe my good fortune at being asked out so much. I didn’t know this was possible. I was incredibly naïve at 16, and this was a year of discovery – boys, beer, partying, and on this particular night, a drive to Radnor Lake.
Mark was really nice-looking, and a year older, and he went to my new school. He took me to a baseball game, and then he drove us to the hill on Radnor Lake to “meet up” with a few of his friends. He parked the car on the side of the road looking out over the lake, and turned off the engine. I guess he wanted to make out, but that went right over my head. I liked him, so I started chatting nervously, non-stop, about absolutely nothing. I chatted so much he completely gave up on trying to make a move.
After 10 minutes, these “friends” never showed up, and he started the car. He was irritated – with himself, with me, with the situation. And on the radio, John Cougar was singing about “Jack and Diane”.
“Oh I love this song!” I said, turning up the volume.
“Well, if you’re gonna turn it up, turn it UP!” he said, turning the knob so high, the speakers blared with distortion.
He started the car and quickly picked up speed on this narrow road, rounding curves, barely missing protruding mailboxes. He were now headed downhill, veering left, then right, along the outer edge of the road. He was speeding now. A car coming from the opposite direction almost clipped us as we zoomed past. I was alarmed, but I thought it would be very uncool for me to ask him to slow down. After all, what did I know?
“Hold onto 16, as long as you can….changes comin round real soon make us women and men...”
The gravel underneath the tires grew in volume, along with the drum solo.
Soon both sounds merged into one, and I felt the entire left side of the car rise in slow motion. Was this a dream? What was happening? The car was rising, yes, the car was definitely rising, as the sound of the gravel to my right grew in volume. Wow, we were actually rolling. The car was rolling off the road, downhill.
As the car smashed through a brick mailbox, several young trees, and a few more mailboxes, I watched myself in slow motion fly around the inside of the car, and the only thought in my mind was,
“Wow, this is really uncool to be happening on a date…”
The car rested on its side. I was lying on the grass, where the window had been. John Cougar was no longer singing about being 16, or chili dogs, or the bible belt saving his soul. That was replaced by the sound of my date crying out my name to see if I was alive. And then the sounds of sirens.
Both of us miraculously walked away from the remains of the jalopy, but the promise of Jack and Diane died that night. A debutante and a football star might be able to go on after the thrill of living is gone…but that wasn’t so appealing anymore.
I cheated death that night. That was painfully obvious when I watched the flattened car get towed off the road, while neighbors shook their heads in amazement, saying it was a miracle we’d survived.
And Mark. This “new guy”. This stupid, impulsive guy, whose reaction to his precious car being towed away was to walk up to a tree, punch it, and break his entire hand.
I’d say I grew up that night, very quickly, with a little help from John Cougar.
