From my desk on the tenth floor of the PeopleSoft building, I am remembering this morning’s train ride to work. The second leg to be specific. I slept through most of the first leg. On the train I am thinking that $10 can get you more than just a ‘Best of’ CD. $10 can buy you nostalgia. I am also thinking of an email that was sent around the office yesterday.

Earlier this morning a suspicious man was seen on level 3. He is described as follows:

Scary looking skinny dude with checked shirt and tight blackish jeans smelling of alcohol and ciggies.

If you see this individual, please notify either myself on #XXXX or the Building Manager, Pat Averageperson, on XXXX XXXX.

Regards,
Mr Blah Blah

Last week I went to HMV and bought Campfire Songs – the best of 10,000 Maniacs. $10 on the bargain table next to Mark Holden’s greatest hits.

The Maniacs were a band that I first got into during late high school. I say ‘were’ because, although the band exists today in some form, they died around the same I first discovered them. They’re alive today in name only. Like how Lassie is alive today but is in no way the same lovable pooch that starred in those black and white films all those decades ago. (Incidently, some of the dogs who played Lassie in later films were actually male – and not bitches- and so the name ‘Laddie’ may have been more appropriate. But I’m off the topic now.)

To me, the Maniacs died when their heart and soul (singer/songwriter Natalie Merchant) left the band to pursue a solo career. The rest of the band re-formed and got a new lead singer. But it just wasn’t the same. The song that got to me was their farewell single – a cover of Bruce Springteen’s ‘Because the night’. I first heard it on a trip to America in the mid-90s. (The trip was also where I bought my first – and last- pair of Reebok Pumps at a store called ‘Shoe City’ in Anaheim. But I really should stop getting distracted here.)

The song got to me. Her voice got to me. And soon after I started collecting a reasonable back catalogue of their music. Symbolically, the Maniacs music became the soundtrack of my early adulthood. A happy simple time. Where I knew less but thought much more.

But their music (and thus this CD) also brings me back to memories of the one person I knew who shared my enthusiasm for the Maniacs. And memories of that one memorable summer of 96/97. It seems so long ago.

I saw you again at the polling booth during the last federal election. It had been so long before that. We spoke briefly there and that was nice. You looked well. I was wearing a suit because I had just been to a wedding. I look pretty good in a suit, don’t I?

Back then we probably saw each other every day. Or at least during the important ones. I still remember that note you wrote. That was one of the two coolest things that any girl has ever said to me. Our times together were good times. It’s a pity we’ve become strangers.

Oh, make no mistake though. This is not to say that I hold any residual feelings. We both moved on a long time ago. My heart now resides elsewhere and have made several stops in between. And you are… well… married. This is purely an exercise in nostalgia. And any regrets I may have of how things panned out are more out of curiosity really.

You see, that’s it. I don’t quite know what I’m writing about here but I guess I want to acknowledge the role you played in my life. You probably don’t think I ever appreciated you when you were around but you remain, and always will remain, one of the most important and influential people in my early adult life. I am who I am (for better or for worse), in part, because of you. That’s when the ball started rolling, so to speak. And the Maniacs played the soundtrack.

So now I sit on my desk, hardly the impressionable teenager that you knew. The fear is that I haven’t changed that much at all. The fear is that I’m still making the same mistakes as always. But for now I am happy. Not quite content. But happy.

That you probably won’t get to read any of this is hardly of consequence. But perhaps I should drop you a line sometime. Just to say hi. And for nostalgia’s sake, I hope you have Natalie singing in the background when I do.