My Pandemic Playlist #2
“For a Dancer” by Jackson Browne
I created my own Pandemic Playlist in the first month of the 2020 lockdown, a list of songs to pull me through, lift me up, sit me down, stay with me for a while. I’ve decided to share them with you. This is song #2.
I love Jackson Browne. I first saw him in concert on the campus of Michigan State University in the late ‘70s. His album, “The Pretender”, is one of my all-time favorites. A few years ago I got to meet him for the first time at a benefit that Carl and Tia had put together. Before I knew it I was standing on the stage next to him singing a Bob Dylan song! A sweet moment I’ll never forget.
Few musicians have taken to singing about sorrow and loss the way Jackson Browne has. Listen to “Fountain of Sorrow” and you’ll see what I mean. Or “Late for the Sky”, the album from which today’s song comes from. Many of us have lost good people in these past two years, friends and family we weren’t ready to say goodbye to. Others have made it through, but suffer with the long term consequences.
“For a Dancer” is a song of hope and sadness. He asks us to “keep a fire for the human race,” but reminds us that “in the end, there is one dance you’ll do alone.” (Click here for the full lyrics). As true as that may be, I share it with you here as my way of extending my hand and, even though we don’t know each other personally, to let you know you’re not alone and that we live on in each other. John Prine lives. Terrence McNally lives. The woman two floors below me lives. We take what they gave us, wrap it all together in our soul, our heart, and use it to make a better world, no matter how small our piece of that world turns out to be. “Go on ahead and throw some seeds of your own… Go on and make a joyful sound.”
We aren’t done yet.
Thank you for your kind words. They are much appreciated in these days of amazing anger. Just one question. We have just lost 600,000 people. Why can't we take in the people from Haiti who so need our help. I just finished taking care of my 96 year old, former WWII prisoner of war dad and the woman from Haiti who was sent by Hospice was an absolute wonder. She was a nurse in Haiti but here she could only help with showers. My dad hated to shower ( I am sure it made him feel vulnerable) and she was able to cajole him into it every time after a long battle. After 3 years she didn't come for a while and I found out that her seven year old son had lost his battle with cancer. She had been trying to hold her home life together the whole time and had never mentioned her struggle. The whole time she was helping us, she was fighting a terrible battle of her own. We need more people like her. Considering our own major losses, why can't we extend a hand to people who have never been so beaten up?
Michael, This song is so fitting. I, too, love Jackson Browne, seeing him in concert for the first time when I was 16 back in 1972 at the Troubadour in LA (Bonnie Raitt was the opening act!) and many other times since then. His songs defined my life in the 70s and 80s and helped me through many a rough time. ‘The Pretender’ is also one of my favorites. I remember reading in a Rolling Stone interview that he said most people interpreted the line “…and we’ll fill in the missing colors in each other’s paint-by-number dreams” as being romantic but actually he meant it as a way of saying how so many people just live their lives by a pre-defined set of standards and never move forward or upward.
Thank you for never living a life of “paint-by-number” and for always getting others to think that there is always more to strive for.