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August 18, 2001

The most obvious change in me since becoming pregnant isn't detectable to the eye. Well, yes, I am sporting a watermelon-sized stomach. And I do tend to waddle if I have been sitting for any length of time. And my face is definitely glowing as I am constantly, disgustingly, always sweating.

But something else has happened to me...something even more disturbing than fat ankles and stretch marks...it's my hormones.

They've taken on a life of their own.

It started with the crying over Cocoa Krispies. And then Bruce Springsteen got involved.

You see, I've developed an addiction. Every time Andy and I get in the car for a trip longer than five minutes across town, I have to listen to "Thunder Road."

And while I listen, I go through seven stages: (click that link up there and listen with me, won't you?)

1. No. No. It's too much. I can't listen to it! [Keep in mind that I'm the one who put it on.] Not today! Oh! Here! It's starting!

The screen door slams
Mary's dress sways
Like a vision she dances across the porch
As the radio plays

2. Oh, this is really nice. Yes it is. Let's just turn it up. Ssssshhh, Andy, you're getting old. There there. Louder.

Roy Orbison's singing for the lonely
Hey that's me and I want you only
Don't turn me home again
I just can't face myself alone again

3. Ow! Ow! Damn! Goosebumps hurt! Ow! (Rub arms and legs furiously in a vain attempt to get the goosers to subside.)

4. At the point where the song goes,

Don't run back inside
Darling you know just what I'm here for
So you're scared and you're thinking
That maybe we ain't that young anymore.
Show a little faith, there's magic in the night
You ain't a beauty, but hey you're all right
Oh and that's alright with me.

--start tearing. Look out the window so Andy won't know.

5. Fight the sobs through this part, even though it's your favorite lyrically:

You can hide 'neath your covers
And study your pain
Make crosses from your lovers
Throw roses in the rain
Waste your summer praying in vain
For a savior to rise from these streets.
Well now I'm no hero
That's understood
All the redemption I can offer, girl
Is beneath this dirty hood
With a chance to make it good somehow

6. Full-fledged, open sobbing can commence at this point in the song:

Hey what else can we do now?
Except roll down the window
And let the wind blow
Back your hair
Well the night's busting open
These two lanes will take us anywhere
We got one last chance to make it real
To trade in these wings on some wheels
Climb in back
Heaven's waiting on down the tracks

7. Love Bruce Springsteen more than any human on earth as you listen, sob, and rub your goosebump-ridden arms.

Oh-oh come take my hand
Riding out tonight to case the promised land
Oh-oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder Road
Oh Thunder Road.
Lying out there like a killer in the sun
Hey I know it's late; we can make it if we run
Oh Thunder Road, sit tight take hold
Thunder Road

What is it? Why do I turn into a basket case every time I hear this song? I have no idea. But I think it's the piano. And the lyrics. And the saxaphone. And the big, lush, climactic musical ending. I didn't come of age in the 1970's in a working-class New Jersey town. None of the events in this song ever happened to me. But somehow I identify with this song in a way that almost embarrasses me, like Bruce is looking at my naked soul while he sings.

I am telling you right now, it is not a relaxing thing to be seated in a car with me while I go through my seven stages. Especially because the eighth one is to paw at the CD player as soon as the music fades out to play it again.

Colleen had a little gathering at her house a few weeks ago because our friend Anne was in town. Andy told them about my reaction to the song, and they demanded he go get the CD out of the car so they could watch me move through my stages, like it was some sort of party trick. So Colleen put the CD on, but when "Thunder Road" started, everyone forgot about me and I was left alone on the couch, silently crying and hoping that Mary would make the right decision and go with Bruce.

I was at Woodfield, king of all malls, with my friend Aimee who was visiting from Florida. We were wandering along, yappin' and waddlin', when we came upon a store with this display in the window:

Hog Butcher for the World, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and the Nation's Freight Handler; Stormy, husky, brawling, City of the Big Shoulders: They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I have seen your painted women under the gas lamps luring the farm boys. And they tell me you are crooked and I answer: Yes, it is true I have seen the gunman kill and go free to kill again. And they tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the faces of women and children I have seen the marks of wanton hunger. And having answered so I turn once more to those who sneer at this my city, and I give them back the sneer and say to them: Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning. Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft cities; Fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning as a savage pitted against the wilderness, Bareheaded, Shoveling, Wrecking, Planning, Building, breaking, rebuilding, Under the smoke, dust all over his mouth, laughing with white teeth, Under the terrible burden of destiny laughing as a young man laughs, Laughing even as an ignorant fighter laughs who has never lost a battle, Bragging and laughing that under his wrist is the pulse. and under his ribs the heart of the people, Laughing! Laughing the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of Youth, half-naked, sweating, proud to be Hog Butcher, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and Freight Handler to the Nation.

No hype. No explanation. No hub-bub. Just Carl Sandburg's poem "Chicago" all laid out nice and plain for us to read. Which we did. And then I sobbed.

"I love this poem!" I told Aimee. "I mean...read that last stanza! Aren't you just so PROUD to be from CHICAGO??"

"Mmmm hmmmm," she agreed, trying to find me a Kleenex. "I haven't read this since we had to read it for Mrs. Hay in American Lit."

"Oh, it's just the PERSONIFICATION!" I told her, supressing the urge to shake her by the shoulders. "Doesn't it just KICK ASS?? Look at it! You look!"

"It does, it does..." she murmured, dutifully reading it again.

"I used to teach this poem," I said mournfully. "When I was a teacher."

"Do you want a picture of it?" she asked kindly.

"Oh. Yes, please." I bowed my head while she took the shot, then we moved on to look at shoes. Shoes don't make me cry.

Much.