It always amazes me how a simple song can bring back long-lost or even repressed memories with such clarity. Music is really the soundtrack of our lives.
Whereas my son is totally into Afro-Carribean music, my daughter seems to enjoy rock classics, indie, grunge and the Motown stuff.
When we are in the car, she often loses the battle for which station to listen to by a ration of 3:1, so occasionally, I’ll throw her a bone. I did so yesterday.
Scrolling through the Sirius-XM stations, I landed on one playing a Tom Petty song she liked – “Into the Great Wide Open”.
Suddenly I was back in Leipzig, Germany. 1992 or 1993, I think. Medical School. Time for the more serious clinical rotations. I wanted the community hospital experience so I picked a hospital outside Leipzig. It was about 19 miles away and I had to be on the floor (ward) by 6 am to prepare for rounds.
I would wake up each morning when the alarm went off at 5 am, wondering whether this was how life was going to be for the rest of my life. In a mad dash, I would get ready and set off in my trusted 1989 VW Golf, still wondering. On the occasions that my then girlfriend spent the night, I rushed out with her still sleeping soundly without a care in the world. I was always so jealous of that.
For some reason, two songs stuck with me on those commutes. They would play often on the radio station I listened to. Both were by Tom Petty from the album “Into the Great Wide Open”. The first song was “Learning to Fly”. The other was, well, “Into the Great Wide Open”. I remember one particular morning in the dead of winter when there was quite a bit of snow so that traffic had slowed to a crawl. I knew I was going to be late. The sky was grey and I wished I was back in bed. In the space of 15 minutes, the DJ played both songs. That day, I was struck by the words.
The refrain of “Learning to Fly” goes:
I’m learning to fly, but I ain’t got wings
Coming down is the hardest thing.
That of “Into the Great Wide Open” went:
Into the great wide open
Under them skies of blue
Out in the great wide open
A rebel without a clue
To be honest, I found the songs quite unhelpful. One told me I had no wings and the other said I was clueless. The songs somehow reminded me of how alone I was – far away from family, “in the great wide open”, trying to grow my own wings so I could fly. Even back then I knew coming down was not the hardest thing. What was the hardest thing then?
As the song played on the radio yesterday and I was taken all the way back, I felt those sharp pangs of nostalgia.
The years have gone by since those days when I drove to Borna from Leipzig but I must say those words have proven to be quite true.
I ventured into “the great wide open” all by myself and so far, I’m surviving. I have fallen often because of the immaturity of my wings. I still do but I am not giving up.
And that “…without a clue” thing, how right was he! After all these years, I still wake up at 5 am, still steal out of the house careful not to wake my wife and kids and still wish I was back in bed.
And then as the song finished playing, it hit me. Coming down is not the hardest thing. It’s having the courage to take off again. Again and again even though the wings are not ready or immature. Knowing that you may come down much sooner than later but doing it anyway…..over and over in spite of crashing repeatedly till one day, you stay up…..maybe even soar to the heights like an eagle.
The years teach you that. Finding it in myself to wake up each morning even when I didn’t want to taught me that. Overcoming fears, anxieties, bad habits, procrastination and just doing it teaches that.
It took my daughter’s taste in music to remind me of that.
One day when she and her brother get ready to step into the world, I may send them off with some Tom Petty. He was a good companion to me once upon a time. Maybe he will be a good one to them too….in the great wide open.