Some Thoughts On Change and Never Saying Goodbye...

by Steven P. Velasquez
Sept. 29, 2013

 

Rutherford High School - Rutherford, NJ

I'm driving up Interstate 85 between Charlotte and Greensboro, NC in my hot rental car. I'm frustrated because the cars on the highway seem immobile. A glance at my speedometer has me at 85 mph though I feel like I'm standing still. Comfortable, but probably not a good change from a safety standpoint.




The radio is filling my ears with literally ALL the sounds of my formative years as I've found an 80's station that has me in complete nostalgia mode. The thought of getting a radio signal from a satellite in space vs. AM waves on terrestrial radio? Never thought we'd see the day back then, but here it is. I say this is a good change as the clarity, selections and lack of geographical restriction are seemingly endless.



 

The personalities on the satellite radio are none other than the original V.J.'s of the earliest days of MTV before it became the abortion it is today (bad change). Mark Goodman, Alan Hunter, Martha Quinn and Nina Blackwood are still alive and well today and their voices (minus J.J. Jackson) unearth an unending stream of beautiful memories that are making my journey more of a movie set. The serious teen crush I had on Martha Quinn and Nina Blackwood I won't detail here. Nina's raspy voice could raise the hairs on my neck at any hour of the day. The fact that she, and her raspy voice have aged so, make her sound more like the now deceased, liberal radio host Lynn Samuels  is disturbing; not a good change (only my fellow die-hard talk radio fanatics will understand that reference).

Photo by Steven P. Velasquez

Just now I had to pull over and broadcast this before the thoughts would subside as the next song and its narcotic effects came on. They just played Bon Jovi's; "Never Say Goodbye" and it reminded me that this was the chosen and scheduled prom song for the class of 87. Due to the reference of "[losing] more than that in my back seat baby," being too much to bear for the administration, that got deep-sixed and our class settled for Billy Joel's, "This Is the Time." Hell, they could have been talking about losing their wallet, change, or a contact lens for God's sake! Compare that to the complete degradation of all things moral today where "Jiggly, jiggly, jiggly, bitches and ho's, bitches and ho's, bitches and ho's..." passes for music, and it leaves me reaching for Tylenol - and longing for the puritan's of our time; not a good change.

To my classmates:
    "You and me and my old friends
    Hoping it would never end
    Say goodbye, never say goodbye" - Bon Jovi



Gotta run, "Danger Zone" is on!!MTV Music Television