It's a Springsteen Thing

June in Central New York it's already hot and humid and sitting out there in folding chairs on the football field in cap and gown was torture beyond words.  It was 1976 and in another month the country would lose its mind in the Bi-centennial.  Already the school administration had Elton John's Philadelphia Freedom blasting through two overused Peevee speakers as all of our parents filled the bleachers, fanning themselves with the ceremony programs.  It was almost ten o'clock in the morning.

"Hey Doug, so where are you spending the Centennia?." Gerald McNaulty was already stoned which was about par for the course, but there were rumors he might be naked under his graduation robe as he would join about a dozen other students in a planned streaking event. 

"I'll be working at the club." I was not looking forward to serving dinner to a bunch of rich, drunk, demanding and entitled men with large handicaps that had nothing to do with their golf game.

"Bummer, dude." Even through his rose colored glasses, I could see nothing, but his pupils, "Hey did you hear that Springsteen song on the radio?"

"Ugh." I groaned.  Gerald, however, was totally blown away by this Springsteen guy who sounded like he was singing with marbles in his mouth like Bob Dylan, but whose instruments were not properly in tune and what was the idea of using a saxophone to deliver the raw emotion of rock and roll.  The man was off the map when it came to decent music.  Just then the speaker was blasting “25 or 6 to 4” by Chicago. 

"One day dude, that man is going to reach down and wake up your soul." Gerald said as he took his seat.  I had to go a few rows up since that's where the B's for Brooks was.  

The ceremony ended at noon with the sun directly overhead melting us in our gowns, but we all threw our hats into the air anyway in one big cheer.  My parents would take me home where I could shed my gown and sweat soaked pants and shirt, take a quick shower and head over to LaMar's house for a big blow out party by his folk's poolside where the cooler would be filled with Pepsi covering the Budwisers underneath.  We each brought our own Pepsi can holders so we could hide the Budwiser cans from the bottom of the cooler.  For his graduation, LaMar's folks got him a really killer sound system to crank out the Disco tunes while a rented disco ball sent a cascade of light all over the party area. Before I finished my first beer, the aroma of burning weed began to float around the pool area as people began to jump into the water.  It was a warm humid evening, so the water was very inviting as Donna Summer's seductive voice boomed through the brand new speakers.  I entered the water when three of my former classmates put me in the deep end head first.  Coming to the surface, no longer inebriated, I felt as if this was the best moment of my life to this point.  Later I would be kissing Katie Murray in one of the shadowy corners of the yard where I slid into second base when. I managed to get my fingers under the top part of her swimsuit and reached her nipple.  She seemed to like it as she put her tongue in my mouth which made my head swim as if I had taken a toke of LaMar's good stuff. 

This magic evening was followed by three long weeks of inactivity, summer temperatures with unbearable humidity.  I called Katie several times, but her dad always seemed to answer and he did not seem pleased when he heard me asking if she was home.  He finally told me she had gone to summer camp and would not be back for quite awhile. My hopes for a summer love was dashed.

In the day we sweat it out on the streets of a runaway American dream

At night we ride through mansions of glory in suicide machines

"Dude, how's it hanging?" Gerald called me as I sat watching Sesame Street with Ben, my younger brother.

"Bored out of my skull." I had a headache from lying on the couch for the past two hours and was bored to death of Big Bird and Mr. Rogers before that.  

"How about a road trip to Canada?" He asked.  Normally I would laugh out loud, but he did not sound high or drunk which in itself was out of character. 

"Are you serious?" I asked as Ben shushed me.

"I'm bored, dude." Gerald sighed. 

I looked at Ben who was back to raptly watching his show and then to my mother who was cleaning in the other room.  Canada would be about a five hour jaunt.  

"Got some good weed.  We'll pick up some Molsons once we get there." He explained.

"How long?" I asked.

"Jake, my older brother has a place up there in Ontario." He said without answering my question.  

"How long?" I repeated my question.

"We could live up there if we want to." He laughed.

"I don't know." I felt a tug in my gut.

"Ask.  Remember we ain't kids anymore." He added.

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 alright

Oh and that's alright with me.

"Mom, can I go for a ride with Gerard?" I called to her.

"Sure, just be home for dinner." She answered from the other room. In ten minutes Gerald was knocking at my door. 

"Ready, dude." Gerald smiled as I followed him to his restored 1956 Chevy with the dual exhaust and Hollywood headers. 

We drove up Highway 81 for three hours until we came to the border station at Alexandria Bay just across the St. Lawrence River. While we were driving, Gerald put in his favorite eight track Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band and let it play over and over again until I had most of the lyrics memorized.  The rolling countryside of upper New York State was nothing but farms and small crossroad towns.  All of this scenery came with the rough soundtrack of Springsteen and his New Jersey band, but for some reason "Thunder Road" best caught the mood of our journey and by the time we reached Canada, we were both singing along with the Boss as Gerald called him.

The border crossing was very routine as the man in the small shack asked us a bunch of questions as Gerald showed him his driver's license. 

" How long are you boys planning on spending in Canada?" He asked as he looked over Gerald's license.

"Until the end of the weekend. My brother has a place on Sharbot Lake." Gerald smiled as the border agent handed Gerald his license back.

"Ah, beautiful lake it is, yeah.  Good fishing." He said proudly.

"Yeah fishing, that's what We'll be doing." Gerald nodded as the agent waved him through.  We were on our way again. 

Sharbot Lake was another three hour drive as Gerald kept the eight track playing the same songs over and over again as we provided the backing vocals in a countryside that appeared much like what we had traveled through in New York with the same tunes playing.

"Used to come up here all the time when we were boys.  Dad owned the cabin, but it went to my brother when he passed." Gerald explained as he turned the volume down a touch, "It was a heart attack." 

It shamed me that I had known Gerald most of my life, but I never knew what happened to his father until now.  I knew his brother had done a tour in Vietnam and came back kind of messed up.  Gerald told me Jake lived up there most of his life, but he loved weed and Molsons.  Gerald hid the weed in the air filter and planned to buy a case of Molsons with his fake ID.  With his scruffy red beard, Gerald looked like he was about twenty two or so.  Wearing his flannel shirt and jeans, Gerald looked almost like a Canadian.  

"Don't let Jake get to you, dude." He said. As the lake came into a picturesque view. "He's got some head issues the war gave him."

"Sure glad the war ended before it was our time." I said as "10th Avenue Freeze Out" came to the saxophone solo by Clarence Clemmons.

"Me, I would have come up here." Gerald grinned.

"My father would have come up here and dragged my ass home." I bowed my head and remembered the talk we had when I dared to express my opinion on the matter.  

"Doug, you will serve your country like I did when I went to Korea in 1951.  If your country calls, you will answer mister or you will answer to me." He waved his finger in my face, "I will let you listen to your awful music, but you will not run away from your responsibility."  We were watching an interview with a bearded John Lennon after he had been denied entry into the country because of a small stash of pot. I had no doubt he meant business, but when I saw what was waiting for them when they returned home, I began to wonder if any of it was worth it.  The war was over and Richard Nixon was gone, the country seemed to be floating without any clear direction.  We lost the war, but no one seemed to care.  No one that is, but Jake, he seemed to care very much.  From the moment I shook his hand and stared into his vacant eyes, I knew that carried his injuries like a badge of honor and was pissed off when people did not wish to talk about the war anymore.  For him, the war was never going to end, no matter how many times he went to the VA. 

The first night there as the sun was sagging into its own reflection in the lake, we stood on the porch and smoked some of the weed Gerald brought with him.  Gerald put in another eight track tape, Darkness at the Edge of Town.

“Springsteen?  I guess he’s alright.” Jake hissed as “Racing in the Streets” played with its sad piano solo that seemed to reach in and tug at my soul.  I could feel the angst of these lonely racers running the streets where no one seemed to care who won or who lost.  When “Something in the Night” began to play, Jake squatted down and let his tears flow.

He looked at me when the song ended and whispered, “You look like you don’t get it...it’s a Springsteen thing.”  He paused and puffed on a cigarette, “I can hear them talking to me.  That night we were on patrol when the VC lit up the sky like the Fourth of July and four of the guys in our platoon got greased. Geese, Old Nicky had the ace of spades sticking out of his head band.  When I found him there was this bullet hole right through the center of that ace.”  He closed his eyes.

The next morning, Jake was cooking breakfast of flapjacks, sausage and hashbrowns.  I had no idea how hungry I was until I sat down to eat.  As we bowed our heads to give thanks, Jake laughed, “Today we are going to hike up the Old Soldier.”

I was to discover that Old Soldier was the hill he would run up each morning, but with the rise and rugged trail, I was huffing and puffing after just a quarter mile which made him smile.  After nearly two hours of huffing and puffing, I stood on the summit next to him and his younger brother staring down at the crystal blue waters of Sharbot Lake.  

“Saw a hawk up here one morning.” Jake said proudly, “Dove on the water and came up with a squirming fish in its talons.  It was beautiful, man.” 

Later after dinner that evening, Gerald is playing “Jungleland.” The saxophone solo echoes in the trees like a revealie.  With a beer in my hand, I can hear in the notes a sense of loss of something that can never be regained.  For me it was the idea that I was no longer a kid, that like it or not I was becoming a man.  I was standing here on the porch of a cabin miles from my home and no one had any idea where I was at this moment in time. 

No one watches when the ambulance pulls away

Or as the girl shuts out the bedroom light

Outside the street's on fire

In a real death waltz

Between what's flesh and what's fantasy

And the poets down here

Don't write nothing at all

They just stand back and let it all be

And in the quick of the night

They reach for their moment

And try to make an honest stand

But they wind up wounded

Not even dead

Tonight in Jungleland.

“Man, that is the saddest song I’ve ever heard.” Jake’s voice rose out of the advancing darkness in the fading rays of the sunset in the pines. 

“We’re gonna be headin’ out in the morning, bro.” Gerald said as he finished his beer. “Are you gonna be alright.” 

“Bro, I’m right as rain.” He laughed and threw his empty bottle into the water.

“Mom asks about you.” Gerald smiles.

“Tell her, I’m doing just fine.” He jabbed his finger into his brother’s chest. “And it was good that you brought a friend with you.  Seems like a good sort.”

The ride home at dawn was quiet, just the sound of the motor as Gerald chose not to play anymore Springsteen as we left the cabin behind.  We were nearly to the border when Gerald finally broke the silence, “I wish he’d come home.” 

“He likes it there.” I shrugged.

“He is haunted.  Talks to his dead buddies when we aren’t around playing Springsteen.”  He coughed, “That’s why I play it.  It’s not for me, even though I like it.  It’s for him.  That guy really seems to get him right there.” He took his fist and thumped it against his chest.  

I would like to say my homecoming was a pleasant experience, but my father met me on the lawn as soon as I got out of Gerald’s car and told me I was no longer welcome in my own home.  So I got back in Gerald’s car and left.  I spent the night over at his house and then I moved into a motel before finding an apartment in a less desirable part of town, but my life moved on from there like the path that led to the top of Old Soldier so when I look down from where I am, I see that spectacular view and the echo of a sad saxophone solo at the end of “Jungleland.”  Don’t worry, it’s just a Springsteen thing. 

Author's note: While the prompt called for a smell, I am much more of a person who associates songs and sounds to a memory rather than a "smell."