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Saturday, February 19, 2011

I'm Gonna Be (500 miles) ~ The Proclaimers (and a little of Benny & Joon from


To say I don't have a history with this song and that movie would be a blatant lie. It completely reminds me of one person. I've figured if I'm going to be blogging about myself and music and whatnot eventually it would come up. Some music reminds me of specific people and times. This reminds me of Zach. We dated for about 9 months-ish in high school (he was my prom date even), and then I saw him a handful of times after high school. Zach is/was a great guy. He's very smart, very political, very sporty and rather funny. He's tall and lean and goofy. He went to a private high school and he speaks oodles of languages and goes all over the world. He's a great listener and a nice guy. He is one of a long list of guy friends of mine I'm hoping will meet nice girls soon. He also plays guitar and used to teach saxophone. In fact he used his sax teaching money for prom. He wore, I shit you not, a Colonel Sanders tie to prom.
Back to the song...and movie - while we initially dated this movie was released and was a favorite of mine (still is, just can't watch it, it's a little like Walter & Army of Darkness, we can both recite all the lines from the movie). When this was released I was a junior, about to be senior and I had spent a couple of weeks in Phoenix over the summer at a journalism workshop at ASU. I had met Zach and Hedra there, they both went to school in the area. Zach and I hit it off and had gotten along well bonding over Beavis and Butthead, MTV, sarcasm, my lost room keys, vomitous dorm walls, coffee at the Coffee Plantation on Mill Ave and music. Oh, yeah we spent a lot of time trying to figure out the magic eye posters.
Z and I did so well we tried it out when school came and we were 2 hours apart all the time. It was an unmitigated disaster. We dated 9 months had a hellish prom and called it quits. We ended up meeting again years later, through chance. I was living in Phoenix and it was the year off I took in the middle of my college education. He knew a friend who knew a friend who was seeing my roommate. My name is rare enough, this sorta stuff really does happen. Anyhow, we met up, it was awkward. Then, by happenstance we met up again I think it was about a year later, I was in Tucson, and we went out with my best friend and her hubby and kids. A great dinner from what I remember. He ended up driving me home and we talked for 3 hours, a lot like we'd used to.
We had a ritual when we were dating, We'd watch movies for hours. We probably saw Benny & Joon a dozen times. I saw Zach last many years back, and he looked much the same. A little more serious, a little more sad. He'd called drunkenly from a phone in a London pub a few months earlier. He'd heard the Proclaimers' song and had thought of me, us. So - he'd called. The phone call had come at a time when I wasn't dating, and had been quite lonely. It sorta blew my mind that he even thought of me, much less drunk dialed me. So, also another reason the song reminds me of him. I was drunk dialed from London over a Proclaimers' song. While I'm here, explaining the history of this song I'm gonna throw out a handful of other songs that remind me of Zach and our times together ~ Hey Jealousy - The Gin Blossoms. The Doors Best of Album (we spent a night hanging out in the Brown Barge, his huge brown van, in The Superstition Mtns listening to the whole thing)
August & Everything After - Counting Crows Zach introduced me to the band.
Wish you were here - Pink Floyd, he put quotes from this on letters to me. Floyd was his vibe in high school. I had yet to appreciate Pink Floyd, it took college for me to appreciate the band.
Sweet Jane - Velvet Underground. Zach introduced me to the Velvet Underground by buying me their best of for Christmas. He bought me that, and a huge Depeche Mode 101 poster.
Crazy for you - Madonna (danced to it at prom, the only dance we did)
Hold me now - Thompson Twins, the week we met I bought Thompson Twins Best Of on cassette at the Tower Records on Mill Ave. I was playing this album when he and I first started hanging out.

So, there you go. My memories of Zach and the I'm Gonna Be song...

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