Are there even words??

oh.my.god.

you know, going into tonight, i knew that it would be great. but i still didn't REALLY know what i was getting myself into.

you know, people can fail you, machines can fail you, you can fail you - but MUSIC will never fail you.

we spent the whole day basically at the xcel... our day started at around one-thirtyish when we arrived there, waiting for our wristbands for the lottery, chit-chatting excitedly and a little nervously, and after we got our wristbands a group of us headed over to the Liffey for some drinks and beautiful Bruce chat. one thing that just sticks with me is Martin Devaney talking about... and I paraphrase -

"You know, I just feel bad for the people who don't get Bruce..."

It's a poignant statement that I can't get off my brain.

After that, we headed back to the Xcel, or pardon me, the Roy Wilkins so we could form multiple long lines of excited people hoping to get into the pit. The area in the very front was reserved for a lucky bunch of people (approx 480)... and we just happened to make the cut. It was confusing, because the number that was drawn was a high one, so it rolled over into and past our wristband numbers... so I only really knew that we made the cut when my peeps started screaming and jumping up and down and of course I joined in. It was an amazing feeling. Tell me I watch too much tv - but it reminds me of the end of every episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition when the bus drives away and the people see their new house for the very first time.

Fast forward past the headache, chaos and stress that was getting that second wristband and finally making our way into the X as the very first group of people on the floor... but even that was still amazing, keeping track of everyone while freaking out.

Pardon this blog post, it's gonna be long, it's gonna be babbling, and it might not even make SENSE. But I need to purge...

This show BLEW MY GODDAMN MIND... there was lots of screaming, and there was laughing, mild tearing up and flat out sobbing. I've just never been where my heart went tonight. We were so close. It was un-freakin-believable. Amazing. Elevating. My FIRST Bruce experience, and not to be my last whatsoever. My own Bruce obsession has officially begun. I had an appreciation of Bruce, but all that has changed.

My moments (in no particular order):

*Jones losing her shit at Incident on 57th Street, her favorite Bruce song.

Good night, it's all tight Jane/I'll meet you tomorrow night on Lover's Lane/We may find it out on the street tonight baby/Or we may walk until the daylight maybe

I love the part in the song where he goes -

Puerto Rican Jane, oh won't you tell me what's your naaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaame...

Jones and myself losing our shit together when he closed the set with Badlands, not even singing, we were SCREAMING - almost savagely. Convulsing with obsessive joy, I seriously could not keep my shit together... I seized with excitement, and I really did not know what to do with myself, because this really is one of the best songs ever written...so I just kept yelling, kept freaking out, and never wanted that night to end.

But that wouldn't even compare to the two song sensory overload in the middle of the encore with Thunder Road followed by motherfucking Born to Run. I wasn't expecting either song, I was satisfied to have Badlands and No Surrender and Radio Nowhere and the always-uplifting The Rising. You know, I like that song, but live... shit, it's just brilliant. It makes your face hurt from smiling, and I kind of just wanted to go around hugging strangers.

Oh yeah - so Thunder Road and Born to Run. The minute I heard that harmonica and the piano, I started screaming like someone had just told me I won a billion dollars in the lottery... I was absolutely overcome with emotion. Immediately, through my wavering, shitty, loud singing, I started sobbing.

Wait - I think I started crying when it started, but the sobbing started here...

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

So EPIC!

Born to Run, bitchslapped me across the face. It just jumped right out and assaulted me. I wasn't expecting it. I had a goddamn brain aneurysm right there. I was jumping up and down. Jones and I were yell-singing at each other as we were in love with the world. I looked back, at the crowd in it's massive entirety and it literally TOOK MY BREATH AWAY. I screamed harder than I ever have in my whole life. I thought my heart might explode.

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOODDAMN!! and CLARENCE!! OMG. shit. Clarence Clemons you are the man. That's that.

--- so where does a person GO from here? How are shows ever going to be the same? Even when I came home and put Born to Run on, I was crying all over again to Thunder Road. I am here singing to my cat.

I ask - Who the fuck is Bruce Springsteen? How can he be that amazing? How is this even possible? I guess I might not have completely gotten him until today, not a hundred percent. And I'm not even close to a hundred percent, but something fucking clicked...

Listen to this masterpiece... (another hilariously ugly widget)

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN ...

We busted out of class had to get away from those fools/We learned more from a three minute record than we ever learned in school

SOUND FAMILIAR???!!!

The pinnacle of how deeply I love music, is locked inside this song.

I love everything about it, how it can make you happy when you are sad... how it can keep you SAD when you just want to wallow... how it can push you do to great things, yet sometimes preoccupy you, make you procrastinate, inspire you, piss you off... create great friendships, and sometimes rip them apart...

i am going to go sit on a bench on the greenway and sing Bruce songs badly till the cops come and tell me to go home.