Minutes to Moments

In celebration of the opening of Mamma Mia (the movie) this weekend, perhaps you’ll relate to my experience of the live musical, just a few fleeting years ago:

Midlife caught me by surprise.  I was born the youngest of six at the tail end of the baby boom.  Although I launched a career, married, and had two children, I still felt like a kid inside.  Now in my 40’s, midlife began creeping in when I entered the “oldies” radio demographic.  (Now known as “classic rock,” I suspect the genre title change was made by boomer radio execs who refuse to grow old.)  There was, however, one memorable day when midlife truly began.

The day started with a check-up.  Discussing a few minor ailments, my doctor’s advice was simple:  more exercise, and more bran.  My optician had already predicted I’d need bifocals soon.  Let’s see:  exercise, bran and bifocals, prescribed by doctors too young for classic rock.  Welcome to middle age!

Unfazed by these diagnoses, I attended Mamma Mia that evening.  Based on the music of ABBA, Mamma Mia features Sophia, a young woman searching for her biological father in the days leading up to her wedding.  Sophia sets the stage with the show’s opening number, “I Have a Dream.”  At another (read: younger) time in my life, Sophia’s earnestness might have brought tears to my eyes.  As the story progressed, however, I grew weary of her whining, and wished she’d just get on with it. 

I was drawn instead to her mother, Donna, a single parent.  As her daughter marries and moves on with her life, the focal point of Donna’s attention disappears.  With her glory days behind her, Donna confronts her second half of life.  To what tasks will she direct her energies, and with whom will she spend her days?  Midlife questions, indeed!

Following the curtain call, Donna and the cast reprised “Dancing Queen,” taking me back to a memory of when I was “young and sweet/only seventeen.”  In my junior year of high school, I had a mad crush on a coworker.  One night after work, we went to a disco.  We danced on a lighted floor surrounded by chaser lights and mirrored walls.  My heart soared when we slow danced.  On the play list that night, “Dancing Queen” captured my excitement:  “you can dance/you can jive/having the time of your life….”

Back at the theater, Donna belted out the same words.  Then, rivaling a 17-year-old cheerleader, she did a high kick.  She nailed it; to the audience’s astonishment and my complete delight.  Jolted from reminiscing, it was then that the tears came. My heart was full, not with the pain of my lost youth, but with hope for the future.  Sophia embodied my disco days, but it was Donna’s dancing queen who encouraged me to give life a good kick in the pants.

Savvy marketers are capitalizing on this phenomenal power of music by featuring classic rock in advertising campaigns.  Targeted to us baby boomers, great songs pitch everything from cars to floor care products, computers to fast food.  When I see the ads, I hit the remote.  I want to associate the songs with my memories, and the feelings and ideas that come with hearing them today.  Maybe that’s why I listen to oldies stations:  sometimes, the music takes me back, and sometimes it makes me new again. 

Isn’t that the vantage point of middle age?  There’s a proverb that says “Midlife is the old age of youth and the youth of old age.”   I can reflect back on my life with wisdom, and look forward to the future, knowing life is filled with possibilities.  Only now, I may need bifocals to see them!