True
(Kemp, G) Performed by Spandau Ballet
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
So true funny how it seems
Always in time, but never in line for dreams.
Head over heels when toe to toe.
This is the sound of my soul,
This is the sound.
I bought a ticket to the world,
But now I've come back again.
Why do I find it hard to write the next line?
Oh I want the truth to be said.
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
I know this much is true.
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
I know this much is true.
With a thrill in my head and a pill on my tongue
Dissolve the nerves that have just begun.
Listening to Marvin (all night long.)
This is the sound of my soul,
This is the sound.
Always slipping from my hands,
Sand's a time of its own.
Take your seaside arms and write the next line.
Oh I want the truth to be known.
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
I know this much is true.
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
I know this much is true.
I bought a ticket to the world,
But now I've come back again.
Why do I find it hard to write the next line?
Oh I want the truth to be said.
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
I know this much is true.
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
I know this much is true.
This much is true.
I know, I know, I know this much is true
It's funny that now that I'm up to high school in my life story, I feel less engaged; I had much more to say about my childhood friends and dramas than those that came later. Last night Mallory asked me if I'd watch Inside Out with her because it's new on Netflix this week, and since we both have a cold, I thought that cuddling on the couch with my little girl (now nearly 18) would, indeed, be the best way to spend the evening. I had been vaguely familiar with what the movie was about -- emotions and allowing yourself to feel the negative ones -- but I didn't realise how deep it actually would be. As the main character Riley was moved across country and saddened by her inability to fit into her new school and city, I was sniffling behind Mallory's back (under cover of my stuffed sinuses) and feeling sorry for myself all over again. I can summon that pain of teenaged loneliness anytime, but what I'm finding harder to summon are the good times; and there were plenty of those. Perhaps that has to do with "core memories" as they are described in the movie; perhaps by the time I was fifteen only the unhappy times were strong enough to be sent to longterm memory. What I wanted to write about this week was my new best friend Kasia, and she was tied to the good and the bad.
As I wrote last week, Kasia was the first to throw me a social lifeline, and I grabbed on with both hands. In no time at all, we were inseparable. Kasia had moved to Lethbridge from Poland when she was in grade three. That was more than long enough for her to become a fluent English speaker, but she was left with the very slightest of accents and it made her sound posh and exotic. Her Dad had been a farm manager in Poland, but under Communism, life had been so hard that he had been willing to uproot his family and work as a janitor in Canada in order to provide a better future for them; if not an overly comfortable present. He spoke rudimentary English, which doomed him to menial labour, but even though their house was small and they didn't have buckets of cash to throw around, Kasia's Dad was a jovial and generous man who loved to have a house full of people to entertain. Kasia's mother spoke no English but she was also always smiling and a wonderful cook who delighted in feeding me homemade perogies and cabbage rolls. Kasia had two sisters, but they were quite a bit older and had moved out of the house by the time I came on the scene. Kasia is the one I would have been referring to anytime I've noted that Slavic people can sound abrupt and rude if you don't know them better; it took me a while to realise that this was just the way that Kasia spoke to everyone -- coupled with the hint of an accent, she had an aristocratic air when she spoke, but Kasia was also a fiercely loyal friend and we were as close as sisters.
Kasia and I got jobs together; first as banquet waitresses at the El Rancho Motor Inn and then at Bonanza when it opened. We both did well in school, we took the same classes, and in time, we dated boys who were friends. We thought alike, we dressed alike, and when we finally stopped being friends, it was a total and catastrophic cutting off: this was an intense and burning friendship that eventually consumed itself; but that part comes later.
From the first day that Kasia invited me to have lunch with her and her friends, I was grateful to her, but also realised that I was rescuing her in a way, too: any girl who has room in her life for a new best friend at fifteen is probably lonely herself. And now to explain this week's song choice: Not long after we became friends, Kasia came to my house and we turned on the radio in my room and decided that we wanted to hear True, our new favourite song. We called up the radio station, but when we told the DJ our request, he gave us an incredulous and unkind laugh and said that he had just played it 3 or 4 songs ago. I was embarrassed and wanted to slink away, but Kasia was incensed: with that slightly imperious accent and clipped tone, she let the DJ know that we don't listen to the radio 24 hours a day and how could we know and who was he and yadda yadda. When she hung up the phone we collapsed in giggles; Kasia was my hero; she took BS from no one. In that picture up there, I was tagging along with Kasia's whole family as they had a winter barbecue at the park. It's not incidental that I'm standing behind her; for the next two years, Kasia served as my shield against the world, and while that might sound like I was using her, she was using me for other reasons, and eventually, the friendship just got used up. We didn't wind up as enemies; we became nothing at all to each other. And that's probably why I'm finding it hard to write the next lines...
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
I know this much is true.
Huh huh huh hu-uh huh
I know this much is true.
