There was nothing at all on television last night. Nothing. Flipping through my overpriced digital cable menu, I come across only one thing that might catch my interest for a bit – Purple Rain. You can never take the 80s out of the girl I suppose. I warn my daughter that the movie kinda blows, the acting is pretty bad, but she should watch it for one of the best soundtracks ever.
Purple Rain came out in 1984, when I was her age. Before that, I wasn’t a Prince fan. I was too young to appreciate the raw sexuality and funk. However, hitting puberty, Purple Rain was deep. My father worked selling cars at that point of our lives, and I remember him bringing home the cassette soundtrack that he had salvaged from a car someone had traded it. He gave it to me, probably not having a clue who Darling Nikki was or that I would serenade each one of my friends blessed with that name for years. The soundtrack still makes me tingly.
So we sit through probably an extra hour of commercials last night to glimpse the energy that was Prince in the 80s perform on stage. The fun part was checking out the Minneapolis scenery, pointing to places I recognized, somewhat, from when we lived there in the late nineties. I talked about how far away from 1st Ave I worked, and pointed out the skyway I used to go to lunch most days. She barely remembered any of it, but it made me crave the city. Of all the places I’ve lived, Minneapolis was my favorite.
And then I got up this morning to the news: the I-35 bridge over the Mississippi in Minneapolis had collapsed. I’ve been crying, lightly, off and on this morning. I can’t watch the news. I can’t read the reports. I’m not silly enough to think what ifs, but only hours after I reminisced about my favorite town, I see pain there. I cry for the victims. I cry for the survivors. But I cry mostly for the city.
