I’ve been in a pretty foul mood the past couple of days, owing to several long nights at work, too much caffeine, too little sleep, and a whole lot of minor stuff that usually wouldn’t bother me too much, but, coming as it has during this most crappy of weeks, has been really irritating me. I won’t bore you with any further details; suffice it to say that I feel like I’ve been dragged through a knothole sideways (one of my mother’s quaint expressions) and I really need a break from the grim-faced, clench-toothed treadmill slog that my life has unaccountably turned into. (Some time to turn out a couple of decent-sized blog entries would be nice, too!)

Coincidentally (or maybe not), I’ve been listening to a lot of the music I loved back in high school but have somehow forgotten about in the years since. One of the old recordings that I’ve blown the dust from is Bob Seger’s The Distance, which, as I recall, was one of my favorite albums back around my senior year (class of ’87, for the record). I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how much I still like this one. It’s a solid set of straight-ahead rockers and wistful ballads by an artist who was in his prime at the time of its recording. (Sadly, Seger’s best years were over by his next album, the over-produced, over-slick, and badly dated Like A Rock; there are maybe four songs on that one that are still listenable these days, including the title track, which is actually a good song if you can get past Chevy using it as a jingle for the last decade or so.)

My favorite tune on The Distance has always been an ode to the open highway called, “Roll Me Away.” When I was a restless 17-year-old with vagabond dreams and nameless ambitions, I thought it was just a cool song about adventure and discovering America. Now that I’m a restless 37-year-old who worries about running out of time before I accomplish everything I want to do in life, I see layers that I didn’t notice before. Now it seems to me that it’s more about trying to put failure behind you, about unfulfilled ambitions, regret, and longing for escape from the rut you’ve dug yourself into. It’s yet another take on the very American idea of reinventing yourself by driving to some other place, or at least by driving. And unlike a lot of tunes I loved in ’87 but which don’t hold much meaning for me any more, this song still speaks to me, even more than ever. I’d like to give you a link so you can hear it yourself, but I don’t think I have my technology set up to do that. So here are the lyrics instead:

Took a look down a westbound road,
Right away I made my choice
Headed out to my big two-wheeler,
I was tired of my own voice
Took a bead on the northern plains
And just rolled that power on
Twelve hours out of Mackinaw City
Stopped into a bar to have a brew
Met a girl and we had a few drinks
And I told her what I’d decided to do
She looked out the window a long, long moment
Then she looked into my eyes
She didn’t have to say a thing,
I knew what she was thinkin’
Roll, roll me away,
Won’t you roll me away tonight
I too am lost, I feel double-crossed
And I’m sick of what’s wrong and what’s right
We never even said a word,
We just walked out and got on that bike
And we rolled
And we rolled clean out of sight
We rolled across the high plains
Deep into the mountains
Felt so good to me
Finally feelin’ free
Somewhere along a high road
The air began to turn cold
She said she missed her home
I headed on alone
Stood alone on a mountain top,
Starin’ out at the great divide
I could go east, I could go west,
It was all up to me to decide
Just then I saw a young hawk flyin’
And my soul began to rise
And pretty soon
My heart was singin’
Roll, roll me away,
I’m gonna roll me away tonight
Gotta keep rollin’, gotta keep ridin’,
Keep searchin’ till I find what’s right
And as the sunset faded
I spoke to the faintest first starlight
And I said next time
Next time
We’ll get it right

Oh, yeah. After the week I’ve had, I can really see the appeal of buying a motorcycle and just… rolling away, baby.
Incidentally, after listening to my warbly old cassette of The Distance a couple of times, I decided I needed to have it on CD. It seems to be out of print here in the U.S., but I found a European import CD easily enough on eBay. Just FYI, in case you’d like to have a copy, too…