I have a distinct memory of eating my breakfast one weekday spring morning in 1987. The stereo was on, as it was every morning when I got ready for school, and I remember sitting at the kitchen table as the DJ on the local radio station announced he was going to play for the first time a brand-new Whitney Houston song. It was "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" and I remember really digging it at the age of 10, and also feeling really cool at just having listened to her song played for the first time ever - on the NJ station, anyway. It went on to be one of the most played songs that summer, to the point that I remember my friends and I at the beach making our Barbies dance to it.
Whitney wasn't my favorite artist of the 80s/early 90s, per se, and I don't feel as tied to her stuff as I did with Michael Jackson, but I liked many of her songs, and she was totally an integral part of the soundtrack of my youth (I can't remember a span from my childhood when she didn't have a song on the radio). And in totally random ways:
-- "One Moment in Time," for some bizarre reason, was stuck in my head when I took my road test for my driver's license (I passed - otherwise, I may not have fond memories of the song).
-- My friend Amy playing the
I'm Your Baby Tonight cassette over and over, and us laughing at the premise of the song "My Name is Not Susan" and taking the "He fills me up" in "All The Man That I Need" in its most literal sense (Come on, we were 13).
-- Her Star Spangled Banner from the 1991 Super Bowl was one of the first times I felt how tied together this country could be in patriotism, especially after hearing it on the radio so often in the weeks to come. That may sound schmaltzy, but as an 8th grader experiencing my country being at war for the first time in my life, it was really kind of moving.
-- My friend Des and I playing
The Bodyguard soundtrack at pub while we were out with her dad and sister one day passing out fliers for his police department, and the bartender rolling his eyes at having to hear "I'm Every Woman".
-- Walking into the Astoria beer garden (before it was cool for young people to go there), and the main indoor bar area being packed with old, grizzled men... and "I Will Always Love You" randomly coming on the jukebox, which cracked my friend Hollis and I up.
I guess her death shouldn't come as surprising given her past, but it is still somewhat surreal. Judging by my Facebook and Twitter feeds tonight, I'd say it's safe to say many of my generation are digesting the news similarly. And regardless of her recent struggles, it's always hard to see an icon from your childhood die so friggin' young.
Oh, and for the record, this one was always my fave. She may have had bigger, more inspirational songs, but, yeah, I still get psyched whenever this comes on. RIP, Whitney:
