Landslide by Fleetwood Mac

I didn’t really fit in when I was in high school. I spent most of my time practicing piano and violin and composing music preparing to be a music major in college. I was perfectly happy staying in on Saturday night watching a movie or reading a book. I think I only went to one party during high school. I never had a group of friends I hung out with but I did have a couple close friends who I would hang out with.

I guess the main reason I didn't fit in with the people in high school was that I didn’t understand them. People would talk about being on sports teams or the crazy things they did on the weekend and I just didn’t get why these things were so important. This probably would not have bothered me as much if I felt that more people understood me better. Only a few people seemed to understand my love of music and how I viewed the world. For some reason, I just didn’t see things the same way that my peers did in high school.

When I graduated Mercer Island High School, there was a tradition of interspersing music performances within the graduation exercises. We had a pretty musical class with a lot of people who wanted to perform at graduation so what the administration decided was that some people would perform during graduation and others would perform during the senior assembly.

I auditioned and performed a couple times in graduation. I opened the ceremony with an arrangement that I made of “The Star-Spangled Banner” on piano (which has a story attached to it for later post), I accompanied some girls from choir singing “In My Life” by the Beatles, accompanied a flute player and I got together a band to play “Ants Marching” by Dave Matthews Band.

One of the people who auditioned was a girl I knew from orchestra. She wanted to perform “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac at graduation. When I heard this, I scoffed at the idea because it didn’t make much sense to me why that song would be appropriate for a graduation ceremony unlike the musical performances I was involved in. In retrospect, “Ants Marching” doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense in a graduation ceremony either but who knows what was really going on in my head back then. The administration did not choose her to perform at graduation but instead she performed at the senior assembly.

I’ve listened to “Landslide” periodically over the years but it’s never brought me back to that performance at the senior assembly until a couple days ago when I heard this song playing in the background at a store. The night before I heard the song at the store my wife and I were talking about our lives and it hit me how much change was in our futures. I know life isn’t really a life worth living if there is not some kind of change that is constantly happening, but knowing that doesn’t make change any less scary.

Stevie sings that she’s afraid of change because what she’s built her life around is changing as well. Though Stevie is reflective and a little sad hearing Stevie sing about her feelings is comforting. "Landslide" reminds me that there is someone out who shares my fears. This doesn’t make my feelings go away, but it makes me feel less alone.

I guess this is what she was singing about at the senior assembly. Just because I wasn’t feeling that at the time doesn’t mean that she wasn't and that our peers weren’t feeling this as well. Even though I may not have understood how what this meant to you at the time I get it now. At least in this small way I understand a little better the people I went to high school with and that means a lot.

The weird thing is, while I don’t remember any of the musical performances from the graduation ceremony but I can clearly remember how her voice sounded singing “Landslide,” vulnerable and pure, a little sad, but mostly happy, fighting back tears through a smile that shined like the stars.