Performer: Rush
Songwriters: Geddy Lee, Alex Lifeson, Neil Peart
Original Release: Signals
Year: 1982
Definitive Version: Snakes & Arrows Live, 2008
I saw Rush for the 13th time
last night as I write this (Saturday). It seemed for the first time in at least
16 years that it wasn’t just some variation of a greatest-hits show. The
setlist, staging and lighting were all very different from what I’d become
accustomed, and it had a purpose. Rush always is enjoyable live, but this was
one of the best shows I’ve ever seen them deliver.
This song wasn’t among those
played, and I was fine with that thanks to Snakes & Arrows Live, which Dave
made a copy of and gave to me … for archival purposes, of course. The package’s
arrival provided a brief ray of sunshine on what was at the time a very bleak
landscape.
It wasn’t until the
following winter that I started listening to it with enough regularity to get
into it, particularly the newer stuff from Snakes & Arrows that already
appeared on this here list.
Laurie and I decided that we
wanted to take another warm-destination vacation in March 2009 when we had
reached our limit on cold, yucky Chicago weather. A return to Mexico was a bit
much, so we chose Florida.
Laurie had taken a
spring-break trip a few years before with one of her friends, and they went to
Anna Maria Island, which is just off the coast of Bradenton, south of Tampa.
She said it was great and not too crowded, which was essential. The last thing
I wanted to do was spend a week surrounded by chotches looking to party.
We scheduled the trip for
the last week of March, same as when we went to Mexico. I wanted to go the next
week, so I could see a Rays home game and knock another team off my list, but
the schedule didn’t work out in our favor. I had have to settle for the beach.
We flew into Tampa early in
the a.m. and got our rental car. I noted with some pleasure that we we’re going
to get a P.T. Cruiser, which Laurie didn’t like, but I thought was perfect for
a beachtown. Dad had a Cruiser while I lived at home, so I was used to driving
one. The Cruiser was just your basic small car with a Thirties hot-rod body
wrapped around it. Laurie said I could drive.
It seemed like a straight
shot out of the airport to Bradenton, where we literally take a right when we
get to town to head to Anna Maria Island, which is an island kind of like Long
Island is an island—no more than 1,000 feet of water separates it from the
mainland, and two roads connect it.
But before we got there, we
came face to face with the Sunshine Skyway Bridge. We could see it from miles
away, eerily rising from the ground surrounded completely by blue—sky and
ocean. Of course, I-275 cuts across Tampa Bay about 4 miles, and the Sunshine
Skyway Bridge, with its cable-stayed design, is the span. As we got closer, I
got a real sense of how high it went up … and how quickly.
This was intimidating, not
only because of the actual height and the fact that you have no turn-offs and
are surrounded by water, but also because if the wind were whipping into the
bay, a top-heavy car, like the Cruiser, could be at the mercy of the elements.
Plus, the Cruiser wasn’t a real powerhouse. I wasn’t sure it could make it to the top, let alone me.
So I just kept my eyes on
the road straight ahead, refusing to look to the left or right or even out the
back. I took it at a regular speed giving extra gas when I needed it and had no
problem getting over the top. It was only then that I looked in the rearview
mirror at the slope behind me. It looked like a 45-degree incline, even though
it wasn’t. Coming down the other side was no problem.
The rest of the drive was
incident-free, and we arrived at our destination—the Blue Water Beach Club,
which if that doesn’t sound like a primo old-school Florida beach hotel, I’d
like you to give me a better name. It was a two-story motel that had all the
necessary amenities: a ce-ment pond, shuffleboard, palm trees and a 100-yard
walk from our room to the beach.
Ahhhhhhh.
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