Wash these sins off our hands....

"So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past."

- The closing sentence of “The Great Gatsby”

Jack and I went to a Springsteen concert in Charlotte near the end of April. We ate barbecue in Lexington on the way there, took light rail to the show, and had great pre-concert burgers at a little joint down the street from the arena. He told the waitress that it was the best burger in the world.

And then the fun began.

Me in my too-big jacket, and Jack, in his shirt that fits just right

We had seats side stage, only about a dozen rows from the action. Jack was enthralled – he sang along, he danced (!), all while wearing his dad’s vintage River-tour t-shirt that doesn’t fit the old man anymore.

The set list was eclectic, one of the best of the tour, with many highlights.

But none ranked higher for me than “Racing in the Street,” a song that deals with growing up and realizing that childhood dreams wash away and adult realities bring difficult choices and sometimes harsh consequences. As I grow older, that resonates more and more with me.

How could I have imagined on that night at the Spectrum in 1978 hearing "Racing" for the first time that 36 years later I would hear it again with my own son, and subsequently develop an even deeper appreciation of this gem.

A son, who at almost 11 and just beginning to work on his dreams, certainly couldn’t grasp the depth of the song, much as I couldn’t on that May night so many years ago.

No matter. Someday, he will, and it will undoubtedly be a live version with that marvelous outro – Roy Bittan’s piano, ringing guitars and crescendo after crescendo of tension and tremendous beauty, crashing over and over again like waves crashing on the rocks – that will bring it all back home for him.

And perhaps it will remind him, as it does me, of how time forever goes on, and the past becomes new, all over again.