“Operator, please connect me with 1982.”
That’s the opening line to a great old country song by Randy Travis. It’s fitting. Not too long ago, while having beers with my brother like pal Marko Vasko we got to talking about all the things we saw happen in 1982. Some of our milestones from that year matched up identically and others were of our own individual experiences. 1982 was FORTY years ago, and yet some of what went down seems like it happened just yesterday.
1982 is the year that brought us landmark movies like “E.T.”, the gender bending “Tootsie” and the teen horn-dog romp “Porky’s.” This was also the year when the mysterious Tylenol murders were happening as random bottles of the pain reliever were laced with poison that killed several innocent people. That still unsolved case led to safer ways to package not only over the counter medicines but thousands of food products as well.
Here are some of what was going on in my life from that year. The summer of 1982 is when a former high school classmate of mine, Lori Borowski was kidnapped as she tried to open the local real estate office where she worked. Missing for several months, Lori’s body was eventually found. Her twisted killers did some kind of satanic mutilation of her and they were all caught and brought to proper justice. While I did not personally know Lori Borowski, I knew others who did and seeing a contemporary of ours murdered shook me to the core.
In more cheerful happenings, 1982 was the very first time I ever visited Poplar Creek Music Theater as me and Dave Potter enjoyed pavilion seats and rocked out to an Elton John concert with opening act Quarterflash. (Remember them?) The Clash’s popular “Combat Rock” album hit stores that summer and me and several pals went to see the band play an incredibly intense concert at the Aragon Ballroom. Joe Strummer, Mick Jones and company blew the roof off the joint that hot August night!
The Who brought us the “It’s Hard” album along with their first ever “farewell tour.” I was lucky enough to catch their three shows that fall at the Rosemont Horizon. The last one happening near the tour’s end in December which was the best of the trio of gigs.
1982 also saw the release of REM’s debut record, a great EP titled “Chronic Town” which began my love for that band. And I can’t forget Bruce Springsteen’s stark “Nebraska” record which remains my favorite Bruce album. I love it because its raw, bare bones recording was as close as I’ll ever get to having Springsteen play a solo show in my living room. The songs on “Nebraska” are dark but they tell true to life stories.
Earlier in 1982, I enjoyed a Spring Break trip to Daytona Beach with college classmates. That wild party week saw me and some others run afoul of the law on a misdemeanor drinking on the beach issue. The judge withheld adjudication of that charge which kept my criminal record clean. That was also the week I first got to know a woman in the Biblical sense. A lovely 30 something bartender named ‘Candy.’ My experience with Candy is best summed up by the 1986 BoDeans song “That’s All.”
In late June of 1982 my sister Marianne married her first husband Gary O’Brien. Sadly, less than two years later Gary would succumb to a recurrence of cancer. This tragedy left my only sibling a widow at age 26.
In January of 1982 we adopted a rescue dog named Molly. Molly was a dynamic Boston Terrier and helped cement the idea that Bostons are the best pure breed of dogs ever! September of that year is when my dear pure white kitty Miss Priss died of old age. Not long after that, our house was recharged with a schnoodle puppy named Minnie who was the sweetest pooch we ever had.
That fall while attending Elmhurst College and thriving on the air at the school’s radio station WRSE, I began a side gig of D.J.-ing on campus weekend dances in the campus cafeteria. Many of these were for the school fraternities and sororities. My rate of pay was 25 dollars cash for 3 hours of being the record spinning life of the party. I also recall a couple of romantic hook-ups happening for me at those gigs and a year later my pal Jim Turano would join me for several years of doing dances all over the western suburbs.
Thanks to the urging of my high school friend Rob Dicker, I began writing a weekly local music column for Press Publications. Rob was a photographer for that newspaper chain and he suggested the idea to his editor, who asked me for a sample writing and boom! I was a local music columnist for the next three years before passing that writer’s pen on to Jim Turano.
Finally, I can’t let 1982’s happenings go without recalling the most significant occurrence I had that year. It was meeting and being carefully mentored by Lee Swanson. Lee was a former record store, rock club owner and rock band manager who was the western suburbs’ best known music and media mogul. Lee was Yoda to my Luke Skywalker and over the next 12 years he taught me more than I could ever write down on a list. To put it bluntly, without Lee’s tutelage, I NEVER would’ve landed at WLS am 89 as Larry Lujack’s producer at the age of 24. Lee has been gone for 28 years now and he remains someone I’ll never forget and will always be grateful for his knowledge, guidance, kindness and friendship.
There you have it. 1982 was an action and event packed year filled with some vital highs and a few lows.
Forty years ago and I loved every minute of it…