Crushed

I’ve experienced a few crushes over the course of my lifetime. If I had to chart them on a graph of my life, they would start showing up around third grade, gradually increase then surge in junior high, both due to boys at my school that I would never actually talk to and those featured on the pages of Teen Beat and 16 Magazine (primarily of RS, as you may have guessed, but others, too).

They’d remain steady through high school and then once I hit college, the crushes decreased a bit. By then I would often start dating them and once you start dating a crush, they usually lose their crush status because at that point, the idealized view fades as you get to know them as a real person. (It’s difficult for crushes to live up to those idealized views because they are of course real people with faults and things that may drive you crazy if you have to actually spend time with them.)

If you’re lucky, you find somebody who you still feel strongly about even after the idealized view wanes.

But still, sometimes it’s fun to have a crush and just feel like a 15-year-old again with those intense feelings. And if it’s somebody that you’ll likely never actually meet (and if you do, you’d be too nervous to actually form a coherent sentence anyway), you don’t have to worry about any of the conflicts that may arise.

Crushes can also make you a little crazy sometimes, because they’re usually unrequited so for fun, I dug a little into my inner crazy to write this song: “Crushed.”

(Click here for lyrics.)

Wishful thinking

I just finished helping one of my kids with his math homework and was relaxing on the couch going through the mail when I noticed the above ad in the Costco mailer.

Of course it caught my attention right away because I recognized the building from the Rick Springfield Bahamas fan getaway promotions. I glanced at the dates: Nov. 10-14 (the dates of the fan getaway) are included.

This four-night package – starting at $589 per person would work quite well with the getaway dates, I thought, and look, kids under 11 stay and play free! That’s perfect, because I got three of those.

What a great family vacation, I thought! Even though it wouldn’t include all the cool getaway concerts and activities, I would at least be in the proximity and might hear some of the concerts or even run into RS at the buffet at some point!

I wondered if I could talk my husband into it, because  that’s a pretty cool trip for under $1,200.

My excitement lasted for about two minutes, until it occurred to me that the price didn’t include airfare and we would still need to get the five of us there. And that would increase the price tag by a few thousand dollars.

But it was fun while it lasted.

Music, TV, movies and more

Rick Springfield in “The Incredible Hulk”

What do the following shows have in common? “Six Million Dollar Man,” “Wonder Woman,” “Rockford Files,” “Battlestar Galactica,” “The Incredible Hulk,” “Suddenly Susan,” “Drop Dead Diva,” “Californication,” “Hawaii Five-O,” “Hot in Cleveland,” “True Detective” and “Supernatural.”

Answer: Rick Springfield was a guest star in all of them. (Thank you rickspringfield.us for the reference details.) I usually know when the repeats of these shows are shown because of all the tweets of exclamation in the Twittersphere: “Is that Rick Springfield on ‘The Incredible Hulk’?!!!!!”

From his first role in 1977 on “Six Million Dollar Man” (if you don’t count his animated character in “Mission Magic” from 1973-1974) to next month’s role as Lucifer in “Supernatural,” RS has been acting for nearly four decades. So although acting was initially more of a way to make money during slow times in his musical career – he has always said that music comes first for him – he still has quite an impressive IMDb profile.

He’s also acted in three films – “Hard to Hold” in 1984, last year’s “Ricki and the Flash” and the not-yet-released “Traces.”

Plus there’s TV movies, TV series, ( “Human Target” in 1992 and “High Tide” from 1994 to 1997), two years of a Las Vegas show (“EFX,” 2001-2002) and even a stint on Broadway (“Smokey Joe’s Cafe” in 1999). He’s also featured in two documentaries: “Affair of the Heart,” made by fans about his impact on his fans’ lives, and “Sound City,” produced and directed by Dave Grohl.

Whoops, I’m already on the sixth paragraph of this post and I haven’t even mentioned “General Hospital” yet. Can’t forget Dr. Noah Drake, his most popular character and the role that catapulted his career along with the release of “Working Class Dog” in 1981.

Then there’s those 18 studio albums, too, with one Grammy award and eight songs charting in the Top 20 on the Billboard charts. And a bestselling memoir and a bestselling novel. Plus he’s still touring and producing new music.

And yet in many people’s minds, he’s a one-hit wonder soap opera star.

I just don’t get it.

First glimpse of Supernatural look

The promo is out for the new season of “Supernatural ” – our first glimpse of Rick Springfield as Lucifer. Big transformation from his last role as Greg on “Ricki and the Flash” – there’s an Alice Cooper look going on here. A Halloween treat comes early this year: Thursday,  Oct. 13 on The CW.

I just love that friendship

The selfies that Doug Davidson shared on Twitter today are just so darn cute – he and his wife along with RS and his wife hanging out in Milan, Italy.

Knowing the background of their friendship (through “Late, Late at Night” and teen magazine interviews back in the day), it’s just so freakin’ cool that they are all still friends.

I’m not even sure if I can clearly explain it, but knowing that the Davidson family was RS’s American family back when he so desperately needed one and that they were friends before fame and through tumultuous times is so heartwarming. Plus, the video clips I’ve seen of the two of them together are hilarious.

And I have a little confession to make.

Back in those teen years, I kind of had a little crush on Doug Davidson, too. I watched “The Young and the Restless” long after I stopped following “General Hospital,” especially for the scenes with Paul Williams.

I’m sure I’m not the only RS fan who experienced this, right?  After all he’s cute and funny and seems like a nice guy. We were even “pen pals” for a few years (“pen pals” meaning that I would write fan letters and he’d kindly write back on “Young and the Restless” postcards.)

I still have all of the cards from him – eight, dating from 1984 to 1987. A couple of them were signed Christmas cards, but most of them were personalized (assuming that there wasn’t a Y&R intern who answered fan mail) notes. I wish I could remember what I wrote to him because the personalized notes always made some sort of reference to whatever it was I wrote. Apparently after I moved to California, I sent him the menu and business card of the restaurant I was working at and he said he’ll stop by if he is in the neighborhood. Ha! He never did. But I still think that he was incredibly kind to reply to fan mail. (Even if it turns out that it was an intern who typed them up, Doug signed them and drew little smiley faces.)

 

 

 

The Australian interview

You may have heard about the recent Rick Springfield interview on Australia’s “Sunday Night” program, where an Australian reporter got the incredible assignment to fly to Los Angeles to interview RS.

(Are there any positions available for reporters to travel to the Bahamas in November to cover the fan trip? If so, where do I apply?)

The interview appeared to be a big deal for Australia because he left about 45 years ago to achieve musical fame on the foreign shores of America and so this interview seemed to be sort of a “Where are they now?” kind of thing. It was a very heartfelt interview and it always amazes me that RS speaks with such candor about personal matters. Perhaps it’s because he already revealed so much in his memoir and he figures the information is out there anyway.

But if one hasn’t read every line of his memoir or listened to countless interviews, parts of the interview could come as a surprise. Hence, the headlines from those interviews.

Rick Springfield: ‘I’d recognize Jessie’s Girl if I saw her’

Yes, another “Jessie’s Girl” headline. No surprise.

‘I was going to shoot myself’: Rick Springfield opens up about his battle with depression while admitting he attempted to commit suicide twice

He wrote about his teenage suicide attempt in his book and so although it came as a surprise when reading his autobiography, it didn’t have the same effect when watching the interview (although it’s still just as sad to think about now). But is counting change from your piggy bank to see if you have enough money to buy a gun really considered a suicide attempt? (Not to downplay the emotions behind doing that, though. So glad he didn’t have enough change.)

As one who has heard/watched many RS interviews over the past couple of years, my fan thoughts after watching the interview were a little different and – not surprisingly – didn’t appear in the any of the articles:

It was interesting to see all the coverage of Zoot, which was a big part of his Australian musical career, and to hear him talking about his early days in America.

Oh, the red shirt in the concert footage shown in the interview – he wore that at the New Orleans show this past summer. Why do I remember that? Because it was the first time I remembered seeing that shirt and I mentioned it in a previous post because he was wearing it in a dream I had. Since he cancelled the show that was scheduled right after the New Orleans show because he was so sick and the doctor ordered him to, that means he was likely pretty sick at the time of the interview.

The interview was yet another reminder that he’s had such an amazing career – finding musical success in one country and then starting from scratch in a second country and finding success there, as well. And all the ups and downs and twists and turns along the way and then being willing to talk so candidly about it all. Such an inspiration.

What I did learn from the interview was the origin of Bindi’s name and that RS sometimes dreams in an Australian accent. Although I don’t remember if he spoke with his accent in my dream when he wore his red shirt.

In case you missed it, here’s the interview: