Music Can Bring Back Some Painful Memories

Musings of an Aging Mind

By Jack Bagley

When I am driving around in my car, I like to listen to satellite radio. My preferences shift from the great radio shows of the past to the best music ever, that from the 1970s.
Your mileage may vary on that “best music” comment but it’s my column so I can say it’s the best music.
I started working in radio in 1976, spinning the hits at WLAG-AM in LaGrange and later at WTRP-AM, where I’ve remained in one billet or another since. Later this year, in fact, I will celebrate 50 years in broadcasting.  Those early years were probably the best … and, on reflection, the music was the best and the worst.
Listening to the hits of the 1970s takes me back, back to high school (I graduated in 1975) and, as mentioned, my first years in radio. There are very, very few songs from that time period that I don’t like to listen to, and one of them was at one time a real favorite.
I refer to the song “Dancing Queen” by the Swedish group ABBA.
Don’t get me wrong; that is one of the classic songs to come out of the ‘70s. But it also is, in my mind, associated with someone I retain very fond memories of, someone who isn’t with us any more.
I’ve never told this story in print, and I seldom make reference to it verbally.  It’s one that bubbles beneath the surface but rarely breaks through. However, I recently found some old photographs from my going-away party when I went into the Air Force, and the person I’m referring to was at that party. The photos show the two of us laughing, goofing off, and dancing together.
Her name was Kathleen.
She was the daughter of an Army officer assigned to Fort Benning while I was at Spencer High School in Columbus, and she was assigned to Spencer as well.
She arrived at the start of her junior year, as I was beginning my sophomore year. We were both in the Drama Club and were both cast in the big show that year, The Skin of Our Teeth by Thornton Wilder. Kathleen had the female lead and I had one of the lesser male roles.
I won’t say I was her first friend at Spencer, but I was among the first, and because we both were in Drama our friendship became very strong. And I’ll admit here that I fell hard for her, the way any red-blooded American teenager does when someone wonderful comes into their lives. Let’s put it this way … I crushed on Kathleen so hard my feet hurt.
We studied lines and rehearsed scenes together at school when we could, and because we had several classes together the next year (I skipped my junior year) we were in each others’ company quite often. From my perspective, it was fabulous.
After graduation, I moved back to LaGrange and, on my 17th birthday, enlisted in the Air Force. During that summer we had kept in touch with letters and phone calls, and when my parents said I was having a going-away party, I invited Kathleen and four other dear friends from school. They all showed up and we had a fantastic time.
Kathleen even kissed me goodbye.
My Air Force career didn’t pan out, sadly, and I came home and started working in radio. Recording my first show for Kathleen, I added a bit about my long-standing feelings … and in her return letter, she quite lovingly and with great friendship shot me down.
Rather than be driven away by the romantic rejection, I used it to make our friendship stronger.  We saw each other from time to time, she in Columbus and me in LaGrange, but then life got in the way and we drifted apart.
These things happen.
In 1995, when my graduating class was planning our 20-year reunion, I was hoping beyond hope that Kathleen would be there. At the time I was married and had a child, and I knew nothing romantic could ever come of seeing her, but I knew I’d have a great time just being around her once again.
She didn’t attend.
She missed the 30-year reunion as well.  I was one of the folks trying to find graduates for the 40-year reunion, and that’s when I learned why she’d not attended.
In October of 1983, while working in Austin, Texas and going to graduate school there, Kathleen had been murdered by a man who she had let into her apartment to use her phone.
Her mother, who I absolutely adored then and now, told about that in an online essay. I learned more details and was devastated.
For many reasons, “Dancing Queen” ties with her in my mind, and I can’t listen to that without thinking of her.
Finding those photos from the party brought back a flood of happy memories, and the sad realization that she’s gone.
Rest easy, Kathleen.