Security Breach

Last night I was detained in my home and forced to watch Mall Cop starring Kevin James of "King of Queens." You know it's bad when the DVD cover is void of any quotes exclaiming anything. That means they couldn't even extract one positive word from a review.

Well, now that I've lived through it, I'm not surprised. I need not go into the plot, predictable shenanigans: cliche good guy saves the day against evil retail terrorists, blah blah blah. But the worst crime of this movie was the surprise attack of one power ballad from the 80s that was buried so deep in the folds of my memory it never would have surfaced again, had it not been for this train wreck of a movie.

There, in the middle of a romantic montage, from out of nowhere it emerged: The opening chords of Survivor's "I Can't Hold Back."

Suddenly I was hurtled back to 6th grade: dangly earrings, jelly shoes, pinstripe jeans, baby fat, and confusion about the mysteries of romantic love. Sitting there on my couch at 34 years old, I felt compelled to sing along with gusto, and discovered with a mix of horror and delight that I still knew every single word to the song.

See if this jogs your own repressed memories:

"There's a story in my eyes.

Turn the pages of desi(ey)er.

Now it's time to trade those dreams

(which for a long time I thought was, "Now it's time to trade those jeans")

for the rush of passion's fire.

I can feel you tremble when we touch

And I feel the hand of fate

Reaching out to both of us..."

Power drums, guitar solo, soulful "ooh"s. Every single word of this song I knew. See, when I was making the slow and painful transition from girl to woman, I went through a period of intense study of pop song lyrics. The way I saw it, collectively, these songs' words of wisdom wrote me a how-to guide to achieving my wildest dream: getting and keeping a boyfriend.

Here's how I would do it. 1) Tape songs from the radio onto cassette tape. 2) Rewind and play back songs in short segments. 3) Write down the words. 4) If words make no sense, rewind and repeat until you decide on the closest likelihood (Example: Till Tuesday's "Voices carry" becomes "Boys are scary," or even more puzzling, in "Blinded by the Light," the one hit wonder, Manfred Mann sings: "Wrapped up like a douche, another roller in the night..."?)

Anyway, after a while, I discovered that there were magazines with song lyrics at the grocery store, so whenever I had a little pocket money, I would pick me up a copy, along with the latest Tiger Beat for some new posters of Ricky Schroeder or the Corys. Stud-o-ramas.

One time I remember my dad finding my transcription of "I Want to Know What Love Is" by Foreigner in my room.

"Did you write this," he asked.

"No, Dad. They're song lyrics. Duh," I said, embarrassed at having my secret lyric study exposed.

In hindsight, I can imagine my dad's horror as he mulled over the possiblity that his 12 year old (who was the spitting image of Jennifer from Family Ties) wrote the following love poem:

I gotta take a little time
A little time to think things over
I better read between the lines
In case I need it when I'm older

Now this mountain I must climb
Feels like a world upon my shoulders
I through the clouds I see love shine
It keeps me warm as life grows colder

In my life there's been heartache and pain
I don't know if I can face it again
Can't stop now, I've traveled so far
To change this lonely life

I wanna know what love is
I want you to show me
I wanna feel what love is
I know you can show me

My poor dad.

Anyway, more than twenty years later, I can say with certainty that I now know what love is. After the initial "rush of passion's fire," love is a comfy routine, a give and take. When I was 12, I thought love was mostly about going out to dinner and French kissing. I thought it was slow dancing and being picked up in a red sports car (thanks to Jake Ryan in Sixteen Candles). Little did I know love drives a station wagon. Sometimes love is tingly and trembly, but as you settle into it more deeply it is much more about compromise. It's about plumbing repair and mulch. It's stealing little kisses in the kitchen while your kid watches Toot and Puddle. And sometimes it's eating leftovers and agreeing to watch Mall Cop when you also rented The Secret Life of Bees. Love is a battlefield, baby.