A Girl, a Friend and Their Band U2

I saw U2 in Boston on Tuesday night with my best friend and fellow U2 fanatic and her college-age daughter who wanted to come with us. Cuz that’s the power of U2, or at least the power of our passion for this band. Even a millennial wanted to see them. See, we’re too young for Woodstock, not into drugs enough for the Grateful Dead, and too old for…oh, yeah, right, there are no really great big new bands anymore. And that’s not just me being an old fart; I have that on great authority, my teenage son. There are great new bands, but the “big” part seems to have gone the way of the network TV. Lucky for us, U2 is still going strong.

Before Tuesday, I hadn’t seen Sonia in about 15 years and last saw U2 in 2005. Encountering both is like no time passing. Sonia and I met in college and bonded over our love of the band–they were just breaking out with their third album, War. It was a connection that launched 1,000 conversations about race, religion, and the meaning of life, and lest you think we’re too serious, there was a healthy amount of talk about boys, various vices, and rock ‘n roll.

I’ve been trying to write this post all week, but the thing is I could write a book about me, Sonia, and U2, or at least more than a blog post. And I think I will, eventually. But for now, I’ll just say, seeing U2 with Sonia was like coming home. They are in a reflective mood with this new music and we are too. Yes, they forced it on everyone for free. Get over it.  I promise to hold my tongue when the new album from your favorite band I don’t give a hoot about shows up for free in my iTunes. In concert they also played a lot of the older songs we bonded over, and they are still making new songs that we both like. Use any cliché you like–transformative, moving, an affirmation. U2 has always been in sync with us. Every album says something to us, and we always have something to say to each other. This visit we talked about new stuff, and we reminisced about old stuff, some of it funny, some of it hard. But all good.

I posted a picture on Facebook of me and Sonia at the concert, and we’re screaming with joy and laughter. I could talk more about what it means to us, but the picture says it all. And that’s it– I loved catching up with her, loved getting to meet her awesome daughter who I babysat as an infant, and I loved hanging out with our U2 boys in Boston.

Sometimes, years later, with losses and loves, failures and successes, it’s as simple as a girl, her friend and their band.