Greetings from Batley Park W.Y.

Borrowed from my brother, naturally

I'm reading my first rock autobiography of the year and I start wishing I could write fiction as raw and truthful and powerful as a Bruce Springsteen song, that would last as long in the head and the heart, and I stick one of Big Brother's cast-off tapes in the cassette player in the kitchen and Thunder Road kicks in and my heart soars and I'm twelve again and buying a second-hand Born To Run LP to play on Sister Number One's hand-me-down record player, and I'm nineteen and clinging to Born in the USA when my peers are telling me it's not cool, and I'm thirty-five and BB's handing over the Springsteen tapes he's replaced on CD and I'm rediscovering that feeling of gritty bluesy rock n roll, and I want to phone BB and tell him how glad I am that he let me rifle through his record collection, and how much joy and catharsis all that music has brought me over the years, a liferaft and a battle cry and a manifesto. But I can't, because I'm British and reserved, and what is more I'm a gruff northerner. Nevertheless... Nevertheless.