Ode to the Big Man.

Other than the post I wrote after my father's death, this is perhaps the most difficult post I've had to write.

For those of you who are not fans of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, I can sort of understand why you think those of us who are, are indeed a bit crazy.

I was a later bloomer myself especially for a kid from Jersey who went to Rutgers in the late 70's. I didn't "find religion" so to speak until that fateful day when my friend Mitch called me and told me he had tickets for opening night at the Brendan Byrne Arena.  It was truly opening night as Bruce was playing something like ten shows in 15 nights to open the new arena.  My thought was I wanted to see the new arena and if I had to sit through a Springsteen concert to do it, so be it.

It was a transformation I've experienced many times since taking other Springsteen newbies to concert, but the saying is true, you can't truly experience Springsteen until you see the band live.

For me, it was the beginning of a life-long journey.  And if Bruce supplied the words on that journey, it was the Big Man, Clarence Clemons who supplied the music.

We Springsteen fans all have stories of that fanaticism that follows.  I have seen the band dozens of times in the 30 years since.  At JFK, RFK, the Garden, the Dean Dome, the Meadowlands both indoor and out.  Greensboro, Nashville, having driven all night.  LiveAid, Kerry-Aid, just to hear an hour-long set.

There was lucking into seventh row seats at Hampton because the DJ at the radio station I was working at  knew I was a fan and someone called him at the station on the day of the concert saying he needed to give up his tickets.  Sitting up all night with my boss at the time and friend, Bill Bouyer, in the Cap Center parking lot waiting to get ticket bracelets. Me schelping my wife who was six-months pregnant with our first child to the top row of the Meadowlands Arena, after walking through that heinous pedestrian tunnel a mile from our parking spot.  Reconnecting with friends like those from college, Dave and Bruce, or those from just after like Terry.  Or exposing Bruce to new friends like Alan and riding with him and others in a limo the one mile or so from our office to the Richmond Coliseum because we wanted to treat ourselves and not have to deal with parking the car.  Taking our daughter Sarah to the suite in Charlottesville, she was eight at the time, having her tell us tell us she wanted to leave after a half hour and me telling her she was there for the duration.  And then returning to our own suite in the same arena months later with a group of 16 or so friends who intersected the entire 30 year span, a special night indeed.  They might not have realized this at the time, but I was extending them the greatest honor I know by asking them to join me that night.

Bruce and Clarence created the soundtrack of my life.  They created the reason to reconnect both with them when they toured and with friends from all the eras of my life who'd sit at our computers at 9:59 on a Saturday morning to try to trick the Ticketmaster gods so we could get the absolute best seats for our reunions.  They lifted us from our depths, they psyched us up at critical moments and they helped us celebrate our success and good fortune.

They introduced us to new friends like Dave's friend Wayne who when I got them tickets and refused their money, paid me back with rare bootleg CD's of concerts I now listen to regularly.  Or to my Twitter buddy Lisa Bednarski, who being a woman, sports nut, Springsteen Fan, successful PR pro and Canadian is me in sort of an alternative universe.

And when the concert started and the music flowed, somehow for me the great Springsteen anthems were not "official" until the Big Man strode center stage lifted his sax and blew the music that struck my inner emotional core.  From solos on Badlands and Thunder Road, to the haunting intro to The River, to the true religious experience of the sax solo masterpiece that is the essence of the greatest rock and roll poem ever, Jungleland, it was Clarence that lifted the crowd to its feet and added the punctuation.

If you asked my wife, she will tell you she'd like to have a dime for every time in the last decade that I sat in the car after a concert and said to her "I wonder if that's the last time we'll see them live?"

Kyra, yes now we have.

When Steve Van Zandt left the band for a while Bruce called on Nils Lofgren to join.  When Danny Federici died he was replaced, it was tough but we moved on.

There is no replacement for Clarence Clemons.  He was born to play Born to Run.

Sure someone will play the sax and the songs will sound almost the same.  But I doubt the music will reach me in the same way.

That era of my life is now over, it is the price we all pay by getting old and having our heroes experience their own mortality.

We will remember, we will listen to our bootlegs and to XM radio and we will celebrate.

"But the stars are burnin' bright like some mystery uncovered
I'll keep movin' through the dark with you in my heart
My blood brother"