Hi, gang.
Another day, another step closer!
For the record, I’m certainly about living in the moment, too; I just don’t dig eating an early dinner in the dark! LOL!!
That said, like the Grass Roots once reminded us, “Let’s live for today.” (Rumor has it, though, that they wrote that one at a backyard barbecue in the L.A. sun all the way back in 1967. So, I’m not sure if we should count it. (-:)
Just the same, I know we’ve talked a lot of music during our time together, but accept for our recent homage to the late Mama Cass, I feel like it has been a while.
So, for our time today, I wanted to harken back to another old song, one that probably pre-dates many of you.
“At Seventeen” by Janis Ian (1975) is not just one of these “teenage angst” songs. In fact, it may well be the standard.
Janis Ian (born Janis Eddy Fink in Farmingdale, New Jersey) has been performing professionally since she was a teenager. In a recording career that now spans nearly 60 years, her song catalog includes approximately 700 songs, the first of which became a top-20 hit when she was still in high school.
Her “Society’s Child,” (released in 1966 and re-released the following year) climbed all the way to number 14, ironically matching her age at the time she wrote it.
Apparently, she was inspired to write the song after observing an interracial couple on a school bus. If you haven’t heard it, think about giving it a listen.
Fast forward nearly ten years, and Ian’s song “At Seventeen” climbed all the way to number three (3), making it by far her most successful commercial hit. Material success aside, though, it instantly became a type of anthem for adolescent insecurity, social disfunction and unrequited love.
The song’s narrator (believed to be Ian herself during her youth) presents herself as an outcast, struggling with everything from feeling socially awkward and unloved to wearing hand-me-down clothes to always being left on the outside looking in.
“To those of us who knew the pain
Of valentines that never came
And those whose names were never called
When choosing sides for basketball.”
I feel like I’d go back to being a high school kid in a heartbeat, but I think we’d all agree that sometimes being a teenager ain’t the easiest.
You guys have a great night.
JFish
@Copyright 2025 by John L. Fischer