17

This week always seems to sneak up on me. Maybe that's for the best.

What can I say? The years fly by, and it doesn't seem possible that so much time has passed. She's still and forever my baby, my wee baby who never drew a breath -- but she would have been almost grown up now. In less than five weeks, she would have been starting Grade 12 (senior year). She would have turned 17 in November, if she's been born alive and on schedule;  she would have been going to prom and graduating next spring. This time next year, she would be (presumably) be getting ready to start university or college, possibly away from home (although we have some excellent schools in this city).  Dh & I both have several friends & cousins whose kids are 17 or turning 17 and starting Grade 12 this year -- I can think of five right off the top of my head. Needless to say, I am not looking forward to all the coming social media reminders of what we're missing. :(

We got some flowers this morning and visited the cemetery. "So here we are again," I remarked to dh as we stood by Katie's niche. Then we went for brunch.

It's been a quiet day. I'm glad.

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On a related (but much lighter) note: 

Katie's impending 17th released several earworms in my head -- songs with "17" in the title and/or lyrics. The more I thought, the longer the list grew: 

• Janis Ian, "At Seventeen" ("I learned the truth at seventeen, that love was meant for beauty queens...")
• Stevie Nicks, "Edge of Seventeen"
• The Beatles, "I Saw Her Standing There" ("Well she was just seventeen, you know what I mean...")
• The Cars, "Let's Go" ("And she won't give up because she's seventeen...")
• Meatloaf, "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" ("We were barely seventeen and we were barely dressed...")(OK, maybe I don't want to be thinking about this one in the context of my would-be teenaged daughter...! lol)
• ABBA, "Dancing Queen" ("Young and sweet, only 17...")

One of the songs that first popped into my head was by (cough!) the Bay City Rollers (the One Direction/'NSync/Backstreet Boys/New Kids on the Block/you get the idea... of my day ;) ) -- opening lines: "It's a teenage dream to be seventeen and to find you're all wrapped up in love..."

"My" special Roller was Woody (AKA Stuart Wood, who was only four years older than me -- the same age as my husband, actually! -- and still a teenager himself when he first joined the group), the bass player in the white jacket and red pants, standing to the left of the lead singer. A penpal from Britain sent me a much-coveted gigantic poster of him, wearing nothing but a very long & strategically placed tartan scarf, which I hung on the wall directly over my bed, much to my parents' displeasure. (The poster, not the scarf, lol.)  This was pretty racy stuff for a teenaged girl in 1977. I wonder if it's still in my closet at Mom & Dad's??

Going even further back, The Archies' first album had this little gem: 

One more, by The Stray Cats!  I had a couple of their albums back in the day, but hadn't heard this song in years, and I'm not sure I ever saw this video before. What fun! :)

Any others you can think of?