Revelations at the John Mellencamp Concert

Last week I took Mrs. YDP out to see John Mellencamp play here in Green Bay.  First a review of the concert: Mellencamp was outstanding.  His voice has grown more gruff with age (as can clearly be heard on his latest album Plain Spoken), and frankly I was fearful of how he was going to sound.  While it did take a couple of songs for him to warm up, eventually the voice smoothed out and he was in great shape for a number of his usual hits.

Highlights for me were all to be expected - a rousing Small Town, the closing Cherry Bomb, and my sentimental favorite Check it Out.

I last saw Mellencamp in about 1989, and at the time he was absolutely fantastic.  Fast forward (way too fast) 25 years, and he still is an outstanding showman.  He knew how to play the crowd, when to tone things down, and when to crank things up.  It was an outstanding evening of music and memories.

Now the bad part - I was really taken aback by the fact that the concert goers were all old people.  I'm not kidding.  Grey or no hair, paunches, slow gaits, glasses, the whole Mary Ann.  It is the first time in my life in which I was presented with stark evidence of how old my peer group and I are.  And it flat out sucks.

I'm fortunate that in my line of work (digital marketing), it is very much a young person's game.  It is an area that is dominated by millennials and constant technological change, and as such, has enabled me to feel/be a lot more young than my chronological age.  Now that I'm out of work, I miss that engagement, and hope that it doesn't quickly age me.  

I've been to the Mellencamp concert.  I've seen what my age is like.  It ain't pretty.