I think I may have just discovered a new way to measure the generation gap–just ask your friends what they thought about Madonna’s Super Bowl halftime show last night.
I don’t watch the Super Bowl because I’m not interested in professional football, and I had never seen (seriously) a halftime show before last night, so I can’t compare it to anything. but I thought it was AWESOME.  I was absolutely shocked to read some of the comments made by my Facebook friends who are (I suspect) slightly/a lot younger than I..
“Lucky Star” came out in 1983, when I was 16.  It was the third song released from Madonna’s debut album, but it’s the first on I remember hearing and liking on the radio.  I can actually remember wondering who the singer was.  And that’s just about when MTV went live (newsflash to you youngsters out there:  they showed videos then!) and I remember watching her “Borderline” video.  I remember being horrified and embarrassed (can they really play this on the radio? I remember wondering) when I first heard “Like a Virgin.”

So Madonna provided a lot of the soundtrack for my high school experience.  And my enthusiasm for her music grew when I was in college.  My roommate and I and our friend Tom used to dance to “Get into the Groove” as part of our pre-exam good luck ritual when we were freshmen.   I loved her “True Blue” stage.  I remember Tom and me ditching our summer bed-making toilet-cleaning  job to stand at the payphone calling over and over again to get tickets to her concert in the summer of 1987.  My God, that concert was 25 years ago but I remember it well–RFK Stadium with Madonna so far away she looked like a dancing doll on the stage.

As the years went by, Madonna continued to inspire, shock, and sometimes annoy. I’m not a big fan of blasphemy, for example.  But she was always talented, always original.  Her ability to reinvent herself instead of sticking to the tried and true is innovative and amazing and has kept her fresh for all these years.
One of my favorite television moments was seeing Madonna on “The David Letterman Show,” chiding Dave because he had not yet married the mother of his son.  Madonna? Recommending a conventional relationship?  It was surreal.  But just like the rest of us, Madonna got older, had kids, maybe grew up just a little bit.
And, hello, the woman is 53.  Fifty-freaking-three, and she just appeared in thigh high boots and a mini-skirt (no fat, no wobbles).  She danced for 15 minutes without getting out of breath.  She did all these deep knee bending moves and didn’t need to hold on to something to stand back up.  She turned CARTWHEELS.  I read comments saying that she danced like someone’s mother, that she looked old and slow, that it was sad to watch her.  The only thing I thought was sad about her performance is that she’s nine years older than I am and she looks a hell of a lot younger.

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