Andy Borgmann's Blog

Yesterday I was watching VH1. Which, on a side note, when did VH1 become cool? When I was in high school, VH1 was for all the 80s and early 90s music that no one listened to anymore. Now, they are usually at the cutting edge of releasing new, good music. But I digress(and fairly early in the post I might add).

Anyways, while watching VH1, they played four songs in a row (of which I might have the order confused). Nickelback's "Savin' Me," Natasha Bedingfield's "Single", Daniel Powter's "Bad Day," and then finally The All American Rejects "Move Along." It was after this that I realized, VH1 has become the station that speaks for the 20-somethings.

Why you ask? I think those four songs encapsulate what it feels like to be post-graduate, single and in your 20's. Bedingfield's music video was amazing. Why? Because in one attempt, she expressed lyrically how great it was to be single, and through the actual video itself, the emptiness with being single. In fact, it caught me off guard at first. I was sitting there thinking, does she like being single or not? And then it hit me, just like every other single, 20-year old, the answer to that question depends on the day.

Nickelback, like so much of its music, does a great job of reminding us all that life is short and we are all in need of saving.

Powter's "Bad Day" should be the theme song of the 20s (in fact I might create a blog just about that another day). I know I feel like I wake up every morning, whether good or bad, and there is just something about it that is lonely and missing. But this loneliness isn't like depressive loneliness that just consumes you. No, it is far more subtle. Like the video portrays. It seems like this loneliness is there simply because you miss something by a half hour each day. Its so close. Its just not there.

"Move Along" barely needs an explanation. It's that obvious. From the moment we're born to the moment we die, humanity is marked with this innate ability to just move along. Not thinking about what is going on. Not thinking about why I am longing for the next stage of life, but just merely running to that stage as fast as I possibly can. When I was in college, all I could think about was getting out in the real world and getting a job. Now that I am there, all i seem to be able to think about is buying a condo and starting a family.

John Eldredge's book "A Journey of Desire" speaks so clearly to this. We need to become people who are content with where we are at. As cheesy as it sounds, life isn't about the destination, but rather the journey, and Who we experienced that journey with. Yet most of us will go through life and reach the end of our countdown (Nickelback reference) and realize that we were so focused on the destinations, we missed what makes life worth living. So maybe VH1 isn't speaking for the 20-somethings, maybe VH1 is speaking for every stage in life (take that MTV!)