For many years I have privately loved the song Total Eclipse of the Heart, by Bonnie Tyler. I started to love it when it came out in 1983, when I was fourteen.
This month I’m turning fifty. And for some reason, every time I think about turning fifty, I think about singing this song that I’ve loved for over over thirty years, and making other people listen to me sing it. I guess in a way it’s a kind of phoenix moment I’m hoping for. That I’ll burn up in some exquisite shame and then I’ll be born again into the second chapter of a century.
So I asked my friends Mike and Brian and Tobin to record the song with me in the East Calais community center at the back of the post office.
I knew they didn’t like the song and they didn’t really want to do it, so I felt really bad asking them to do it, which in a way seemed like part o the phoenix moment I was looking for.
I feel ambivalent about turning fifty. I don’t know what’s supposed to happen next. So I recorded conversations with some friends about getting older. I talked with my son Henry, who’s 16. Bianca Giaever is 29. Scott Carrier is 60-something. And Clare Dolan is around my age.
Here’s a show about turning fifty and recording Total Eclipse of the Heart.
Credits
Thank you to Scott Bassage for helping me secure the best recording studio in central Vermont at the back of the East Calais post office
Thank you to the band: Brian Clark, Mike Donofrio and Tobin Anderson (pictures below)
Thank you to my friends who talked with me for this show: Scott Carrier, Clare Dolan, Bianca Giaever and Henry Heilman
Sponsor!
This show is sponsored by the excellent people at Honey Road, making the best food in Burlington on the corner of Church and Main. Click on the picture and check out the menu…
LOVE IT!
Thanks
I loved the show but I have to tell you, most of your fears do not reflect reality. The objective truth is that you look great in a miniskirt and you are more visible than you have ever been in your entire life. You have more listeners, more exposure of your work, more people wearing RumbleStrip tee-shirts, more friends, more ambition than when RS began, and more love than ever. I can’t wait to hear the next big show.
Simply wonderful. What a 50th birthday party for you and all of the rest of us. I was one of the lucky ones who got to go the party and didn’t have to sing on the little stage. And I didn’t have to muse about turning 50 – and what lies beyond that alarming bench mark birthday. The show made me laugh and to marvel that you have so many interesting, eccentric, loyal friends and admirers who joined so loudly in the last part of the song. And these were just the lucky few who were close enough to be at the party itself. The far flung radio fans join me I am sure, in celebrating your birthday. For the record, I am well beyond my “Use by date” age and predict with the authority granted by experience, that yours will be an extraordinary final 1/3 of life (and maybe lots more) filled with marvelous friends, curiosity and contentment. Keep on doing what you are doing for – yourself and the rest of us.
So so awesome! I’m about to turn 60 and it couldn’t be more relevant. And wacky and impossible and hysterical. I love this show and love that it’s you doing it. There’s only one EH. 50, 90. Keep on truckin.
This is so FUN!
I don’t even like the song but laughed and cried, the delivery is priceless.
Happy birthday, you nailed the spirit of it. . . cheers to the excellent accompaniment too.
Erica Heilman is a rare gem, the rarest. Her birthday party was great fun. I will say that she and Tobin
(Tobin Anderson, a national treasure of a writer as far as I’m concerned) should definitely NOT go on the road
as a duet. But the band rocked, the evening rocked, and everyone laughed and cried. The whole party was
deeply informed by mortality, but probably no one uttered that word. I eavesdropped all over the place,
and heard “Erica is awesome” oh I’d say thirty times (28 from Erica, but so what?) I don’t love every episode
of RumbleStrip but even the ones I feel dubious about are inimitable—Erica is that rarest thing on public
radio—an original voice. I think “Total Eclipse of the Heart” now should be the B-side of
“Moonlight in Vermont.” (But please, not in Erica and Tobin’s version!) Erica is also, as you know, an amazing
private investigator. She is the hero —and written of by actual name—in my novel set right next door to Erica’s
house. She deals with crimes in reality and in fiction. I myself can’t remember turning fifty but I’ll never forget Erica’s
party. It was so generous. I love the photograph in front of the post office; it looks like a 60’s album cover.
I just got a chance to listen to this. I was saving it until could pay attention because I am closing in on 50 *and* I have a thing about Total Eclipse of the Heart and I wanted to hear about both of those things. I realized, almost at the end, that the entire time I had a smile stuck on my face. I laughed so hard where your friend was describing putting you out to pasture and then what the pasture would be like. When I was 11, in 1982, my parents separated and I moved into an apartment with my mom. She was crazy about Bonnie Tyler and that song in particular. (I don’t know, did she actually have other songs? There was a B side at the very least…) My mom listened to that 45 all. the. time. I would come home from school and open the door and hear it blaring. Weekends while we cleaned the apartment? Blaring from the living room. Late at night while she and her friend (also recently divorced) drank wine on the couch? Quietly playing on repeat… I hear it and I feel all cringe-y inside. But listening to your version has given it a new life! I can think about this instead! I got a little bit teary at the end when the people at your party were singing along, too. This was so good.
Loved it, thanks for bringing us along for the ride! Happy Birthday Erica!
Happy Birthday, Erica Heilman. Total Eclipse of the Heart, being so melodramatic, might have worked wonderfully with that twang. I loved hearing everyone at your party singing along. You tapped deep into something. On becoming invisible – you sure are audible to a lot of people these days. Thanks for sharing a little vulnerability.
Erica,
I’m so grateful for this entire podcast. Your work is so illuminating! From the brilliant “Problems” series, to your ability to show the majesty in minutae, from the personal dignity that you invite your subjects to offer, to the real time affirmations that I hear in your voice with each piece, I’m just plain grateful.
I live in Portland, Oregon, but I’m from Massachusetts (and spent some time as a child and adult in Vermont), but when I listen to Rumble Strip, I feel like I’m back in the Berkshires…I don’t know how you do it, but it’s magical.
I also did my graduate thesis on the Poet/Playwright David Budbill, whom I assume you’re aware of. I haven’t heard a Rumble Strip episode on him (I know, he’s passed, but it’s never too late…he’s the NE Kingdom’s poet laureate in my opinion, but you’d know far better than me).
Please do a show on his work some time.
That’s so funny. I was just talking about David Budbill with someone the other day. I will think on this. And THANK YOU for listening Patrick, and for taking the time to write in!
Dear Erica,
congratulations and many thanks for such a great show!
I am 33 and having my first baby this year has very much heightend my awareness for getting older and that (my) life is not going on forever…so despite the profanity I was very moved listening to you! If my daughter will speak similarly of me in about 12 years that will be the most important achievement in my life 🙂
And more generally: thank you for allowing me to brain-travel to Vermont and meet you and your amazing friends from time to time. Greetings from a stranger in Berlin, Germany
Nell,
33 is the best age EVER. That’s when I had my son. Perfect age for having babies! And thank you for taking the time in a busy parenting time to brain travel to Vermont. Give me a call if you ever get here. And congratulations on new motherhood!
e
Happy 50th, Erica! This story made me laugh and cry at the same time. Good job! By the way, I turned 51 on my last birthday. I know that song and associate it with a short-lived TV show featuring the hunk, Jon Erik Hexum, who was a guilty pleasure, along with the song. Sadly, he didn’t live to see 50, so we can count ourselves lucky, even though we’re invisible to guys like him.
If there is one gift this birthday has given me, it’s the certainty that EVERYONE REALLY LOVES THAT SONG. I feel I can face my fities, knowing this…
I think about that question that somebody had- how do you be yourself across all these different periods of change? It is a good question, and one I am tuned into in the shift between semesters and long winter and summer breaks… AndI love school. But how can I still prove to myself that I am devoted to my studies, to my art practice while on these long breaks, where time moves differently and my responsibilities?
I think that impulse to share outward remains the same, and I think the work of covering that song accomplishes that. How cool.
I’ve been thinking about that question ever since the interview. I agree it’s a good question…without an easy answer. But a very interesting question to ponder. Thank you for writing in.
I’m one who listens to your podcasts way down the road because I like to wait until I’m in a reflective, contemplative state, and really ready to HEAR what you and your guests have to say. With that being said… Happy waaaaaay belated 50th birthday, Erica! I really, really loved this episode. I will be celebrating 52 this summer, and I have to say that the 50’s are my best decade yet. I thought it was my 30’s. And then I thought it was my 40’s. But here we are and now I understand the appeal of the aging process. Finer. Sweeter. More deeply meaningful. Thank you for doing what you do. I’m actually sporting my Rumble Strip t-shirt as I’m out and about today! 🙂
Oh, and I can’t tell you how many times I soulfully belted out Total Eclipse of the Heart as a teenager! So fantastic that this is what you wanted to do for your 50th.
I am beginning to believe that EVERY SINGLE ONE OF US loved that song when we were teenagers. I feel a certain pride for outing all of us. Thank you so much for listening Marni, and for rockin the tshirt. I’m hopeful about the 50s. Not convinced yet…but hopeful!
I recently listened to “Fifty. A Phoenix Moment” and feel that it ranks with such Rumble Strip masterpieces as “An American Life,” the “Our Show” series, all of the converations with Leland, and “Problems, Episode 1: Grout and the Contra Dance.”
As someone who recently turned fifty, I was both astonished and moved by the way this show addresses such phenomena of maturity as becoming invisible to youth, and recognizing that certain clothes are not yours to wear anymore.
These are precisely the things that have occured to me privately, and I held them inside myself with lonesome sense of shame.
But Erica addresses these troublesome realizations with such poignancy and tact that, in a sudden soulful rush, I realized that what I’m feeling is not at all unusual.
Perhaps this doesn’t make these realizations any less sad, but does make living with them a lot less lonely.
Only a brave and kind human being could have made such a soulful work of art as this—thank you endlessly, Erica!
PS—You really sing well! You made me realize that “Total Eclipse Of The Heart” is a great song indeed. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ERICA!!!
Thomas,
This is well timed. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about these things. About a gathering invisibility, about certain kinds of maturity that I’ve not achieved and are beginning to feel conspicuously absent. Lots of things. The fifties seem to present a paradigm shift I still don’t understand. And yes…the only thing that makes it easier is having the good company of other people in their fifties asking the same questions. And you know what? I still might pull out my short kilt on a good day.
I am very late to the game, but so glad that The faceBook (speaking of being of a certain age) somehow introduced me to You. I will be binge listening for a while now, I suspect, and let’s be clear about one thing… Total Eclipse Of The Heart is a masterpiece! Keep up the great work, and wear your kilt whenever you damn well please. Cheers! TM
Oh my gosh, so great. Thank you from someone in San Francisco, living in the lost decade (we exist!), and turning 54 in a few days.
WE EXIST!!!!! WE ARE PROUD!! Thank you so much for listening Denise.
This: “I feel pretty ambivalent about turning 50. Up until now, it seems like I’ve been trying to get to the right place, or prove something, and now I don’t feel like that, which is nice in a way, but I don’t really know what happens next.”
I don’t know who you are, and I only found your podcast today, but that you were able to put into words exactly what I’ve struggled to convey since turning 50 last year absolutely blows my mind. Thank you.
I can’t wait to listen to more of your shows. 🙂
Solidarity my friend.
I loved this so much! I sing like a mouse, and that rip-roaring singing was such a boost at the end. Happy birthday!
Wow – listening to this for the first time- and as I approach 60! This is so great! I love hearing you sing and what a gift Henry gave you here with his loving and insightful words. I hope your 50’s so far have been good to you. Despite the cancer , the death of my parents, COVID and the various other ups and downs- there have been so many peak moments these last 10 years. I am shaping in my minds eye the next decade. I find inspiration from my energetic, in their 70’s and 80’s something year old friends. Love to you and Henry.
Thank you Lizzy. And almost HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
I’m late coming to the party as I just recently discovered your podcast. But I’ve spent most of today listening to your shows. I feel like I found a new friend.
Thank you for your amazing work!
(And you rock at singing Total Eclipse of the Heart)
Thank you so much for listening Ellen!