The first time I heard John would have been in late spring 1982. My older brother died from injuries sustained in a car accident 8 days earlier on Mar. 11th. So I inherited all of his music albums but was unabled to actually listen to them for a couple of months because everytime I looked at them brought back my memories of him and would start crying. But after a couple of months I started listening to John Cougar and found his singing to be awesome.
I remember hearing Jack & Diane for the first time on the car radio while on a date with my girlfriend at the time on our way to the drive-in. Something else that went by the wayside while on my way to adulthood.

I met my wife about 18 months later and low and behold, found that she was a bigger Cougar fan than I was. Her biggest dream was to get to see John play live, but because of where we live in Atlantic Canada, it was never within our budget. Not until this year. Our oldest son always said that if John Cougar ever came to Canada he would  buy his mother the ticket to go. Well, because of the concert date being so close to my birthday (Feb. 4th) he bought 2 tickets and gave my wife one for Christmas and me the other one for my birthday. However, with me disabled for the past couple of years and confined to a wheelchair and taking so many medications, I really wasn't sure if it would be worth the trip for me to go. I mean, I didn't want her to need to do most of the driving, plus take care of me, helping me to take bathroom breaks and so on. Needing to get my chair out and put it together every time that we stopped. But let me tell you, after getting there and seeing her face light up when he came on stage in Ottawa, it was priceless. Then sitting and watching the performance that he and his band put on, man, it was awesome. Worth all of the suffering that I've endured the past couple of years since I got sick.

So, we left for home Monday morning and talked, reminisced over the prebious nights show and had a great time. Listened to his singing on the radio and cd player all the way to Montreal where we stopped for yet another bathroom break. We were in the store for no more than 20 mins. Came back out and found that our car had been broken into and the satellite radio, camera and as well as my wallet from the glove box was stolen. It was like someone had just busted our hot air baloon that we had been riding in. It was like our journey that we were expecting to last for a lifetime had just ended. Gone were the pics from my birthday celebration, our trip up to Ottawa to see the now John Mellencamp concert "No Better Than This" tour, the pics that we took at the concert to help remind us of our wish come true.

We lost our house to a fire along with all of our possessions, well, this feeling was pretty much the same as it was on that day.

After getting through with the procedures at the police dept. we were solemnly heading the rest of the way home from what was suppose to be a wonderful lasting awesome memory (but was now a memory of a horrible experience because of the need for someones fix or high), we started listening to John's cd again and started feeling a bit better and were glad to be alive and at least we were not hurt. It is a shame that it all ended like it did, goes to show "AGAIN" that life doesn't always go the way that we plan. It is like an old friend told me today, if it wasn't for bad luck, I wouldn't have any at all... 

Thanks John for the awesome experience, it was really the best concert that I have ever been at!!! Hopefully we will get to see you again before this life is over and we embark on another journey!! Hopefully we won't get robbed on that one... lol