#33 | i think i'll go to boston

An elite scream-sing-in-your-car song, even 19 years later

It was the summer of 2006. I was graduating high school & the boy I dated from freshman to junior year had just returned from his first year of college. We were both dating other people but still had that lingering, unresolved tension, navigating the mystery of who we were to each other & not yet understanding the emotional benefits of going non-contact.

Enter Boston by Augustana.

If I told you the number of times I sang this song at the top of my lungs in my car as tears streamed down my face, you’d probably call my therapist and beg her to invent a time machine so she could go back to June 2006 and intervene.

This song has the kind of emotionally fraught lyrics that make an 18 year old think someone really sees her.

In the light of the sun, is there anyone?
Oh, it has begun
Oh, dear, you look so lost, your eyes are red when tears are shed
This world, you must have crossed, you said

"You don't know me, and you don't even care"
Oh-yeah, and you said
"You don't know me, and you don't wear my chains"
Oh-yeah

I couldn’t offer you a deep analysis of these lyrics today, but they felt like they were written specifically for me back then.

Because, you see, I really was going to Boston. For college, later that summer.

Oh-yeah, and I think I'll go to Boston, I think that I was tired
I think I need a new town to leave this all behind
I think I need a sunrise, I'm tired of a sunset
I hear it's nice in the summer, some snow would be nice, oh-yeah

It was my chance to start over, to escape the bubble of suburbia, to reinvent myself, to leave this relationship behind. This song was an anthem.

I recently saw a friend share this song to her Instagram stories & all those complicated, youthful feelings came rushing back. The entire album is still a banger, and seeing Augustana open for The Fray at the House of Blues that summer is still one of the best concerts I’ve been to.

I’ve listened to this song so many times throughout the years, and each time I hear it I find myself transported back to my Honda Civic, driving out of that suburban subdivision through the tears in my eyes.

Maybe this is a depressing story to share! But it also feels like a universal experience, the angst & ennui of moving past that first love. And Boston isn’t the only song that triggers this kind of feeling; I’m sure I’m missing a lot but these were also on heavy rotation in my teens & twenties:

• Someone Like You by Adele (& most of the rest of 21 if I’m being honest)

• Use Somebody by Kings of Leon

• Pretty much the entire Heartthrob album by Tegan & Sara

• Somebody That I Used to Know by Gotye

I can only imagine what emotional terror The Tortured Poets Department would have unleashed upon me had it existed in 2006 😅