Despite all my work on the Fortress of Solitude, I managed to catch the Pearl Jam Storytellers not once, but twice this weekend. For various and sundry reasons having to do with a death of a teenage girl, being 21 when Vs. came out, and Sister #2, Pearl Jam has a very special place in my heart.

It should come as no surprise that while watching Storytellers late Saturday or Sunday night I cried (incidentally, later when I can post a picture I will tell you about how I cried about three times while watching “Superman Returns”).

Eddie Vedder was talking about writing the song “Alive”. A song about a teenage-boy who finds out that the man he thought was his dad was not really his dad. In fact his real dad had just died.

It’s a song that I’ve always loved, because I relate with the boy in the song. Though my parents never hid the fact that my dad was not my real father, it’s one of those things that didn’t really sink in until I was a teenager. In throes of teenagerhood, I had decided that all my problems with my dad stemmed from my not being his ‘real’ daughter. Even now, I think it’s partially true, but not wholly true. All my sisters had a hellish relationship with my dad when they were teens.

Anyway, Eddie talked about how when he wrote the song the phrase “I’m still alive” was like a curse. continuing to live was a curse put upon him. He went on to tell the audience about how amazed he was at the audience reaction to the song, hearing all those voices signing that line over and over again “I’m still alive.” He talked about how they would move their bodies as an expression of joy, and over the years how their joy changed the meaning of that line. And now whenever he hears an audience sing that song, it reminds him how they broke the curse.

It was great to watch. To watch him explain the evolution of his song, his art. I loved that idea that an audience could take something so painful to him, interpret it in their own way, and change the meaning and feeling for him the creator.

Plus, I really like the idea that he can now take joy in something that has grown to mean so much to so many people.