Bruce Springsteen. “Candy’s Room.” On Darkness on the Edge of Town. (Columbia, 1978.)
The Standells. The Very Best of the Standells. (Hip-O, 1966-67/1998.)
E.M. Swift. “A Reminder of What We Can Be.” Reprint of the 1980 Sports Illustrated article naming the ‘80 United States ice hockey team as Sportsmen of the Year. (1994.)29
Uncle Tupelo. “We’ve Been Had.” On Anodyne. (Sire/Reprise, 1993.)
Van Halen. Fair Warning. (Warner Brothers, 1982.)
WarGames. Directed by John Badham. (MGM, 1983.)30
29 I watched all or most of the U.S. games live or on tape delay. I watched the game versus the Soviet Union on tape delay (the greatest sporting moment in U.S. history, and ABC didn’t cover it live) while staying alone at home. Saturday, I took a Greyhound - I was fourteen - to Fargo, where my dad was working and my mom had been staying for the past few days. Sunday, I watched the final game against Finland in a motel room in Moorhead. We scored three goals in the final period to win. At some point I said “dumb Finns” to the TV set, and my mom gave me a dirty look. I watched the gold-medal ceremony at a friends of the family’s house. Sunday night, I took a Greyhound back to Grand Forks. My sister’s friend Nancy gave me a ride home from the depot. My sister, four years ahead of me, had attractive friends that I was scared of. Nancy had long blonde hair, was wearing a suede jacket with fringe sleeves, and pulled up to the depot in a red muscle car. Luckily, she had watched the games also, and I was able to talk to her.
30 In one scene where the missiles are about to launch, Grand Forks, North Dakota is announced as the Soviets’ second nuclear target after our nation’s capital. In Grand Forks, we all got a kick out of this. There had been quite a debate as to whether our town or whether Minot, North Dakota (both towns have vital Air Force bases nearby) was the #2 American target; this seemed to settle it.