![]() ![]() When I saw him, I couldn't formulate a single thought in my brain other than "Wow!" We spent the rest of the day flirting, and by the second day I had volunteered to drive him on an errand he needed to run. I heard his voice before I saw him, and I held my breath as he made his way up the stairs while telling some joke to his colleagues. In 2011, at a small IT security conference in Dayton, she met a German man who - six years later - would become her husband: The phrase "I won't back down" is engraved on the wedding rings of Niki Vonderwell and her husband, Matthias Luft. There really never had been an easy way out of what I had gone through. And when I saw live for the second and last time at Red Rocks a few months before he passed, I sang just as loudly, surrounded by several thousand fellow fans belting with the same force that I did. When I slept once by myself on the side of a mountain, completely sure that a cougar was going to come by and snack on me, I sang that song from the safety of my hammock. I didn't let being alone keep me from seeing the places I had always dreamed of. I have a lot of favorite songs of his that are lesser known, but there is no greater feeling than crossing the plains of South Dakota, window down, belting "I Won't Back Down." Because I wouldn't. And always, while driving outside cellphone range and social media's reach, there was Tom Petty. The boundless enormity of our country made my previous problems feel so small. We put thousands of miles on my vehicle, and I was happiest when there was a black shimmering strip of highway extending from my hood to the far horizon coupled with endless blue skies. Several years ago, after a harrowing 48 hours in which her house burned down and she finalized her divorce, Sara drove across the country with her young daughter. Sara Register with her daughter, Rhiannon, at a Tom Petty concert at Red Rocks, Colo., during his final tour in 2017. Suicide is an intensely sad option to get out of this broken world, but man, there was no easy way out. I knew he had been sick with mental illness and addiction for many years and suffered at the end of his life with these battles. The line "There ain't no easy way out" took on a new meaning. I felt freaked out this coincidence happened, but the car was so quiet as we all listened without saying a word. As we began driving, this song began to play. My husband, my 1-year-old daughter and I were the last to leave the funeral home. When I was 30, my dad died by suicide with a gunshot through his chest. It was so much fun! I stayed a Tom Petty fan ever since. We would get lost and then find our way out of backroads. My dad would come pick me up on the weekends and we would go for a drive in the country, listening to Tom Petty (and of course this song) loud with the windows down in his old wood-panel van, or in later years, his red Ford Probe. On April 12, 2019, it was seven years since I was diagnosed, and I am cancer-free.Įrica Kufus with her father, Bradley Bundgaard, at her high school graduation in 2000. My next two surgeons played "I Won't Back Down" for me. She listened to the whole thing, sitting there in the courtyard. I held it up to her ear and she and my brother and I just sat with tears in our eyes and listened. I said, " Mom, you know what a Tom Petty fan I've been all my life? Well, I used this song to get me through the pain and recovery from the spine surgery, and it's gonna get me through this, too." And I played "I Won't Back Down" for her. I told her I was about to have a double mastectomy, and we wouldn't know my prognosis until the results from the surgery came in. I will never forget going to the nursing home with my brother to tell my 89-year-old mother that I had cancer. Shortly after returning to work, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I did recover, my spine fused, and I was stronger than ever and went back to work after a few months. The lifelong Petty fan that I am (my home is named Dreamville), I of course chose "I Won't Back Down." My surgeon played it for me as I was going under anesthetic before the seven-hour surgery, and I played it during recovery to walk to, my goal being to walk to the rhythm as I walked around my staircase. When I was preparing to have intensive spine surgery, a friend advised me to have a prayer or mantra ready for when it was time to try to walk, because it would be very painful, very challenging. Vallerie Drorbaugh has her mantra printed above a doorway in her home. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |