Angel at a U2 Concert

First published November 4, 2005

She was probably a little too large to be a prom queen.

And her hair was probably a little too black, nothing like the beauty parlor blonde of prom queens. She had obviously had that too-black hair carefully cut and styled for the concert, but it was a short, sensible cut, not at all what a prom queen would require for a night at the Palace.

Her outfit was what you might call an “enthusiastic” shade of green. It was a color that the average prom queen would probably avoid in favor of pinks or whites or pastels.

She was at the U2 concert with a couple of girl friends, who were also probably a little to large to be prom queens.

And she was gorgeous.

She stood in the front row of the pit, as close as she could possibly get to where the stocky genius Rock Star marched up and down the stage in his bad haircut, purple shades, black jeans, sensible shoes, and leather jacket. She sang every word of every one of his brilliant songs in perfect synchronization with him, sometimes watching with a look that said that she could not believe what she was seeing, and other times closing her eyes and soaring into his lyrics, shaking her head from side to side with the music.

Every now and then the whole experience would seem to overwhelm her, and she would clutch the sides of her head as if she needed to hold it to keep it from embracing the beat.

But she never stopped singing.

It would be easy to dismiss her as nothing more than a girl with a crush on a Rock Star. But I have to believe that the story behind her angelic face has to be a lot better than simple hero-worship.

You see, in the thunderous symphony of sounds and spotlights spilling from the stage, her face glowed with an even greater brilliance than the show we’d all paid to see. It was a glow generated deep in the heart of a young girl who was completely and perfectly happy – completely and perfectly involved – with where she was at that moment.

Not far from where I was standing, a girl about the same age as the black-haired angel in the pit brushed lint off of her size-2 skirt and smiled indulgently at the activity on the stage and at her date. She had almost certainly been a prom queen at one time. She bobbed her head with the beat, she held her cell phone up and waved it in time with the music when everyone else did, and she even valiantly tried to lip-sync part of one of U2’s most popular songs. I’m sure she enjoyed the show.

But she didn’t live the show.

You know, I can’t help thinking about that angel in the pit with the too-black hair. I wonder if later, as the echoes of Bono’s voice and the ringing in her ears faded away, as all the prom queens reestablished their beautifully manicured domination over the real world, if she had some way to recreate the pure joy that wrapped around her as she danced in the edge of that stage.

And I wonder if she’s ever looked in a mirror and recognized in herself the radiant and pure beauty that she unselfishly beamed in the direction of the Rock Star – and me – on that night.

I hope so.

Copyright © 2005 Michael Ball