To recognize the 10th anniversary of the passing of Dan Fogelberg, I sought a voice close to him:
His widow, Jean Fogelberg.
There are no Fogelbergs left in Peoria. Long a widow herself, his mother, Margaret, died two years ago. His siblings live out of state.
Though Jean Fogelberg has no Peoria roots, her husband shared many memories of his boyhood home. And when he died, he left behind essays of his childhood here. Never published, those writings are excerpted here (marked in quotes) for a Peoria memory dear to his heart, and she shows a deft sense of what Peoria meant to her spouse, especially at Christmas. Though his renowned "Same Old Lang Syne" recounts a particularly poignant Christmas-in-Peoria memory, you'll find below another East Bluff yuletide remembrance that always burned bright in his mind's eye, which Jean Fogelberg shares here for perhaps the first time anywhere.
In that way, this story includes two voices: that of a Midwest-born singer-songwriter and his artist wife. Thank you, Dan and Jean Fogelberg.
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“I can’t believe it’s been 10 years.”
I’m hearing this a lot, now that Dec. 16 is just around the corner. On that day in 2007, my husband, Dan Fogelberg, died of prostate cancer. He was 56 years old.
A few days ago I was asked to write something for the Journal Star to commemorate this, the 10th anniversary of Dan’s passing. As I sit with my laptop at our home in Maine, I’m struggling to find words. What can I say to Dan’s hometown about the man who was such a bright jewel in its crown?
I can let you know that 2017 was a huge year for Dan’s legacy, and for his fans. Two new CDs were released: “Dan Fogelberg, Live at Carnegie Hall”, where Dan played a solo show in 1979 while his parents, Larry and Margaret, watched from the audience; and the star-studded “A Tribute To Dan Fogelberg,” featuring the likes of Garth Brooks, Zac Brown, Jimmy Buffett, Michael McDonald and the Eagles.
On Aug. 13, Dan’s birthday, a sold-out crowd of 18,000 filled Fiddler’s Green Amphitheater in Colorado to attend a tribute concert and Dan’s induction into the Colorado Music Hall of Fame. In September, “Part Of The Plan,” a musical featuring 20 of Dan’s songs, debuted in Nashville to glowing reviews and award nominations.
New music, tributes and accolades— along with words like “resurgence” and “long overdue” — made it a glorious year for Dan’s memory. But I also want to write something that will have relevance in this season of glory and give a sense of what the season meant to him. Because Dan loved Christmas.
In early December, Dan would bring up the boxes from the basem*nt: stockings for the mantle, boughs for the bannisters and bulbs and decorations for the tree (which wouldn’t come down until late January, when you could finally convince him it was a fire hazard). On Christmas Eve, he’d pull out the VHS of the 1951 film "A Christmas Carol," starring Alastair Sim, and we’d both be smiling and teary-eyed at the end.
On Christmas Day, once the presents had been opened and the cats were leaping on wrapping paper and ribbons, Dan would start preparing the meal: roasted goose, acorn squash, green beans, cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes with gravy. The house was filled with tantalizing smells and the diverse Christmas music Dan had collected over the years: chorales and choirs; string quartets and guitar quartets; Loreena McKennitt, Jim Wilson and Magical Strings; and albums of his childhood like Johnny Mathis and Tony Bennett.
Dan’s favorite boyhood memory of the Christmas season in Peoria was the year there was a big ice storm. He remembered huddling by a frosty window with his older brothers, Marc and Pete, watching “a storm so violent, it rattled the glass and pelted the doors like jackhammers. Even our parents’ faces were drawn with concern and anxious tension as the very sky seemed to shatter and tear into a million tiny shards. The streets were empty of cars and people, and beneath the isolated streetlights wild shadows skittered and danced like witches at a coven.” As the night deepened, the storm blew itself out and softened into a gentle snowfall. The boys were sent to bed, happily anticipating announcements of school closings the following day."
The next morning, “We awoke to a wonderland beyond our wildest imaginings — a world tangled in ice, the trees shining and bending under its weight and the streets lying vacant and inaccessible beneath a half-inch of perfectly smooth ice. Skating ice! Could it be? Would it melt before we could try it out?”
The three brothers tumbled out of bed and wolfed down their oatmeal as the kitchen radio reported traffic accidents and power outages and urged citizens to drive only in emergencies. Schools were open, but only for students who lived within walking distance. “We lived approximately two miles from school and were accustomed to walking, but today who could walk? Today we would skate to school!”
Bundled up to his eyes, his mittens warm from the hot air register, he laced up his clumsy brown hockey skates and stepped out on to the porch. “The bitter, crackling air rushed into my lungs and sinuses freezing the small hairs lining my nose and setting my blood to pumping, my eyes to watering. At first, my feet moved tentatively towards the porch steps and, after a careful descent, found the driveway where I caught sight of my brother Peter whizzing and twirling like a speed skater down the glistening street.”
His reservations vanished and he pushed off down the steep cement driveway, only to crash at the bottom. The initial pain behind him, he got back up and glided onto the pavement, meeting a group of friends at the end of the block. There were no adults to be seen as they skated the abandoned streets toward school, laughing and inventing new games.
“What heady abandon in each reddened face! What unfettered glee in each shivering motion! The world was ours! We clumped through the hallways and into the classrooms and sat stocking-footed at our wooden desks as our gloves, hats, coats and mufflers lined the radiators and littered the floors. All talk was of the storm and skating and play and, after several unruly hours, the teachers decided to let the few students who had attended to leave.
"We spent the afternoon racing around the vacant lot behind the Episcopal church, practicing our turns and pirouettes. We held trial heats and quick sprints and hockey games and long arduous endurance races. We bruised elbows and twisted ankles and cursed and got to our feet again. We skated until it felt like the blades were attached directly to the soles of our feet. After dark, we skated within the confines of the spots the streetlights created and were allowed to stay out later than usual.
"By the next morning the ice was almost gone; the town returned to normal and the grownups regained control. We walked to school again and the cars filled the streets and highways as they had before. The storm was soon forgotten, as storms always seem to be, and the magic of that day faded from all but a few memories. But for me, the magic lingered, and if I had ever doubted that magic exists, I could no longer. Magic had spent the day with me.”
Dan was such a brilliant storyteller; I hope this winter memory transported you, if only for a moment, to a place of wonder and joy.
Merry Christmas,
Jean Fogelberg
PHIL LUCIANO is a Journal Star columnist. He can be reached at pluciano@pjstar.com, facebook.com/philluciano and (309) 686-3155. Follow him on Twitter.com/LucianoPhil.
