"How are you doing these days?"
It's Christmas and I'm in the kitchen with my dad as he struggles his way through his first meat-free roast dinner. It's a fairly innocuous question; the kind that's often sandwiched between the likes of "found a girlfriend yet?" and "eating properly?" in our monthly Groundhog Day-style catch up sessions ("obviously not" and "does pizza count yet?", for the record). But this time, he digs a little deeper: "Y'know… with your depression?"
Such well meaning ham-fistery, like most of my dad's actions, owes an inordinate amount to Bruce Springsteen. The "Born In the USA" megastar has been a constant presence in our house: At just three months old, Dad tried to take me to my first Springsteen show, semi-seriously attempting (and failing) to convince my mum that it would be integral to my development into a red-blooded "real man". Since then, The Boss has played the role of surrogate stepfather with aplomb; acting as the shining light of hope, flamboyance and the American dream that was ever-present through my parent's divorce and the development of my teens. From the post-9/11 anger of The Rising soundtracking my angsty puberty, to the golden sax of "Thunder Road" lending every drab British seaside holiday a sun-kissed haze, The Boss offered both escapism and grounding whenever either was needed. But the release of Springsteen's autobiography Born to Run dragged far darker topics to the fore.
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