Inspired by Blur (1994). Tracey Jacks [Song]. Parklfe [Album]. Warner Music
Photo by Justin Simmonds on Unsplash
Do you ever get bored with normal? Then you’ll love the tale of Tracy Jacks by Blur. It’s the story of a civil servant who has the most normal of lives. So ‘normal’ it is perhaps the epitome of the British equivalent of the American dream. A steady respectable job, enjoying golf with friends, and the money to see a private Doctor in one of London’s fashionable Harley Street clinics.
His health and wellbeing are also very ‘normal’ in the same sense. Middle-aged with some middle-aged spread, prescribed healthy living by the Harley Street doctor as his life is perhaps a little too rich. Maybe a bit too much food and wine.
Although he has a very socially aspiring and respectable life, Tracy Jacks is heading to a mid-life crisis fast, represented in the song by his early morning jaunt to Walton seafront where he runs around naked.
The warnings were all there. Whilst Tracy Jacks had the life others might be dreaming of, it wasn’t the life for him. The frustration bubbles over and he destroys his house.
So, OK, it’s not the report of a real person. But it’s a really good parable of how easy it is for us to be socialised into living a life which doesn’t really fit with what we hoped it might be. In effect, the story of Tracy Jacks leads us to question, have we been sold a lie? Are we aligned with our hopes and values for life, or those expected of us and sold to us as ‘the good life’?
There will be many external pressures on us to conform to society's ideas of ‘normality’ and to live our lives following this dream but there are consequences for our own wellbeing when our lives and expectations do not match. In our hearts we know the ‘normal’ is overrated.:
Our choice today is to hear the story of Tracy Jacks before we find ourselves in a place we regret, our equivalent of naked on Walton seafront, or even destroying our own home. Our opportunity is to go beyond what is expected of us as conforming to the standards of ‘normal’ to discover a life which isn’t overrated but fulfilling.
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