It first caught my ear because of the title. I’d had a long, angst-y on-and-off thing with someone for many years. At one point, I found out one of my co-workers was psychic (I was the only person he ever told, by the way — not even his wife. People are always telling me their secrets!) and so I asked him about it.
He closed his eyes and gave it some thought. When he opened them again, he looked apologetic. He said, “I’m sorry. You’re just parallel lines that never meet. It’s never going to happen.” (He was right.)
So years later, when I first heard the tune, the intensity of the lyrics brought all that back. Todd Rundgren was living with someone else (they had two kids) and his backup singer Michelle Gray was married, but they started fooling around on tour and fell in love. Much heartbreak and drama! After the tour, Michelle went to stay with her mother and told her how she broke things off with Todd, but she knew it was the right thing to do. While she’s at her mother’s, Todd mails her the demo for this song. She listened to it with her mother, who said, “Oh, now I understand.” (Or words to that effect.)
Now they’re married and have a grown son. Whew! If someone wrote a song like this for me, I’d probably get divorced, too.
