My Broken Heart Will Go On

This happened a couple of weeks ago, but it still hurts. I'll preface by saying that everyone who knows me knows that I love Celine Dion. Even if I don't like the song she's singing, which happens quite often because some of her stuff is a little poptastic for my taste, her voice still brings tears to my eyes (the good kind, for you smart alecks out there) and gives me goosebumps almost every single time I hear her sing. She also seems to be a genuinely sweet, ebullient, giving person. Because of all this, I dressed as Celine for two or three Halloweens in a row (sorry, no pictures [especially since one year a fellow reveler asked me if I was supposed to be Jenny Jones - ouch!]);


caught her Las Vegas show two times;


own a pretty impressive Heart of the Ocean replica;


and am a proud, card-carrying Team Celine fan club member (and have been since 2000).

So on account of all the love and devotion I've shown Celine over the years, her being my lady and all, I never in my wildest dreams thought she would be the one to cause me such a titanic-sized heartache. This is what went down:

In case you hadn't heard, Celine is in the middle of a seven-continent, world tour at the present time.


I had resigned myself to missing the show, however, because San Diego wasn't one of the cities on her tour list, and I just couldn't commit to driving north all night to catch her because of work, kids, you know how it goes.

But then, a new day came in mid-October when Celine's promoters announced that she had added a San Diego date to her tour!!! She was slated at the last minute to appear at the San Diego Sports Arena on November 25th!!! I was so excited!!! My friend, Joyce, and I bought our Team Celine seats at the earliest possible opportunity and just waited (along with her husband and my mom [#1 refused to be my date - one Vegas show was enough for him]) for the happy day to arrive.


Then, horror of horrors, the following message arrived in our in-boxes less than a week before the show:

"SAN DIEGO CONCERT AT THE SAN DIEGO SPORTS ARENA
November 19 , 2008

AEG Live, the promoter of Celine Dion's Taking Chances World Tour, has regretfully had to cancel the artist's San Diego concert on Tuesday, November 25, 2008 at the San Diego Sports Arena. Celine's physician has instructed her to refrain from singing in order to completely recuperate from a recurrent naso-pharyngeal infection which was further complicated by inflamed vocal chords."

A naso-phrago what? To make matters worse, the e-mail continued:

"After reviewing artist and venue availability with tour logistics, the promoter was unable to reschedule the concert."

NOOOOOOOOOO!

But cry as I might, I had to surrender myself to the fact that Celine was not coming to San Diego after all.

I spent some time being sad, but then I got mad. The medical explanation just sounded a little fishy to me. I thought maybe what really happened was Celine had caught a glimpse of what passes for San Diego's Sports Arena and thought better of coming south. Or maybe she was saving her voice for the bigger LA market, where she was headed after San Diego. But then again, the Celine I know and love isn't someone who would make the decision to cancel a tour date lightly.

So I decided to do a little research. The Team Celine website advertised that Celine was scheduled to appear on the Grammy Awards Nomination Concert, which aired last week. I set the DVR and finally got around to watching the show this evening. And you know what? That poor little songbird's wings really were, in fact, clipped. Celine sat on a stool throughout her whole televised number and just barely whispered the notes to some song about being 17 again. No soaring octaves, no big notes held for impossibly long durations. Just a singer, sitting on a stool, humbly singing a little song. It was Celine, so her voice still sounded beautiful, but not otherworldly like it usually does. So Celine is forgiven for breaking my heart last month. I hope she feels better soon, accepts my apology for all the bad thoughts I sent her way, and comes to San Diego some day soon!!!