(From the Indiana years)

“I met a girl who sang the blues and I asked her for some happy news.  But she just smiled and turned away…”

She was special on stage and also in life, contrary to what others thought.  You could definitely hear the pain and angst when Janis Joplin sang, a true epitome of a blues singer.  The account that sticks out to me most about her life occurred shortly before she died.  

Joplin grew up in a small town in Texas where she was labeled an outcast in her high school.  People who would go on to accomplish so much less in life than her derided and made her feel worthless and lonely as a teenager.  Joplin would eventually become one of the legends in rock music.  At the height of her success, Joplin decided to return to her hometown for her ten-year high school reunion where she thought she would finally receive the respect and love that she longed for all those years.    

Sadly, circumstances may change, but people often don’t.  Joplin returned home only to find that people still treated her poorly.  Her high school classmates hardly acknowledged her even though she had eclipsed them in fame, wealth, and success.  To them, she was still an outcast.  One of her friends chronicles how Joplin staggered the streets of her hometown drunk after failing to quieten her inner demons.  A few months later, she dies of a heroin overdose after an unsuccessful attempt to numb her pain and loneliness in a hotel room.  She once said that she would make love to 25,000 people on stage and still go home alone.   

All that is gold does not glitter.