jessie's girl.

i was listening to my regular morning radio station last week and, like a gift from the gods, they had rick springfield on.  sigh.   (thank you, dean blundell)  touted as one of the greatest songs of all time, jessie's girl is undisputably mr. springfield's biggest hit and is the penultimate anthem of unrequited love.

legend has it that rick attended a stained glass class (an artsy rocker dude?  nice!) with his friend gary and gary's girlfriend.  poor rick had it bad for gary's girl and wrote the song.  of course, "gary" doesn't have the exact same ring as "jessie", and rick is probably glad he didn't use his friend's actual moniker.  apparently, oprah attempted to track down gary's girlfriend (rick has stated that he did not remember her name) but to no avail.  so, probably to this day, gary's girl doesn't even know that she was the inspiration behind the classic.  but then again, doesn't that just make the song better?