The White Album

(re-run)

The last time I saw the Beatles cover band in the Santa Cruz mountains hippie town of Felton, I noticed that most of the crowd was coupled off, and most of the couples didn’t dance. They were too old, having been die-hard Beatles fans for fifty years. It was a shame. The floor is real wood.
My girlfriend and I had come over to Don Quixote’s from the Monterey peninsula, but she kept going outside for a smoke. That left me sitting alone and tapping my toes to the beat.
A good-looking guy came over and asked me to dance. I jumped up, ready to go. He was about my height and had his groove going.
I leaned over to him halfway through the song and said, “I LOVE the Beatles!”
He leaned over and replied, “So do my parents!”
Oh, crap. His parents? How old was this guy?
I danced with him until Yvonne came back inside from her smoke and came onto the floor.
“He’s cute!” she said.
“He’s young,” I said.
“How young?”
“I don’t know.”
He turned out to be fifteen years younger than I am. By the end of the night he asked me to go to Mendocino for the weekend to a rock festival.
I politely said no thank you. Since when is a first date a whole weekend? Plus, his age!
I went back to Don Quixote’s this past spring to see the same cover band, The Sun Kings, only now the venue is called Flynn’s Cabaret, and the cover price has gone up by $8.00 to $25.00.
It’s okay. It you want live music, you have to support live music. Plus, now the band plays four hours instead of three. The Mexican place is now a steak house. I wonder if the wine will be any better.
Will the cute guy be there, or his parents? This time I will have my younger sis with me. She lives near the venue. Based on the ticket sales online, I’d say it will be the same crowd of older non-dancing couples. This time the band is featuring the White Album: Rocky Raccoon, Judy in the Sky with Diamonds, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, etc.
It was a long drive through traffic on highway 1 to get to Felton. The parking is tough. But I forgot all that when I hear the harmonies of Drew and the boys, as my friend Bob calls the Sun Kings. It was a shorter drive home with no traffic. I wish I’d had someone riding with me to keep me awake. But this trip was unexpected and unplanned. I had to seize the opportunity and go hear live music.
The band was great that night, but I’ve decided that The White Album is not my favorite one.
Since that night Sis came out of rehab, returned home, went back in the hospital again, then rehab, then hospital, then rehab, now board and care in a private home. The best thing she ever did was to buy a long term health care policy.
If anything, my caregiving role has shown me that life is short. You never know what’s coming around the corner, so get out there and do what you want NOW.