When I was 14, there was this older boy who liked me. You know, liked me liked me. I thought he was pretty cute and he knew some really good friends of mine, very well. They had all been kids together in Far Rockaway and then most of them moved to Oceanside (where I lived), but Alan still lived in Far Rockaway. I met Alan through these friends and he had this hot, blue, 1970 442. I, as troubled as I was, liked dating older boys (he was 18!!), and I liked to drive really, really fast. Also, he was from Queens - that’s totally like New York City and I was very impressed. So when Alan called me and told me had tickets to a concert and that he’d like to take me to the concert and dinner, I was all in. I had never heard of the band and it was in the Calderone theater, which at that point was a pretty run down, small venue in a not so nice neighborhood. I was all over it. I tried to control myself and sound composed when I told Alan that the evening he was planning for me “sounds cool”. I have no idea where we went for dinner, but when we got to the theater it was still light out and the neighborhood was rough. There were bikes parked up and down the block and Alan maneuvered his car into a space between two big hogs. We walked into the theater and it was filled with the toughest looking bunch of guys I had ever seen. They had long hair, and braided beards and tatoos everywhere. We were, by far the youngest people there and I wasn’t sure that we were going to make it out of there in one piece. Here I was, this five foot, two inch, 14 year old with too much makeup, smoking Newport 100s and thinking who the hell I was and my escort for the evening was a cute, little Jewish boy from Far Rockaway who thought he was James Dean. Of course, there wasn’t a chance in hell that I was going to let Alan know how nervous I was and he certainly wasn’t going to suggest to me that we might be in over our heads, so we found our seats and started to look around.
There were more empty seats then there were occupied and the lights were still up high, so I was really able to take in where the exits were and how far I was from them. Back then smoking in public places was not only allowed, it was encouraged and in places like this it was almost required, so I thought that if I got into trouble I could burn someone with my cigarette while I ran screaming from the building. Yeah, I didn’t really think things through back then.
I settled into my seat and started to press my shoe against the floor just to hear the sucking noise that it made when I tried to lift it from the sticky mess that was the floor. Classy joint this Calderone. Alan went to get us two beers (yes, I was 14 - it was a different world people) and I was left all by myself in this sea of bikers. I truly don’t remember any other women being there. I’m sure there were, but they weren’t sitting by me. As I started to worry that my date had been dragged off, the guy sitting in front of me turned around and looked directly at me. This man was the scariest person I had ever seen. He was holding a big rebel flag and while I knew what it was to some extent, I had no idea why anyone would carry such a thing. I assumed the band was from the South and left it at that. He had straggly hair and an even more straggly beard, was wearing a T-shirt and a black leather vest. He had rings on almost all of his fingers and tattoos on even more of them. Skulls and earrings and rubber bands in his pony tail and when he had stared at me for too long not to acknowledge him, I said, “Hi”.
“Well, haaay” he said in a really thick drawl and smiled. When he smiled the skin around his eyes got all crinkly and he reminded me of Santa Claus. That thought was so absurd that I almost laughed out loud. “Have you ever seen ‘em before?” he asked.
“Um, no I’ve never actually heard of them.”
“Well, y’all are in for a treat.” I swear to God, this was the first time I’d ever heard anyone seriously use the world “y’all” and something about it seemed so warm that I relaxed a little.
By that time Alan was making his way to our seats with the beer. My new biker friend shook Alan’s hand and I really don’t remember if we ever exchanged names - but a couple of minutes later, biker guy passed us back a bottle of Southern Comfort and in the interest of diplomacy and peace between the North and South, we gladly shared in his bottle. (Again, It was a different time). The lights lowered and the band came out and started to play. Maybe it was the warmth of Southern Comfort in my belly, or the stale beer going straight to my head, but this was the best band ever. We danced and shouted and sang along to songs we didn’t even know. We had communion with these biker people and they were our tribe. It was a great night and the songs kept running through my head and I hoped and hoped that I’d hear this band again.
A week later I heard the single on the radio. It was “Rockin’ Into the Night” and the band was .38 Special. I’ve been a big fan ever since and even saw them a couple of more times over the years. I dated Alan for a while and stayed friends after that, although we’ve lost touch now.
Tonight I was flipping through the DVR and saw that I had a new Crossroads recorded. It was .38 Special and Trace Adkins. I settled in to watch it and all these memories came flooding back. You know what the funny thing is? .38 Special comes from Jacksonville and they play Ocala once a year or so. I think I’m going to go see them and relive some of my misspent youth. I love them Wildeyed Southern Boys, I really do. And Trace ain’t bad either.
