Whose Gift Is It, Anyway?

Yesterday I was given a gift - technically, it was a 'hopeful' gift for my daughter; I had mentioned to a friend that I was getting her a record player for Christmas, and he purchased a blind assortment of 70s and 80s rock/pop/funk 45s, hoping I could get at least a couple out of the selection that would be good for her. That was a thoughtful idea, in and of itself.

I took the box to work last night, knowing I’d have time to go through them - and it turned into a gift for me. Any time somebody does something for your child, it is something done for you - but what I got out of it had nothing to do with her.

I opened the box and spent the next two hours in my own little happy bubble.

The first thing I noticed was each record came with a jukebox label stored in the sleeve with it (the way I used to keep them); that’s where the fun started, and it went from there. I grew up with two jukeboxes at home; we had one in the house and one in the large garage out back. My father would let my two sisters and I fill up the one inside every time we had a party. The ritual was for him to take us to Peter’s Record One-Stop (PROS) in Dedham and we would each buy ten 45s – I amassed quite a collection from those trips. The jukebox held 81 records and each of us would get 20 slots to fill, and the last slot would be filled with a record we all agreed on. Then the three of us girls would spend two weeks ‘discussing’ our choices, because there were certain songs we all liked and none of us wanted to ‘waste’ a choice on something the others would have chosen (that’s where we learned to barter. Sort of.)

It’s a beautiful thing to stand in front of a jukebox, to peruse the title strips and see all of your favorite songs displayed for your selection.

Dad always reset the counter on the jukebox beforehand and the day after the party would laughingly tell us that our two weeks’ worth of record debate was wasted, because we played the same six songs all night (we were each aged 10 – 13 during this time period; repetitive radio was the thing).

The jukebox in the garage in back would be close to the edge of one of the three bay doors and face the driveway – you could listen inside or outside. After our elementary school began teaching us the New York Hustle in gym class (after square dancing), that backyard jukebox hosted neighborhood line dances in our driveway.

 Night fevah, night fevah-ah-ah, we know how to do it …

I went through all 50 of the records and not only did I know every one of them, I liked every one of them. I ended up sitting on the floor with the 45s splayed all around me, like my father used to do when I was really young. I was handling them with the happy familiarity of putting them in order to listen to – that physical act made the memories tangible; hands remember how records were held – and even without a turntable next to me, I was able to ‘listen’ to them.

Then I was thinking about the last time I actually just sat and listened to records. It was almost three years ago with my best friend, Donna – and that time was ‘just like old times’ (except for the fact that we were also drinking wine). I subjected her to a live performance of Gene Pitney’s “Town Without Pity”.  I’m smiling now, remembering how she was laughing at me.

I sat there for a long time, transported back to a time I enjoyed. I already have the records sorted for my daughter – the few that she knows will be gifts under the tree, and then the others will be played for her later. My own record player is in storage, and now I’m impatient for her to get hers so that I can listen to records ‘with her’ – so now my Christmas anticipation is even more … anticipatory.

Music has been imprinted on me my entire life; I tell ‘time’ with songs, using music as communication is my native language, and nothing inspires my writing more than music (and what it triggers) does. After I resurfaced from my bubble I got out my keyboard and starting writing, and was able to write steadily for the next hour.

That gift for my daughter meant – and still means – so much more to me because I’m still ‘getting’ from it.

What a nice surprise! Thank you.