***Growing Up Absurd In The 1950s- In The Heat Of The Last Dance Night

Recently in a related sketch about growing up absurd in the 1950s I commented on my cluelessness about what to do, or not do, about girls which went like this:

“Nobody, nobody that I can recall, ever spoke about sex, ever informed us three boys, three Roman Catholic household boys, about what the heck to do with, ah, girls, or about them. And so we, I, learned the personal arts out on the streets just like about every kid did in our 1950s Irish and Italian-edged working-class neighborhood. Learned it mostly wrong, mostly hard-bitten and mostly hurt-filled before we, I, got it more or less right a couple of divorces, and a few sorrows later. The intertwined bodies’ part was the least of it, far more worrisome, far more challenging was that first last dance kiss, the one that sealed your fate for a while anyway. Some things once you start growing old you are mournful over but not that. Here’s somebody’s story that proves the point.”

And this one will put paid to that point as well.  

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Scene: Prompted by the cover photograph, the memory cover photograph, which graced each CD compilation in a Heart of Rock ‘n’ Roll series recently reviewed here. The photo on this CD, as might be expected, shows a he, Jimmy Callahan, and a she, Kathy Kelly, in formal attire dancing, dancing that last sweet teenage high school, maybe the senior prom, dance. Or it had better be else this scene will turn to ashes)

“I don’t understand why it took you so long to ask me out, Mr. James Callahan,” murmured Kathy Kelly as they clasped hands in anticipation of the last dance. Jimmy mumbled, or it seemed like mumbling to Kathy, that he was shy, that he was busy, that he wasn’t sure that she even noticed him, or if she did notice him, liked him. Kids’ stuff, typical guy kids’ stuff, thought Kathy. But just now, unbelievably, the last dance, the last sweet time high school dance before facing the Cold War world and whatever it held out in that 1957 night, was to begin. But that world stuff was for tomorrow tonight Kathy has finally, finally, snagged the boy she has been mooning over for, well, let’s leave it as a long time, long before rock ‘n’ roll made it easier for a guy like Jimmy Callahan to ask a girl like Kathy Kelly out on to the dance floor without having to get all balled up in following the leader close dancing, sweaty palms and all. Now though was the time for slow dancing, slow last dance dancing and two-left feet, two left-shoeless feet, heck, two left-snow-shoed shod feet or not, Jimmy, as Kathy beamed to herself, was snagged.

Kathy looking resplendent in her Filene’s finest formal dress, complete with lacy see-though shawl, and topped off with a Jimmy corsage, a corsage that spoke more powerfully to her victory than ten million dances, and that finally felt that it all worth it feeling another ten million. Worth the “every trick in the book” that she had to pull out of the hat in order that he would “ask” her to their senior prom, the last chance Kathy would get to claim her Jimmy before he left for State later in the summer. Just that hand-clasped moment she hoped, hoped to the stars above, that they played her “their” song, a song that she had been listening to with Jimmy last dance dancing in mind since, well, you already know, a long time.

That right choice might also be the last chance to put her mark on him, although earlier in the evening she sensed something, something unsaid, when they played 16 Candles by the Crests and Jimmy mumbled something about how he was sorry that he couldn’t make it to her 16th birthday party, although Kathy had gone through six levels of hell to try and get him there. Then he kind of backed off when they played Patsy Cline’s cover of Crazy and right after that he said he didn’t understand how someone could keep on “carrying the torch” when the love affair was over. And he was definitely moody when they played I’m Sorry by Brenda Lee, calling it drippy. He lightened up a little when they played in In The Still Of The Night by the Five Satins and said he loved doo wop, proving it by knowing all the words and doing some fine harmony in his deep bass voice.

Suddenly some awfully familiar music started up and the last dance began, the last dance ending with Only You by The Platters. And just as the Platters got into the heart of the song, the heart-felt “only you” part, Jimmy, red-faced, shy, two left-feet Jimmy, asked Miss Kathy Kelly if she would come up and visit him at State in the fall. Ah, very heaven.