by Rob Rufus
November 26—Bob Dylan,Arie Crown Theater, Chicago, IL
Black Panthers—MOVE ON OVER OR WE’LL MOVE ON OVER YOU!
But out of all those posters, the one that struck me the most was pinned on the wall behind her unmade bed. It featured a young guy burning his draft card, and read simply—FUCK THE DRAFT!
“Cool room,” I gulped. “Subtle décor.”
She laughed her gentle laugh.
“Can ya imagine what your dad would say if you hung that poster on your wall?” Milo asked.
“He’d put me through the wall,” I said.
“Mine doesn’t give a fuck,” Hana shrugged, “but controversy doesn’t faze him. If you marry a Japanese girl on the heels of World War II, you sorta have to be comfortable with other people’s discomfort.”
“I guess controversial parents have controversial kids,” I smiled.
She smiled back.
“Did they meet in the war?” Milo asked.
“Nah, my father fought in Europe, not the Pacific. They met when he was in Nagoya, evaluating a company that makes toilet plungers.”
“No shit?” Milo said.
All three of us laughed.
“Let’s spin some records,” she said. “Who wants to kick this show-n-tell off?”
“First things first,” Milo said ceremoniously. “All members of the record club are present, so let’s vote on a club name. A club’s gotta have a name!”
“Any ideas?” I asked.
“Music Geeks Anonymous?” he joked.
“Uh, or, like, maybe The Rock-n-Roll . . . uh, Rebels?” I said, trailing off and scoffing at my own dumb suggestion.
“The Vinyl Underground,” Hana said. She grinned.
“Eh,” Milo shrugged, “that sounds more like a gang name.”
“No shit, man. It’s the name,” she insisted. “The Vinyl Underground.”
“Yeah,” I said, “I can get behind that.”
“Then a gang it is,” Milo nodded. He picked up his LP. “Let’s spin this one first. It’s one of my favorites, ‘Fairytale’ by Donovan. This is the Hickory Records pressing, so it has a completely different track list than the mass-produced version.”
“Trippy!” Hana said.
“Yeah,” he nodded, “this first song isn’t even on the original pressing.”
Hana took the record from him and looked over the packaging. Then she slid the vinyl out of the dust sleeve and sat Donovan on the turntable.
She put the needle on the record and let it spin.
The speakers gave a warm crackle as the needle found the groove. She handed me Otis Blue just as Donovan’s soft warble eased over an acoustic guitar.
“Put this up for me, would ya?”
I nodded, and went to her shelf. Donovan sang “Universal Soldier,” and his exhausted disgust came through clearly. Milo nodded to the music.
I slid Otis back with the Rs. I glanced down at the table beside her bed—it was stacked with newspapers, and a paperback copy of Been Down So Long, It Looks Like Up to Me.
When I turned back, Hana and Milo were sitting on the floor. She was hunched forward, examining the liner notes. Her black hair hung in her face, and the lamplight cascaded across it like a stoplight on wet blacktop.
I sat down across from them.
“Were you really at this?” Milo asked Hana.
He pointed to a newspaper clipping on the wall.
Thousands Join Spring MOBE Protests in NYC and SF
Hundreds of Draft Cards Burned as Youth Take to the Streets
“Oh yeah,” she said proudly, “last April. We marched all the way to the United Nations. Everyone was there, Martin Luther King even gave a speech!”
“Woah,” I gasped, “what was that like?”
“Transcendent, man.”
“What does MOBE mean?” Milo asked.
“Mobilization to End the War in Vietnam.”
“Were people really burning their draft cards?”
“Hundreds,” she said. “My guy, Phillip, burned his before the march started.”
“Your guy?” Milo cooed. “Aw, Hana’s got a boyfriend—”
“Boyfriends and girlfriends are for boys and girls,” she snapped. “All that’s nothing but a distraction. Boyfriends, girlfriends, glee club, the debate team, they’re traps the Man uses to monopolize the minds and time of the youth.”
“And I thought I was cynical!” I laughed. “You win.”
“You’d be cynical too, if you weren’t tucked away from the real world.”
“The real world found me easy enough,” I said, harsher than I’d intended.
Instead of responding, she got up and grabbed a 45rpm from her shelf.
“Have you heard of ’em?” she asked. “They’re from Detroit.”
She handed it to me.
AMG RECORDS
MC5
I CAN ONLY GIVE YOU EVERYTHING
(T. Scott—P. Coulter)
Time: 2:36
“I don’t see a band listed,” I said.
“It’s right there—”
“MC5?”
She nodded.
“Is this a Van Morrison cover? From when he was in THEM?”
“Yeah, but it doesn’t sound like him or like THEM, or like anything.”
She pulled the single from my hands and stood up. She took Donovan off the turntable, changed the speed, and put the single on.
“What’s it sound like?” Milo asked.
“Like a revolution,” she said, and cranked up the volume.
Suddenly, the song’s riff blared from the speakers, thick and distorted and nearly unrecognizable. Two bars in, the singer screamed over the music like a maniac. The volume of the recording pushed it beyond any chance of coherence.
“This is wild!” I yelled above the music.
“I know!” she said excitedly. “They’re the most epic protest band ever! Word is they’re gonna play outside the Democratic National Convention in Chicago!”
“You goin’?” Milo asked.
“Oh yeah, I’ll be front and fuckin’ center!”
The song ended as quickly as it began. My ears rang slightly. She stood back up, and chose one of her many full-length records. It was the new Bob Dylan album, John Wesley Harding.
“Have you guys heard this?”
“Not yet,” Milo said.
She smiled, and put the record on. Bobby came right outta the gate with the title track. His voice meandered as the song unwound itself at a soothing tempo.
“So, Ronnie,” Hana said, settling back down on the floor, “was your brother drafted, or did he enlist?”
“He was drafted. All he wanted to do was play records. Right before his number came up he’d been offered a job at a radio station in Sacramento. I was gonna meet him out there after I graduated and work as his sidekick.”
“You guys must’ve been crushed,” she said.
The song changed to a harder tune with a backbeat.
“I was. But honestly, it didn’t faze Bruce. He figured he’d be back home by the time I graduated, and the two of us could go out west together. He acted like it was all a gas, one last adventure before his real life started.”
Bob Dylan said life was a joke, and I shivered.
“What’s wrong?” Milo asked.
“Just listen,” she whispered.
We sat in silence until “All Along the Watchtower” ended.
Hana pointed to the records I’d brought. “Are those your brother’s records?”
I nodded.
“Would you play me one?”
I’d been planning to play the Blues Magoos LP first—I wanted to tell her that it was the first album to ever use the word “psychedelic” in the title. But when I got up
and went to the bed, the vinyl I grabbed was the 45.
The cover featured a photo of Roy Orbison wearing glasses, not shades. He looked almost like Milo, except Roy’s hair was still quaffed back.
Below the photo read the title—“Blue Bayou.”
“Man,” Hana smiled, “I haven’t heard that in forever.”
“It was one of Bruce’s favorites,” I told her, handing it over.
She took the Dylan LP off the turntable, and set the speed back. But as she pulled the Orbison single from the sleeve, the envelope with Bruce’s letter fell out.
I dove for the letter dumbly, sprawling across the floor before anyone else could pick it up.
“What’s that?” Hana asked, as I grabbed it.
“Nothing,” I mumbled, shoving the letter into my back pocket.
“Don’t be a freakazoid,” Milo scoffed. “What was that?”
“Nothing,” I said, more forcefully. “Look, I gotta go.”
I stood, and went to collect my other record.
“Fine,” Hana said, “then you’re outta the gang.”
I hesitated. I looked back at her.
“Gangs keep secrets from the world,” she said, “not from each other.”
“Yeah, man,” Milo said, “what gives?”
I sighed.
Part of me wanted to run out the door and shut down the conversation. Grief is a selfish thing, and it screamed inside my head, demanded solitude and secrecy. But another voice—a soft, lonesome voice—urged me to trust my friends.
I cleared my throat.
“It’s a letter,” I finally mumbled. “An old letter from Bruce.”
I was surprised at how easily the words rolled out.
“He wrote me a lot at first,” I went on, “and he always paired his letters with music. It was his way to keep DJing, I guess. So whenever I got a letter, I’d store it with whatever song he chose.”
“Damn,” Hana said, “that’s beautiful, man.”
I shrugged.
“Would you read us the letter?” she asked.
I squirmed uncomfortably.
“I’d like to hear it,” Milo said. “I miss Bruce, too, ya know?”
“Yeah,” I muttered, “I know.”
I went to the stereo. Hana sat down beside Milo. They stared at me eagerly, like I was some bonked-out Mother Goose about to read them a bedtime war story. I unfolded the letter, and looked it over. Was I really gonna read it out loud?
Apparently fucking so.
“Bruce sent this to me from California when he was there training. If I remember right, this was the last I heard from him before he went to Vietnam.”
I eased the needle onto the wax. Roy Orbison sang about his faraway home.
Softly, I began to read—
Listen to: “Blue Bayou,” by Roy Orbison
How’s the weather, Raspy Ronnie?
It’s great here . . . because I’m writing you from California!
I wish you could hear the stations we pick up from the barracks! KRLA in Hollywood, the Boss Jocks on KHJ-AM—they’re incredible! Me and you have got some serious competition out here on the coast!
But otherwise, California isn’t exactly how I imagined it. Scratch that! It’s exactly how I imagined it! This just isn’t how I imagined ending up here.
I thought we’d be cruising Sunset with Wolfman Jack by now, ya know? Having fun in the California sun, going on safari to stay, all that good shit.
But all I’ve done is run, run, run, climb, climb, climb, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot. Seems like they’re pushing my battalion harder than the others.
But hey! Last week I went to San Diego on leave, and let me tell you . . . the chicks out there, Ronnie! Good Sweet Baby Jesus, they were out of sight! Wouldn’t give me the time of day, though, because of this stupid buzz cut. I have S-O-L-D-I-E-R written all over me. Do girls back home still like a man in uniform? Because out here, not so much.
Crazy, isn’t it? I finally made it to California, and all I seem to do is miss Florida. Especially at night, when the scent of gunpowder dies down enough for me to smell the ocean.
But word has it we’re shipping off to Da Nang in two weeks. I’m so ready to get this over with. I’ll try to scrounge up some medals so you can watch people kiss my ass when I get home, ha ha. I’m counting down the days until then. I count them like I’m in prison. Not that I need to tell you that. You’re in high school, after all.
Send my love to everyone, Wolfman included. I miss you, Little Brother.
I miss all y’all. Tell Momma to keep putting those candles in the window.
I’ll be home soon,
-Bruce
The song was over before I finished reading. No one seemed to notice.
I folded the note and looked up.
Milo had removed his glasses. He was wiping his eyes with his shirt.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, “shit, I’m sorry. That was just . . . that was so sad.”
Hana was looking right at me.
Her dark eyes took it all in, and didn’t give back an inch.
Finally, her lips curled into a soft smile.
“The sad ones are the truth, man. Go on, play it again.”
five
How To Outrun A Bullet
The first meeting of The Vinyl Underground was over by 10 p.m.
Milo called dibs on borrowing the MC5 single. I left the Blues Magoos record with Hana, and she loaned me her new Bob Dylan. I kept it at my side as she walked us out. They laughed as I struggled to get my shoes on, but I didn’t mind. Milo held me steady until I got situated.
“This was cool,” he said as we crossed the porch.
“Yeah. Solid idea, Ronnie.”
“Same time, next week?” I asked.
“Definitely,” they both said.
Hana pointed to the Roy Orbison single. “How many of those do you have? The ones with the letters.”
“Fifteen, I think,” I said, knowing damn well.
“Could you bring more next time?”
I clammed up for a moment. I was surprised she asked.
“Sorry if that’s weird,” she continued, “I just never got to meet him. But when you read that letter, I felt like I almost did.”
“Yeah,” Milo said, “I wanna know what happens next.”
You know what happens next, I thought.
“Sure,” I smiled, “I’ll bring more next time.”
“Groovy,” Hana said, grinning.
I blushed and looked at my shoes.
“Well, I should get going,” Milo said.
“Me too,” I said.
“Bye, guys.”
I followed Milo down the front steps, and we crossed the street in silence. The two of us shared a smile in the dark, and then went our separate ways.
I looked at the vinyl again as I climbed the stairs of my porch. It was the first time I’d been able to listen to Bruce’s records without plummeting into the void—and I knew it was the others who’d held me in place. My family considered grief a private thing, but finally sharing a little had proven shockingly cathartic. If my friends could understand it, maybe they could help me bear it.
I was still smiling as I fumbled my key in the front door and walked inside.
“Hey, Ronnie,” Ramrod called from the dining room.
He was sitting next to my dad, looking over a chart of wrestling matches that were graphed together like the branches of a family tree. He’d turned nineteen last week and been forced into an unofficial retirement from wrestling.
Now Lewis had the prestigious title of Unpaid Assistant Coach. The job came with only one benefit—free beer at scheduling meetings. A half-dozen empty bottles of Jax surrounded the poster board.
“Hey,�
� I said, “what are y’all doin’ up so late?”
“Tryin’ to see if we can squeeze a scrimmage in before finals,” Dad said.
“County’s coming up that soon?”
“Barely a month away,” Lewis said.
“And what happens the week after county finals?” Dad asked me, grinning.
“Uh, I dunno . . . what?”
“Your birthday!”
“Oh. Yeah.”
“I talked to Adams the other day,” he continued, “and he said—”
“Talked to who?”
“Sergeant Adams? The recruiter? I’m sure you’ve seen him in the halls. We were talkin’ the other morning, and he said now that the D. E. P.’s in effect, boys under eighteen get a signing bonus if they enlist early.”
“D. E. P.?” Lewis asked. “What’s that?”
“Delayed Entry Program,” Dad said, and then looked back at me. “That’s why I thought ya should know. We can talk to him together sometime, if you’d like.”
“That’s OK, Dad.”
“Suit yourself. But I don’t see the point of waiting ʼtil you’re eighteen, when you can enlist now and get yourself some spending money.”
I don’t know why I didn’t walk away. Normally I would’ve. But instead I held Bruce’s letter tighter and said, “I’m not enlisting, either way.”
Dad calmly put down his pencil. He crossed his thick arms, and a curious look spread over his face. Lewis pretended to keep working on the schedule.
“Since when?”
“Since, I don’t know, since always? You’ve never asked me if I was enlisting, Dad. You just assumed, I guess.”
“Well, gee-whiz,” he said sarcastically, “I guess I did just assume. I guess I just assumed that if my older brother died defending my country . . . well, I guess I just assumed a man might feel obligated to honor him and his sacrifice.”
I sighed.
“You got somethin’ else to say?” he snapped.
“I just . . . I dunno what to tell ya, Dad. If you wanted to send a boy over there to get revenge, you and Momma shoulda had Roy sooner.”
Dad marched around the table toward me. I swear, the ground shook. I wanted to back away, but I didn’t.
“It’s not about revenge,” he barked, “it’s about duty. It’s about service. If you’re too arrogant to understand that, the draft board will set you straight quick.”
