Then the Neighbors Would Start to Trickle Over

When I hear the beginning guitar strains of Rocky Raccoon, I'm transported back to when I was very young, and all was well and good within my family.  At least that's what it looked like to outsiders. 

My father had been in a band called New Beginnings from before I was born until I was about 10.  He was very close with the guys, my mother was close with all of their wives, and my brother and I grew up tagging along with my dad to band practice and playing, (read:  getting in trouble,) with the children of various band members.  Every summer we'd have a "New Beginnings" cook-out, even long after they stopped playing as a band.  They were all very talented musicians, and after the food had been put away, the sun would start to go down, out would come the instruments and the jam session would begin.  An acoustic guitar or two, one snare drum, an acoustic bass, no mics, a tambourine, and Danny's trumpet (they could cover Chicago tunes like it was no one's business.)

When I learned that the Beatles' music had been released to purchase on iTunes, this was the first song I added to my cart.  (Yes, every album they ever made is upstairs, boxed up in the closet of the spare bedroom, but I don't know where the record player is and I don't have the energy to convert vinyl to digital.) 

I hear the opening notes and Paul McCartney's storyteller voice start - "Well somewhere in the Black Mine hilltop of South Dakota there lived a young boy named Rocky Raccoon..."


I immediately picture my father sitting on the back deck, plucking at his guitar, surrounded by old band buddies and all of our families. I was too young to ever pay attention to the words or grasp the irony of the story being told within the song. But I would sing along nonetheless.

"But Daniel was hot, and he drew first and shot..."

I picture him, not the adulterer, not the alcoholic, but my daddy, the man who still calls me Angel, the man who would take my brother and I on Saturday morning errands in his little red truck, blasting Styx or Boston while doing his over-exaggerated version of air-drumming on the steering wheel, doing his best McCartney impression, forgetting the words, (no pun intended, really,) chuckling his way through the song, because I swear Doc, it's only a scratch.

I hold onto this song and the memories I've attached to it so tight.  It's the only thing I've got left.

"Gideon checked out, and he left him no doubt, to help with good Rocky's revival..."