Arlene and Gary Moore. Author
“Your’re kidding,” I said to the love of my life when she told me of her plan. “Please, tell me you’re kidding.”
“No, I’m not kidding and you will do this for my mother,” replied Arlene with the finality only she is capable of delivering. After thirty-five years of marriage I have a clear understanding of the few battles I can fight and win. This was not one of them. Her plan was set. We were going to drive more than three hundred miles from our home in Bourbonnais, Illinois, to Independence, Iowa to take my 77-year-old mother-in-law and her husband Bob to the “Winter Dance Party” at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls.
“What is the Winter Dance Party?” I asked.
“I’m not exactly sure. I think it’s a Buddy Holly impersonator,” Arlene responded, bending down to take the last plate out of the dishwasher. She turned and faced me. “We’re going and you will act like you are delighted to be there.” She punctuated the word “delighted” with a wide smile.
Mother-in-law jokes aside, I truly love Norma. Norma Wurster Wigant Jackson is an amazing woman in more ways than I will recount on this page. But so often, just when you think you know someone, they throw you for a loop. In all the decades I have known her I have never heard Norma talk about music, and certainly not Rock & Roll. My mother-in-law is a Buddy Holly fan? Get out of town!
Arlene and Gary Moore. Author
I stared at Arlene’s broad smile as my mind mulled over what little I knew about Buddy Holly. I knew his name, of course, and that there was a movie about him I hadn’t seen. I knew he was a musician. I had a hunch he was dead, killed in a plane crash. In fact, I remembered landing at an airport in Iowa in a private plane many years ago and being told by a kid at the airport that the wreckage of Holly’s plane was hidden away in a local hangar. I remember doubting it at the time, not really caring one way or the other. I was not a fan of Holly or Rock & Roll, and I had no intention of becoming one.
“Okay. I’ll do it for your mom, but I’m going to hate it.”
The following day I arrived at my office to meet with Tim Duggan, a good friend and business associate. “I’m going to see Buddy Holly,” I offered in passing as I pulled my laptop from its case.
“Thought he was dead,” Tim responded casually without bothering to look up from whatever he was reading on his own computer.
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure he is.”
Tim looked up. “Then how are you going to see him?” He seemed confused.
“I’m going to see an impersonator.”
“I didn’t know you were a fan.” Tim said. He lowered his eyes and began reading again. He was already losing interest in the conversation.
“No. Not me. Believe it or not, my mother-in-law is.”
That got his attention. Tim looked up again. “How old is she?”
“Seventy-seven.”
Tim stared at me for several seconds before replying. “Okay. Well, that makes sense. The day the music died was what? 1959?” He paused again. “So she was . . . twenty-six or so when Holly crashed. Of course she would be a fan. Everyone under thirty was a fan.”
“Excuse me? The day the music died?” I had no idea what Tim was talking about.
“Get outta here!” Tim answered with a skeptical look on his face. “You know, “American Pie.” The day the music died! You know what that means, right?” When it became obvious by the look on my face that I had no idea what he was talking about, Tim appeared dumbfounded. “Please tell me you are not totally dim.”
Tim awaited my response, but all I could offer was raised eyebrows and a blank look.
“Come on! The song “American Pie” is about the death of Buddy Holly. Tell me you know that!” Tim demanded with passion in his voice. “Come on!”
“Really? I thought no one knew the meaning of “American Pie” but Don McLean.”
“Yeah, I think that’s true, but he sings about the plane crash. Remember? ‘But February made me shiver, with every paper I’d deliver. Bad news on the doorstep.’ Remember? He couldn’t remember if he cried when he read about the widowed bride on the day the music died.”
“Yeah, I remember that.”
Tim stood up and looked at me. “Gary, he’s singing about the news of the plane crash killing Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper! He’s talking about Buddy Holly’s young widow—the widowed bride. That’s the infamous day the music died.”
“His first name is Big and his last name is Bopper?” I asked.
“Stay with me. Focus. I am trying to teach you something,” Tim responded. By now he was clearly frustrated.
“Okay, okay, I’m focused.”
“You do know about “American Pie,” right?” Tim asked.
“Yes, of course. I know the song but I had no idea who the widowed bride was.” I paused and thought about it. “So the day the music died is the day these three guys were killed in the plane crash?”
Tim just shook his head in disbelief and let out a deep sigh. “Sometimes I worry about you,” he answered, lowering his voice and his eyes as he tried to refocus on his work. A few seconds passed in silence and then Tim looked up at me again. “What planet are you from?”
“I really didn’t know he was that popular,” I said. Looking back now, that answer must have confirmed to Tim that I grew up on Mars. “Tim—I was born in July of 1954. You said he died in what, 1959? I was still four years old! How would I know Buddy Holly?”
“Okay, well, you are the only person on earth past puberty who doesn’t know who Buddy Holly is—or was. Geez, Gary. The guy is a cultural icon for Pete’s sake. He helped create a musical movement that changed a generation and the course of music forever.”
“Really? Buddy Holly did that?”
Tim closed his eyes and shook his head. “I’m not talking to you for a while. I need to finish this memo and let your lack of pop cultural awareness sink in.”
I am an anomaly and I know it. I grew up in a Rock & Roll music vacuum. At a very young age I joined a drum & bugle corps. My passion for rudimental drumming immersed me in marching music. During my teen years, drum & bugle corps played more jazz and classical pieces, so I became a fan of both genres. I loved Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Stan Kenton, Buddy Rich, and Maynard Ferguson. I joined concert band and jazz band in junior high. We didn’t play any Rock music there.
My dad was of the WWII generation and he was not at all a fan of Rock & Roll or what he saw developing culturally in the 1960s. I largely ignored the music of that era. My dad was a Country & Western music fan, so Billy Grammer, Hank Williams, Ernest Tubb, Ray Price, and George Jones is what was played in our home.
I went on to earn a degree in music education at VanderCook College of Music. Playing Rock & Roll at VanderCook would have been blasphemy during those years, so once again I paid little or no attention to the musical wave that was sweeping the country. I had a brief stint playing drums for the Country star Ray Price and the Cherokee Cowboys, but my exposure to Rock & Roll was nearly nonexistent. I get why I didn’t know much about Buddy Holly, and I also realize I’m quite unusual for my generation.
I explained all this to Tim, who shook his head and sighed again. “Gary, you missed an entire decade of music.”
He’s right. I loved The Beatles song “Eleanor Rigby,” but only because my drum & bugle corps, the Cavaliers, played it. And somehow I had it in my head that all Rock & Roll was created and spread from Liverpool, England . . . not Lubbock, Texas.
“Just when you think you know someone . . . ,” my voice trailed off.
“What do you mean?” Tim asked.
“My mother-in-law. She is the sweetest human being I know. Almost like a Donna Reed or June Cleaver kind of woman. I’ve never heard her mention Buddy Holly or any other band. I’ve never known her to listen to music of any kind. I always figured her for a Benny Goodman-Tommy Dorsey type, not a rocker.” I paused to think about Norma. “Next thing you know, she’ll confess she was dropping acid with Jimmy Hendrix in the sixties.”
“Please tell me you didn’t just say that!” Tim exclaimed. “You missed that entire era and you don’t even understand what you just said or who Jimmy Hendrix was!” Tim laughed. “Don’t act like you do. My kids would say you’re being a poser, so stop it.” Tim turned back to his laptop. “Arlene’s mom is hipper than you. That’s too funny.”
Tim’s right. She is hipper than me.
I’m depressed.