So Michele calls about 5pm and asks if I have plans (it's been a most unproductive weekend so my 'plan' is to remain in denial that life is normal, maybe even tackle the to-do list in the last futile, dying hours, so of course I say "no, what's up"...) I'm ordered to dress nicely and to meet her in the Carrs grocery parking lot at Minnesota & Northern Lights at 7pm to claim my Christmas surprise.
Eyebrows raised, I follow orders while wondering what in the world this could mean. Lots of thoughts go through my head but I let them go and just see what happens. And also appreciate two hours warning to put myself somewhat together, safe in the knowledge that it's unlikely I'm headed for speed dating or something equally odious. No practical jokes to worry about, etc. I get in her car and we go downtown. Still no idea, though the fact that she was so prompt makes me think we must have tickets for something? We park near the Delaney Park strip and start walking north. Still no idea. Although I do actually know what Big Deal Major Event is going on down here and even that one of my friends was the local reviewer, it just hasn't occurred to me. Finally Michele takes pity on my clueless face, as she is so often called upon to do, and says 'Well, obviously we are headed toward the PAC." (that's Performing Arts Center) And I say vacuously, yeah...?
And then we were transported back to the Depression, via the Anchorage premiere of the national touring company of the Broadway production "42nd Street." What a GRAND squealing surprise!I've been trying to calculate in my head exactly how many individual clicks of tap-shoe-on-stage we might have heard in the course of the evening. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands I'm sure. The voices were strong, the comedy was sharp, and oh, those incredible legs... Nothing like a live performance to bring those old songs back - "We're in the Money," "Lullaby of Broadway," "Shuffle Off to Buffalo..."
What Michele didn't know is that besides the geographic connection (the constant references to Allentown PA just up the road from where I lived all last year) is that this show contains my all-time favorite love song, maybe my all-time favorite song, ever. When my mom was growing up, she became an accomplished pianist, even played some concert broadcasts and so on. Next to the movie house in her little town was the music store she frequented, and whenever a new movie musical opened, the music store would create a window display based on the movie. Back then, a musical would publish sheet music of every song, not just the one or two most famous, and my mom's big brother would pop for a movie and then take her next door and buy up all the songs for her too.
And eventually that's how I learned to play the piano too. I was too stubborn to let my mom teach me, so I fumbled through and taught myself badly, from old lesson books and from all my mom's sheet music of the thirties and forties. I was playing songs from Carousel, State Fair, On the Town, Holiday Inn, Meet Me In St. Louis and so many more, years before I ever saw the films. I could pick Dick Haymes or Jeanne Crain out of a lineup before I ever saw one of their performances. I've known there were actual verses to White Christmas since I was little, all those prologues to the tunes that are familiar standards. We didn't have a record player so most music I learned was by pulling it off the page.
And I discovered "I Only Have Eyes For You" cold from the sheet music of the 1933 Busby Berkeley musical 42nd Street when I was 11 years old and it's been in my heart ever since. (Later on I figured out that it was a pretty famous song too.) So simple and lovely, so heartfelt, it puts a lump in my throat whenever I sing it. I've just never tired of it. It was just a thrill to hear it performed live with all its original charm. Michele said she'd read a suggestion somewhere to cut back on the presents and to make memories instead, and she gave me a perfect one tonight.
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