I miss large social gatherings. I miss weddings and graduation parties and concerts and movies and I miss going to the 3 day Harley Rendezvous in Pattersonville, NY. To be clear, I haven't been to this Harley Rendezvous in about three decades but it still ranks up there as far as compelling memories go.
My college boyfriend played bass guitar in a band which was faithfully hired to play at the yearly biker rally. On this sunny late summer morning, something about the air and the atmosphere brings the playlist for those events to the forefront, thrumming through my mind. Perhaps you can join me for a trip down memory lane. Strap on your helmet, sidle up and ride along.
I had the privilege of introducing the band. This was a time in my life when my weekend attire consisted of denim mid-thigh skirts, concert t-shirts and studded cowboy boots made of black ox hide and alligator so I was the perfect two minute frontwoman. Stepping up to the mic, I'd hold it with my right hand and holding my clear cup of domestic beer by the rim with my other hand, dangle it casually down my left leg. When the wolf whistles stopped (more ceremonial than intimidating), I'd welcome everyone and do my best "Ladies and Gentlemen..." intro. I'm not saying it was perfect but it was effective. I got the attention I asked for.
The opening song was always "Call Me the Breeze" by Lynyrd Skynyrd and I was primed and ready to jump off and dance with whatever biker chicks were already out on the floor. They were the ones swathed across the stagefront chirping to the guys while they set up their amps and instruments. They were the ones who would hip check me hard at the bathroom sink so they could apply layer after layer of fairy tale pink lipstick to their wanton mouths. They were the ones who the lead guitar player's wife wanted to kill, show after show, and the reason why she'd come to only the very occasional outing.
A minute into The Breeze, a few long limbed bikers would join us on the floor. Usually the chaps, so proudly and boldly worn up until that moment, would be shed in an effort to move more freely. In my mind I see crimson colored do-rag bandanas, inky black tshirts rolled up north of the bicep, boxes of Marlboro Reds tucked safely within those rolls or visible dangling just above the stitching of the front tshirt pocket, well worn jeans ripped and thin in all the right places, and boots of every variety being lifted and lowered in time to the music, some remarkably alight despite their lugged heft.
You can tell a lot about a biker based purely on boot selection.
Most of the guys that I knew wore electrician boots. These boots were waterproof, shock proof, steel toed, oily leather. They were also skid and slip proof, with 2 inch rubber soles, so they weren't the easiest to dance in, but the guys who wore them were usually so bone-weary and dog-tired from working five twelves one sleep prior to their Saturday rides that they didn't shimmy a lot anyway. They were more or less standing in place, singing loudly, lifting their plastic cups in overhead drippy gestures of respect, and letting their necks loll side to side in a deliberate motion of loosening and slackening, shrugging off the stress of the week.
The guys who wore classic coal colored, engineer-style, pewter buckled riding boots were typically well groomed with nice leather jackets and newer black Levis. When speaking with them I would detect a hint of cologne which was in stark contrast to the majority of the guys who smelled of hard work and sweat and oil and electricity and maybe even something burning. The engineer boot wearers' jackets were blank tabula rasa style smooth cowhide, also dissimilar to the motorcycle gang artwork adorning many of the backs of the others in attendance. I loved the decorated garments and would spend a lot of time studying them, memorizing their allegiances and, often, pictures suggesting pain. Running my hands over the tapestry of painted, stitched and patched jackets left draped over the seats of barstools, I could feel the stories of these men animatedly sparking in my palms.
Chiseled jaws, facial scars, eye patches, gloves, and shots of whiskey instead of plastic cups of beer belonged to the denim jacketed guys. Some had sleeves, many did not. The denim dudes rarely made eye contact with me despite my attempts. Their combat wounded veteran patches helped me sense what might belie their shifty eyed silences. Sometimes their hands and gills would tremble in the beginning of the first set while they stood alone and I anonymously bought them shots, but later in the night when I crept by again and stole a glimpse, I'd see a pack of heads pitched together, a cohesive powwow of blue jeaned GIs, and the fingers were pond water calm.
The guys with the cowboy boots were usually the dancers, tripping the light fantastic. Their smooth soles allowed for scooting and sliding and I liked their assortment of T-shirts, emblazoned with the latest concert, or an American made automobile logo, or checkered flags and STP, or even the occasional Bart Simpson. The band's second song was usually Honky Tonk Woman by the Rolling Stones and the cowboys would ball up their fists and close their eyes and hoist their shoulders up a few inches toward their ears sloping their hips forward, knees bent, while the front row ladies cavorted and spun and mingled about giving them giving them giving them the honky tonk blues.
Songs three through eight were always a nod to the late sixties and early seventies when many of the festival patrons came up in the world. Louie Louie by the Kingsman, Wooly Bully by Sam the Sham, Born to be Wild by Steppenwolf, a trifecta of Run For the Jungle, Bad Moon Rising and Green River by Creedence Clearwater Revival; then they'd take it down with the Allman Brothers Midnight Rider.
Jimi Hendrix's version of the Star Spangled Banner followed (and I almost always heard the first three minutes from the bathroom because I knew this was the song right before their first break and I tried to get in there before everyone else did). I'd catch the end, exiting while wiping my hands on my skirt and bearing witness to every person in the crowd standing at attention, some hands on hearts, some lifting salutes, all listening to the lead guitarist share his powerfully metallic patriotism, full of reverb and whammy, eventually down on his knees, back arching and fingers cramping from the dichotomy of the notes; a whirling swirl of red, white and blue spiritualism tinged with hope, backdropped by grungy strings squealing in protest and anger.
After the break, with the front row ladies tipsy and sparkling with sweat laying claim to their prominent positions on the floor, the band opened back up with Greg Allman's I'm No Angel. This would invariably draw a huge crowd. I never thought the song was the best in the set, but it spoke to the people, well seasoned and unwound, hanging loose and trolleyed by the music and liquid courage.
"So I might steal your diamonds. I'll bring you back some gold. I'm no angel."
Elvis, Johnny Cash, Tom Petty, George Thorogood, Bruce Springsteen, Marshall Tucker, Molly Hatchet, Little Feat and the Georgia Satellites peppered the second set. Dancing ensued. Drinking ensued. The revving of engines and smoking of cigarettes and noisy peel outs ensued. Break time after set two was usually around ten thirty at night.
Since my friend's group began as a Skynyrd tribute band, set three was almost exclusively Florida swamp rock. The flooring trembled underfoot while a hundred or more gamy, euphorically carefree bikers, bathed in the sweat of a good time, hoofed it without reserve for another hour. The drummer looked like he'd emerged from a nearby lake, mullet plastered to the sides and back of his thick neck. This time of night was my favorite because we all became one sticky ball of black tar, oozing and swelling and dragging on each other. Shoulder hanging-on was common; holding one another up was routine. Differences were overlooked. Kindness was the rule. Kinship through music and back slapping and heat and drink made us all sailors on the same boat in the same sea. We were all worshipping at the same altar. The greatest of friends for an evening; ready to defend someone you met an hour ago within a heartbeat of your life, we fit together like the shingles of a roof.
We did a lot of car sleeping back then. Tired and too drunk to drive, we would recline the bucket seats and catch a few hours of awkwardly positioned, mosquito-bit rest before getting up and making our way home. The early morning grounds around this out of the way farmtown premises would be festooned with the dancers, some in tents, others curled in balls on Mexican blankets next to their motorcycles, some single, some spooned in the mauve colored light. It was like a battlefield scene, and I'd walk silently among them as I waited for my boyfriend to shake off the night and start the car.
They slept, some peacefully childlike, some contorted in the clutches of a bad dream or a sour stomach, but mostly puddled softly in the light; jumped and jived out, spent like an ultra marathon runner at the finish, it was, for me, the best morning-after buzz.
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