Someday I Will Play a Duet with Garth Hudson

The rumor is I met Garth once when I was three―

               my mother was at a friend of a friend’s house

in the midst of her 30-year stint as a hippie, still pregnant

               with my little brother, but before his father died

of a drug overdose in the county jail. There was

               much ado about that a member of The Band

was in town, traveling through, and my mother reluctantly

               dragged me along, unable to pawn me off

on one of her girlfriends or her mother-in-law.

               There were a lot of people around, and I remember

touching the tailpipe of a motorcycle, some tricked-

               out chopper, burning my finger. It was the same day

I made my first simile: I likened a green chili pepper

               to a Christmas light, and everyone laughed. I believe

it was Garth who was eating the peppers, and he

               jokingly offered me a bite. That day I was burned twice.

Other memories surround that time in my life: a car

               accident where cheatgrass seemingly came up through

the floorboards of the front seat as the car tumbled into

               the highway median―me, bouncing at my mother’s feet

watching the dust and rocks. It was the early 1970s,

               and car seats were not a thing most people had, nor seatbelts.

It was not my first miracle, but its caesura remains

               to this day, and I always associate the crash when I think

about my mother and our itinerant life before I started

               going to school. I think in some ways the connection

I have with Garth Hudson was built in those days.

               People come into our lives like a pebble’s ripple—each

can last a lifetime. There never was a time I did not

               know The Band, their steady ability, their friendship

with Bob Dylan (Can you ever mention The Band without

               mentioning Bob?). It was all part and parcel being

the product of hippies, watching the emergence of the

               Me Generation as they slowly realized they had lost

to time—that they too had been burned. I lived through

               the demise of Garth and the boys, but always there were

slight tremors saying he and I have always had something

               between us. Someday I will jump on a Greyhound,

ride myself north up to Canada, and track him down,

               ukulele in hand, remind him of the green chili pepper.

He will tilt back with laughter, invite me in as he sits

               at his piano and starts to play some long-forgotten melody.