There is a holy trinity in my life of things that I have been obsessed with. It of course, includes the New York Yankees. It started with the Smurfs. And in between the two, there was the Monkees. Oh god, how my 9-year-old self completely ate up anything and everything about them. It all began when my dad started recording their reruns in 1986(off Channel 9 around here - we didn't have cable back then) and would watch them after work, and, you guys, it was like the perfect thing for me at that age. 1) They were all cute in some way. 2) They were funny. 3) I was one of a quad of neighborhood friends, so it was like
we were the Monkees. No, really, my friends Brian, Johnny, Kimberly and I would pretend we were them - I was always my favorite, Peter, because apparently at the age of 9 stoner humor was really my sort of thing or something - and we would act out our favorite scenes from the show and dream of what it would be like if we were ever to meet them and they wanted to adopt us or something. We would be jealous of one another when our parents would get us one of their records or tapes (I think Kimberly got the album with "I'm Gonna Buy Me a Dog" on it and I secretly hated her until I got the record myself for Christmas). I know there is a tape somewhere around my house of the four of us on my front steps singing a really terrible version of "I'm a Believer" in which we may have played our own coffee can drums and a guitar made of a plastic box and rubber bands. Oh, yes, we were the Monkees.
Best. Video. Ever. For a third/fourth grader whose only wish, outside of meeting the Monkees, was to have a dog, anyway.
The biggest moment in all this came down one day after school in May of 1987, when Brian, who lived across the street, called. I picked up the phone in my basement (I was probably re-watching
The Muppets Take Manhattan for the 7,324 time) and he was like "GUESS WHAT?" And I was like "WHAT?" And he was like "MY MOM GOT US TICKETS TO SEE THE MONKEES" And seriously? That was the best moment in my life to that point. He came over right after that and all we did was jump up and down like crazy people. And then all we did after that was talk about it for months, speculating what the show would be like (we'd never been to a concert before), what kind of swag we could score, what we would wear. And when Sunday, August 9, 1987 (you don't forget the most important days of your life, guys) rolled around, we were nearly exploding with anticipation. We got to the Garden State Arts Center, in our seats in like the third-to-last row, and we were so damn excited to see them that we actually were rolling our eyes and whining about the opening act, Weird Al Yankovic, who we also liked (this concert was tailor-made for kids, I'm telling you), but GOD he took forever to get off the stage.
When the Monkees did come out, it was pandemonium and Brian's mom, Pat, remembers us complaining about it being so loud. It was also the first time I'd ever smelled pot, which is kind of hilarious. Anyway, the concert was, of course, the most incredible thing ever at the time - we were several hundred feet from our idols! In the same venue! - and I remember there was a really bad thunderstorm during it and not even being freaked out. I also remember being rendered deaf by the time we got in the car to go home, and felt like my ringing ears were a badge of honor as we paged through the way awesome souvenier program. Which I also poured over for the rest of the summer and probably even slept with.
So all of this is to say that when I saw a friend's Facebook status declaring "RIP Davy Jones" the other day, I actually gasped out loud at work. Sure, I haven't really followed the Monkees in, oh, 25-26 years, but that sort of crazy love always lays dormant in you. To see that Davy, the most spry, youthful-seeming one of them was no longer among the living was like someone taking a baseball bat to the pinata of my childhood. I'd spent every summer weekday with Davy on the little black-and-white TV I'd put in our living room, when I was too afraid of the crickets in the basement to watch the big TV down there. He was a huge part of a show/group that pretty much shaped my sense of humor in storytelling. And, of course, was one of the first musical things I adored. I guess maybe I was hoping deep down that maybe they'd reunite and maybe we could go see them again, and not get so over-the-top impatient and fire-spitty at the opening act this time.
Still, it kind of warmed my heart to see the incredible outpouring of remembrances on Twitter, a social media site that makes me feel, uh, a little old from time to time given its primary audience. In this case, though, "RIP Davy Jones," and even "Marcia Brady" trended for almost the entire day, as pretty much anyone between the ages of 30 and 70 expressed their sadness, pushing the tween Beliebers out of their domain for just a bit. It was nice to know that even though you've gotten older, other people still have a soft spot in their heart for the icons of their younger days, even if they'd seem "corny" by today's standards.
Anyway, I still don't know what it can mean to a Daydream Believer/Homecoming Queen, but I do know that I practically wore out the album with that song on it, so it meant a great deal
to me. I may never have met Davy Jones (and therefore never received an offer of him wanting to adopt my friends and me to become
the awesomest fake family ever), but I am forever grateful for the mark he left on my childhood. RIP, indeed.
