Lights out in 1979
“This level of exhaustion deserves its own genre of music.”
Looking back on my 46-year relationship with my wife Anne, I can’t help but express certain profound regrets and proffer belated apologies.
I’m so sorry that my nocturnal proclivities cost Anne so much sleep back in 1979… a situation which she soon rectified.
When Anne and I were first living together that summer, I wanted to share everything about my past life with her, particularly the Toronto nightlife of the era.
We had met in Quebec City during my first year of teaching in that frosty city, but I was still very attached to the effervescent Toronto of my youth.
So we off we went after the college semester ended in Quebec, hitchhiking to Toronto where we set up in a Lilliputian apartment without a private bathroom near High Park.
I immediately began dragging Anne to my favourite night clubs and bars. We headed to the El Macombo on Spadina, where we took in a concert by the retro group “The Nylons” (Anne expressed a strong preference for Pink Floyd); we caught a number of late-night gigs by quirky Joe Hall and the Continental Drift; and we attended beer-sodden live performances by David Wilcox and the Teddy Bears, as well as by my good friend Andy McClelland, who often performed his guitar magic with local icons Ken Harris and Ron Nagrini.
Anne endured these initiations like a trooper and stifled her yawns.
But there was one bridge too far…
When Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey floated into theatres, the hippie crowd—high on idealism and perhaps a touch of something else—saw it as more than just a film. To them, it was a cosmic trip, a cinematic acid test.
I had already seen the film, which first graced the silver screens in 1968, a half dozen times by 1979, but Anne had yet to indulge in this cinematic feast.
Fortunately Kubrick’s counter-cultural classic was frequently featured at Toronto’s Revue cinema, especially as a midnight screening.
Outside the cinema, clusters of strange and uncouth long-haired visionaries milled about, unsure if they were about to see a movie or enter the fourth dimension.
As the lights dimmed and the film began, the audience settled in. The opening notes of “Also sprach Zarathustra” thundered, and a ripple of awe passed through the crowd. Someone in the back whispered, “Far out, it’s like the universe just dropped a beat.”
By the time the iconic monolith appeared, a debate broke out—was it a cosmic launch pad, or was Kubrick just hungry for symbolism? The scene with the spinning space station prompted one hippie to yell, “That’s it! The Earth is just a big turntable, and we’re all the record!”
The final transformation of Bowman into the Star Child left the crowd in stunned silence. Eventually, a lone voice called out: “Is the baby us, or are we the baby??”
As the credits rolled and the crowd spilled back into the neon night, the hippies agreed: 2001: A Space Odyssey was “mind-blowing,” “groovy,” “cosmic” and “the best trip for under three bucks.” Also, none of them were quite sure what happened, but they were pretty sure consciousness had shifted—if only by a few degrees.
Except for Anne. She had been lulled to sleep by the Blue Danube Waltz, the opening theme music of the film.
For her, cosmic consciousness would have to wait for another day.
And at that point I promised never again to disturb her golden slumber.
Your friend,
Robert
https://robertmcbrydeauthor.com/
