Elvis Is Dead and I Don't Feel So Good Myself. Lewis Grizzard

an Elton John concert... completely by mistake.

      I was dating a girl who was several years younger than me. I was in my late twenties at the time, but she could still remember where everybody sat in her high school algebra class.

      “What do you want to do Friday night?” I vividly recall asking this young woman.

      “Elton John is in town,” she said.

      “He’s somebody you went to school with?” I asked, in all honesty.

      “You’ve never heard of Elton John?” she said, an unmistakable tinge of amazement in her voice.

      “Well, I’ve been working pretty hard and....”

      “Elton John is a wonderful entertainer. You would love him.”

      She was a lovely child and had big blue eyes, so I managed to purchase excellent tickets for the Elton John concert — third row from the stage.

      I had never been to a concert by anybody even remotely connected with modern rock music. As a matter of fact, the only concert I had been to in years was one that Jerry Lee Lewis gave. “The Killer” came out and did all his hits, and everybody drank beer and had a great time. I didn’t see more than a dozen fights break out the entire night.

      What I didn’t know about attending an Elton John concert was that Elton didn’t come on stage until his warm-up group had finished its act. I don’t remember the name of the group that opened the show, but I do remember that they were louder than a train wreck.

      When I was able to catch a word here and there in one of their songs, it sounded like the singer was screaming (as in pain) in an English accent. One man beat on a drum; another, who wasn’t wearing a shirt, played guitar. They were very pale-looking individuals.

      “What’s the name of this group?” I tried to ask my date over the commotion. I heard her say, “Stark Naked and the Car Thieves.” I thought that was a strange name, even for an English rock group, so between numbers I asked her again. Turned out I had misunderstood her; their real name was “Clark Dead Boy and the Bereaved.”

      “So what was the name of that song?” I pursued.

      ‘“Kick Me Out of My Rut’,” she answered. I was having trouble hearing, however; my eardrums had gone into my abdomen to get away from the noise. I thought she said, “Kick Me Out on My Butt.”

      After the next number, I asked her to name that tune, too.

      “It’s called ‘I Can Smell Your Love on Your Breath’.”

      That’s what she said, but what I heard was, “Your Breath Smells Like a Dog Died in Your Mouth,” which sounded a great deal like “Kick Me Out on My Butt.”

      Finally, Elton John came out. He wore an Uncle Sam suit and large sunglasses.

      “Is this man homosexual?” I asked my date.

      “Bisexual,” she answered.

      That must come in handy when he has to go to the bathroom, I thought to myself. If there’s a line in one, he can simply walk across to the other.

      I had no idea what Elton John was singing about, but at least he didn’t sing it as loudly as did Stark Naked and the Car Thieves.

      As the concert wore on, I began to smell a strange aroma.

      “I think somebody’s jeans are on fire,” I said. “Do you smell that?”

      “It’s marijuana,” said my date. “Everybody has a hit when they come to an Elton John concert.”

      I looked around me. My fellow concert-goers, some of whom weren’t as old as my socks, were staring bleary-eyed at the stage. Down each row, handmade cigarettes were passed back and forth. Even when the cigarettes became very short, the people continued to drag on them.

      Suddenly, down my row came one of the funny cigarettes. My date took it in hand, took a deep puff, held in the smoke, then passed it to me.

      “No thanks,” I said. “I think I’ll go to the concession stand and get a beer.”

      “Go ahead,” said my date. “It’ll loosen you up.”

      This was my moment of decision. I had never tried marijuana before. I had never even seen any up close, but now here I sat holding some, listening to a bisexual Englishman wearing an Uncle Sam suit sing songs I didn’t understand. I was completely lost in this maze and wanted to bolt from the concert hall and go immediately to where there was a jukebox, buy myself a longneck beer, and play a truck-driving son by Dave Dudley — something I could understand.

      I looked at the marijuana cigarette again. Would I have an irresistible urge to rape and pillage if I took a drag?

      It was very short. “You need a roach clip,” said my date.

      “There’re bugs in this stuff?” I asked.

      “When a joint is short like that, it’s called a roach,” she explained, pulling a bobby pin from her purse. “Hold it with this.”

      I took the pin in one hand and clipped it on the cigarette I was holding in the other.

      “Take a good deep drag and hold it in,” said my date.

      “Suck it or send it down,” said somebody at the end of my row.

      I continued to look at the roach. The smoke got into my eyes and they began to burn. Suddenly, to my horror, I noticed the fire at the end of the roach was missing. It had become dislodged from the clip and had rolled down between my legs. I quickly reached between my rear and the seat cushion to find it, lest I set the entire arena aflame.