Hair

Gimme a head with hair
Long beautiful hair
Shining, gleaming,
Streaming, flaxen, waxen

Give me down to there hair
Shoulder length or longer
Here baby, there mama
Everywhere daddy daddy

Hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair
Flow it, show it
Long as God can grow it
My hair

- Lyrics from the song Hair

Merv outdid himself with tonight's holiday treat for the family. In addition to buying tickets for us all to see Hair at the Royal Alex theatre, he ordered a white stretch limousine to take us to dinner and then the theatre and then to return us home. It was quite an evening.

Hair is set in New York in 1967. It was an age of rebellion and unrest. The days of sit-ins and marches on Washington. The days of drugs, free love and rock and roll. The days of the Vietnam war, the draft in the U.S. and the haven Canada provided to draft dodgers. We had the soundtrack album to Hair and Cath and I played it endlessly until the vinyl was nearly worn out. We knew all the words to all the songs. Surprisingly, these 44 years later, I still did. But I was only twelve years old in 1967 and I didn't know what the story of Hair was about. I knew it was about the sexual revolution, hippies and drugs and I assumed it was about war protests and rebellion. I did know that in its day, it was very risque both for the language used and the on-stage nudity. I didn't know it would end with such sadness or touch so many nerves. Forty-four years later, it is still poignant, still relevant, still in so many regards true to our times. The music is still fun and still fresh. I really enjoyed it. Merv is going to have an awful time topping himself next year.