It was an obscure Beatles song. I was in two sweat sweatshirts, both button and zipped up, but trying to listen, following the friendly feet on the dancefloor. Even there — as it was everywhere for me these days in my adult gazing — it was as if they said everything, how those feet moved. How someone danced was so uniformly a thumbprint of action. I felt decidedly unlike myself that night though, at least three kinds of ache physically challenging me, and at least two other emotional aches grinding away at the present. Mine, this time, were firmly on the ground, back straight against a chair, feigning unheard jokes about flossing.
And so I wondered, “Was it more of a John or a Paul song?” That game you could play, realizing all kinds of surprising things about the tensions and credits of artistic partnerships. Did it sound more like a seventies Lennon romper? Kind of. But surprisingly older. There was a weird footprint in the song itself — a song they released late in their career, but written much earlier. Did it matter so much, who had written what? Something less melodic with the melody. Faster. A backbeat written for a bar.
