Happy Birthday, George
Who was your favorite Beatle? (Assuming you're of an age to have had a favorite Beatle when they first hit the world.) When I was nine years old and my best friend Clara Thompson started talking about this really, really, really cute band from England, Paul was the one most girls crushed on, because he was cute. Or John, because he was funny. Or Ringo, because he was adorably funny looking. I, weird kid that I was, fell for George. Paul was just too pretty (and besides, Clara had already claimed him as hers) and John was a little too smart (even at nine years old I had a sense that John would be a very uncomfortable friend). Ringo was cute too...but I liked George. Forty years later, he's still my favorite--music didn't seem to come as easily to him (watch film of him playing guitar in the early days--he's always making sure he doesn't screw up) as to Paul and John, but he worked at it. And he always seemed to be thinking about something funny, a private joke that made it easier for him to stand up there in front of a million screaming people. Someone asked him once, years after the Beatles had split into four different paths, "So, is Love all you need?" And he smiled, with that private joke look, and said, "yeah." Happy Birthday, George.
posted by Madeleine Robins at 7:23 AM
6 Comments:
I was always a Paul girl, like Anna Quindlen.
GraceAnne, known as Girasole on Lj, which I where I read you, Mad.
I was a Georgie girl, too. I liked his teeth, before he got them fixed.
I liked his crooked smile.
The nice thing about the Beatles was that it didn't matter who you liked best: it was the music and their persona as a group that really pulled you in.
Oh, I liked Mike Nesmith too, for the same reason. (I liked Peter Tork because he reminded me of a golden retriever--blond, amiable, vapid--I always thought if you scratched him behind the ear he'd probably start shaking his hind leg!)
Of course Clara liked Davy Jones.
George here. He was so interesting. John was always making fun of things and I was pretty sure that I would be one of the things he made fun of.
I adored Peter because of his hair.
He did have wonderful hair--both the color and the thickness was just astonishing.
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