Editor’s Note: Fools’ Parade

The older you get, the more you appreciate how lucky you are to be playing the long game. Sometimes you discover you hit a milestone you weren’t even trying to reach.

One of the first rock concerts I ever attended was staged in the White Mountains in the summer of 1980 or 1981. I can’t tell you exactly when or where because the Southside Johnny & the Asbury Jukes tour shirt I bought at that show was stolen from the laundry room during my freshman year at the University of New Hampshire. 

I lost it along with every other concert shirt I owned, all freshly washed and folded. And I had quite a few show souvenirs in my collection including Tom Petty, Frank Zappa, Rush, the J. Geils Band and the Kinks. (Yes, I’m still mad.)

On the bill that day with Southside Johnny were Dr. John, the late icon of New Orleans R&B; and The Fools, a Boston-based band that was on the verge of national stardom but never quite made it. My memories are fuzzy, but I remember Southside Johnny Lyon sang shirtless, Dr. John played guitar behind his back, and The Fools, whose calling card was a parody called “Psycho Chicken,” upstaged them both with their goofball antics.

Over the years through working for newspapers and magazines in Florida, Colorado and New Hampshire, I’ve had the chance to interview and write about dozens of musicians including Southside Johnny and Dr. John. And, now, finally, The Fools. 

The Fools, who formed in Ipswich, Mass., in 1976, are celebrating their 50th anniversary with their first new album in 15 years and are the subject of a documentary expected to be released this fall. The band still plays a couple of dozen shows a year around New England.

In preparation for the “In Their Own Words” feature with lead singer Mike Girard (page 38), I traveled to Georgetown, Mass., with my brother, Steve, to check out The Fools in action at a block party. As we took our seats among the hardcore fans gathered on lawn chairs, it felt like we had crashed a reunion. 

45 is better than 50

If I had not traveled from Denver to attend my 30th high school reunion with the Manchester West High class of 1981, I probably would have never returned to New Hampshire. We’re about to mark our 45th with another reunion this month. 

I had never been to a reunion before that 2011 gathering, which like our next one, will be held at the Derryfield Restaurant in Manchester. I was scheduled to visit Cuba for a work trip that weekend, but when the trip got held up by government regulators, I was still itching to go somewhere. Why not Manchester? I still had family here.

My wife, Jeannie, was involved in planning the 30th, and I nudged her to help plan this one since that 2011 reunion sparked a relationship that owes a little bit of debt to the class of 1981.

We didn’t wait a full decade between reunions because we’re at the age where we keep losing people. The list of MIA classmates includes a buddy of mine who used to drive me to school — as long as I could squeeze through the passenger side window of his broken door — and the girl I took to the senior prom, who was still nursing a broken heart over another guy. 

Not everyone gets to play the long game. Enjoy every moment.