Winter With the Beatles

Liz Durkee Monday, March 14 2022 - 3:27pm

My winter escape this year was to a warm, nostalgic place — a limitless, undying love for the Beatles.

My winter escape this year was to a warm, nostalgic place — a limitless, undying love for the Beatles. It started with Get Back, the new, eight-hour documentary on the making of the Let It Be album in 1969. I’ve watched it three times.

Get Back blew my mind. Phenomenally accomplished, the Beatles were so young in 1969. It was mesmerizing to watch them laugh and argue, jam, rehearse and create music. At one point John and Paul danced together. This was not a look at their demise as a band so much as a study of young adult growing pains.

I’ve finally come to terms with their break-up. As one Get Back reviewer put it, they disbanded when it stopped being fun, something most bands don’t have the courage to do. And this after they opened the door for all rest. They cracked the code on rock and roll. The hair, the wit, the style. Their own songs, the harmonies, the band-ness of having no lead singer. They innovated in every musical direction. Together they were genius.

As a child I was a huge fan. In college a friend and I had a Beatles radio show. In December 1980, the two of us sat silently for hours on a dormitory bed, absorbing the news of John Lennon’s death.

I lost touch with the Beatles over time. After watching Get Back I scrambled to find and devour the Beatles Anthology my husband gave me years ago. More documentaries and books followed. How the Beatles Changed the World is a fascinating documentary.

I no longer have a favorite Beatle. They were such a force because of their individual talents, personalities and quirks. I see pieces of myself in all of them. Not always pieces I like, but ones I can relate to, and now I feel a bond with each of them. Like me, Paul is a perfectionist and John had a wounded soul. A small, shy girl, I was often underrated, as was George by his older bandmates. Like Ringo I was the family peace-keeper. Thanks to them I learned how to be me in time.

I don’t have a favorite song either. They are with me here, there and everywhere. As a climate change planner I try to take a sad song and make it better. On world affairs I pray that with every mistake we must surely be learning. Every now and then I feel so insecure. Cancer taught me that the word is love (and chemo).

These days I wake up with a Beatles song in my head. I love it best when I wake up to one, two, three, four — Pow! “She was just seventeen, if you know what I mean . . . “

I learned during my winter escape, right here at home, that the Island is my strawberry field, my Penny Lane and my Octopus’s Garden.

Liz Durkee lives in Oak Bluffs.

Comments

Wonderful.

Chaplain Robin Bugbee Riverside RI

Wonderful.
I have always loved them all. The reality that Paul is almost 80 makes me sad. I do not wish them to leave the stage. I am too aware that our lives are gifts that and that we are all temporary creatures. George and John are gone and so will be the generation that they were part of. We all owe them a great debt of love and gratitude for the joy they have given us and they will never be forgotten.

Wonderful piece. I, too, was

Joe Sprague East Providence, RI

Wonderful piece. I, too, was transported by Get Back. Watched it multiple times, a welcome respite among life's anxieties. Appreciate the band now more than ever.

What a sweet piece, Liz. You

Thomas Dresser oak bluffs

What a sweet piece, Liz. You captured the essence of the Beatles enduring spirit, the captivating songs that resonate more than a half century after they disbanded. I watched Get Back twice, all the way through, and plan to review it again, sometime down the road. Thanks for sharing your precious memories, so similar to many of ours.

All you need is love, Liz!

Susie West Tisbury

All you need is love, Liz! Thank you so much for this lovely piece.

Great story Liz , I too got

rob the roofer new jersey

Great story Liz , I too got back to the Beatles also I bought a black t shirt with the Beatles on it written like it is on Ringos base drum skin.They were amazing with each transfer of style they remained number one. The fact that apple records signed James Taylor first on there label is something that I cherish also. Off to work now ,being a Roofers I'm fixing a whole where the rain gets in and stops my mind from wandering.

Love this Liz! I wasn't

Allie OB

Love this Liz! I wasn't always a huge fan of the Beatles, but you've inspired me to watch the movie!

What a deeply personal and

Elizabeth Mulligan South Carolina

What a deeply personal and beautifully written article. From one Beatle fan to another…” Though I know I'll never lose affection, For people and things that went before, I know I'll often stop and think about them, In my life I love you more”

We are like spirits, Liz. On

Marjory Potts West Tisbury

We are like spirits, Liz. On a winter night in 1965, my husband & I went to see a foreign film at a movie house in Brooklyn. We’d been married six months & walked over to the movie, on a deserted street behind the court house in downtown Brooklyn. We got there to find the film we wanted to see wasn’t playing, but another was. Called “A Hard Day’s Night”.I was disappointed, told my husband I didn’t want to see a movie with some pop group, let’s go home. No, he said, what have we got to lose, let’s try it & leave if we are bored. There were about 20 people, if that, inside. Less than two hours later we walked out dazed. We literally danced along the deserted streets back to our apartment and raced to a record shop the next morning to buy the album. . To this day I feel the same excitement, thinking about that transformative moment in our life - we danced to The Beatles for the next 50 years - and I still do, listening with my small speaker as I dance -walk on the bike path. They never age (nor do I!).

Liz, I hoped you’ve read

Mike Edgartown

Liz, I hoped you’ve read Geoff Emerick’s “Here, There and Everywhere”. It’s offers a wonderful insight to the recordings of all the Beatles albums.

You wrote a fabulous love

Pam Coblyn Oak Bluffs

You wrote a fabulous love letter to the Beatles, Liz—my feelings exactly after watching Get Back. I was transported into the 13 year old Beatlemaniac in was in 1963. I’m still starry eyed over that superb documentary. Didn’t we all truly believe that was the way it happened—they simply stopped playing together?

We need to come together, take a stroll down Penny Lane to Strawberry Fields…forever!

Thank you for providing the

John Wightman West Tisbury.

Thank you for providing the catalyst for a trip down memory lane. Your story took me right back to August 1966 when I drove from Massachusetts to San Francisco with two horses, two white German Shepard’s, two Siamese cats and a huge Calico cat. It took ten days and the trip culminated with a ticket to the last Beatles concert at Candlestick Park on August 29. There were about 25,000 screaming, and I mean SCREAMING, fans. The Beatles came onto the field about 9:30 after the opening bands and did their 11 song set. I still have the ticket. It reads… KYA RADIO 1260 WELCOMES THE BEATLES at CANDLESTICK PARK-SAN FRANCISCO MONDAY AUGUST 29, 1966 - 8:00 P.M. UPPER STAND RESERVED $4.50 - NO REFUNDS.
A few nights ago, Jan and I watched CONCERT FOR GEORGE which was performed 20 years ago but it was your story that took me way back to 1966.
Thanks for sharing and opening my mind to rewind the adventures of my youth. It was an incredible trip.

What an incredibly, well

Annie Mcaward Litchfield, CT

What an incredibly, well-written piece Liz! Your words are nostalgic and heartwarming, optimistic and true. Uplifting us and giving us a way to make a sad song better in times of trouble. Thank you for sharing your wonderful thoughts!