mindful of memory

went clubbing on saturday night. long, long time since i danced the night away. my hearing has only returned to normal today!
back in the day ...
many, many years ago, when i was young, the fellas who played in bands wore suits and ties. we sat at tables around a dance floor and drinks were brought to the table. we waltzed, we danced the cha-cha. the tango, the fox trot and we rocked! we twisted and we shouted, we did the bossa nova and the pepsi. all those tedious dancing lessons, clutched in the arms of sweaty palmed boys ...
they had finally paid off!
the lights were romantic, there were always free cigarettes on each table... great marketing gimmick! our guys would usually drink too much and try and nick a glass or a pot plant on the way home - the embarrassment of it - oy!
my mom was very anti the demon drink and i was a good girl. not that good though, i smoked and imagined myself very grown up and elegant, i even savoured an occasional baby cham. i really enjoyed port and lemon but then "someone" informed me that port and lemon was a prostitute's drink, ruined the whole thing for me! what a goody two shoes!
saturday night was different. me and my lady were out with a bunch of twenty something girls, celebrating a birthday.
the dance floors were hot and crowded, the music was bloody loud and one would need to fight for a place to sit! ahhhh ... the simple joy of it, swaying, mesmerized by the beat, the noise, the flashing lights and my girl in my arms. we older-thans left early and still we only got to bed at three in the morning

back home in the RSA, in the good old days, the night clubs closed at midnight ... well, after midnight saturday it is sunday and in those days ...
sunday was for church and sombre music on the radio. our crowd would meet at the park where we would listen to LM radio on the car radio. LM radio was beamed out of mozambique, they played the top forty on a sunday night. whew ... such wickedness. we used to wash down all this illegal music with hot dogs and lime milk shakes from the pie cart!

memory, the gift of recall, remembering times long gone by and each day storing new memories for our future tomorrow.