To Hold the Hands I Love

June 5, 1993—Grady Gammage Auditorium, Tempe, AZ

The lamp is burnin' low upon my table top
The snow is softly falling
The air is still in the silence of my room
I hear your voice softly calling

It is a beautiful early summer night in spite of the heat. The sun is setting as we walk into this building made of circles and sound. The sudden cool air is anything but still, buzzing with excitement over what is to come. For me, this is a bucket list item: to see Gordon Lightfoot in concert. I’ve loved him since I first heard “If You Could Read My Mind” on Top 40 radio when I was 12, the months just before or after four college students were gunned down at Kent State by the Ohio National Guard. That song played everywhere, all the time.

But years later Gord became something much more when Donald and I came together. There’s a generation between us and a lot of uncharted territory therein. Our musical tastes could not be more different. I mean, Elvis? The Beach Boys? Buddy Holly? Child, please.

Give me a song written to change the world. Our older daughter once observed that I couldn’t enjoy a song unless its lyrics contained the phrase “social injustice.” Our younger would invent satirical songs I might like, tunelessly intoning “Save the whales. Be free. Fight the man. Peace out.”

So we planted flags wherever we could find common ground. Gordon Lightfoot was one of those shared pleasures. And here we were on a rare date night. We’d left our little girls with my mother, dressed up for a nice dinner, and landed here at Gammage, the best place in the universe to hear a singer you love. Somewhere in the audience were my best work friend and her husband—we’d see them in the lobby at intermission.

Minute followed minute with the house lights up and the audience chattering excitedly. Then the lights dimmed and a hush fell. We waited and waited for a local DJ to come out and make the introductions. Finally here he came, a tall figure striding through the darkness toward the mic to get the evening started.

And then to our surprise he lifted his guitar and played the opening bars of “Sundown” as the lights came up. There he was: a killingly handsome and full-throated minstrel in blue denim.

Sometime in those beautiful hours, he sang “Song for a Winter’s Night,” and one of us reached for the other’s hand. Another intersection: Growing up in places with snowy winters where the ultimate show of love was to keep someone warm.


October 24, 2008—Dodge Theater, Phoenix AZ

The smoke is rising in the shadows overhead
My glass is almost empty
I read again between the lines upon the page
The words of love you sent me


I schedule my flight back from Canada to Phoenix carefully so that my friend can pick me up at Sky Harbor just in time to grab dinner and make it to Gord’s concert downtown. The tickets are a bribe to make myself return to Arizona just as autumn turns to winter. Snow is in the air if not on the ground, and I want to be north of the border for every minute of it. I want every fire in the fireplace, every hot bowl of soup and mug of coffee, every book read under a quilt, every moment I can spend with Donald and Selby.

But if I have to live between two places (and I will for seven years), Gord is worth coming back for.

Tonight he’s dressed in a trim brown leather vest that accentuates how thin he’s become. His long hair cascades over his collar. His face is lined and strained, almost as if he is in pain. As he sings his first line, the audience is stunned by his weak, breathy voice. It sounds as frail as he looks.

My first thought is “Isn’t there someone who loves him enough to tell him it’s time to stop?”

He must be aware because after the first few songs, he tells us he’s going backstage to get some air and then he’ll come back and sing for us. And he does and it’s better, except that the friend next to me is singing along with every song, and my eyes are rolling hard.

And then I hear it: sleigh bells. I know what’s coming. I can’t breathe because instantaneously I am choking back a sob as he starts into “Song for a Winter’s Night.” Everything I love, everything I left a few hours ago floods over me. All I can do is cry as quietly as possible. I will never hear this song the same way again.


October 31, 2014—Charles Bailey Theater, Trail, BC

If I could only have you near
To breathe a sigh or two
I would be happy just to hold the hands I love
And to be once again with you

It’s Halloween, and there’s snow on the ground in Trail, BC, a tiny, smoky old mining town near the US border. I once heard it dismissed by locals as “good enough for Americans.” The steps of the theater are treacherous, the tile floor puddled. 

We couldn’t believe our eyes months back when the posters went up advertising this concert. Gord in Trail? How was this possible? Then again, he is the consummate Canadian minstrel (how had we Americans missed this all those years when we thought he was ours?) and he was bringing us a Halloween treat. No trick.

So when our daughter Selby called from New Orleans to say she was homesick for autumn, I panicked. We had two tickets. What were the chances of getting a third? I’d seen him in concert twice, so I told Donald he should take Selby. It was a test of mother’s love, and by gawd, I was going to pass.

And then—miracle of miracles—a third ticket turned up.

Tonight Gord is beautiful again and we have come prepared to fill the thin spots in his voice. He is warm, humble, grateful for the audience. Between songs, he steps to the mic and says, “We love the work.” Just so.

Bring on the sleigh bells in this snowy little Canadian town! Donald is on my left, Selby is on my right, we three are home, and we are all holding hands.