The recollection
of the intensity of the evening/night, and the peace that came with the
next morning is still with me even though my memory fails me with dates.
Sometime in the mid 80s, in the afternoon I
received a phone call from my friend and In One Ear (Vancouver Magazine)
co-conspirator who said something like this, “Alex we have to go tonight to
Boston Bar. We must go now. We have to do this. And we will listen to Lou Reed
on your Fiat X/19’s tape player.” I tried to dissuade Wiseman from this trip
that seemed to be sheer folly not to mention the idea that staying at a hotel
(The Charles Hotel, I believe) would incur an expense. I went to my Rosemary for
advice thinking that she would tell me to ignore Wiseman. But, no, and she told
me, “You must go. He is your friend.”
We drove the almost two-hour drive (the
X/19 was superb on curves) and Reed was on the tape machine all the way. The
one song that we kept repeating was Caroline Says II , from Reed’s Berlin. We arrived late
in Boston Bar and checked in. Not much was said. The next day, after breakfast
we drove back home.