Song 157 – Maxine Memories

This song is referenced by Song 55 – Ma Mere, and provided the music for Psalm 37. Like many of my songs, I do not remember what got me to write this one. Maybe I had written a song about Mom (see Song 018 – Mother’s Day), and Dad (see Song 011 – Howard Nelson), and Grandma Hafen (see Song 024 – Helen Hafen), and I felt the need to write about another of my parents, albeit by friendship to Randy (see Song 060 – Randy’s Song and the chorus: “Another mother of my brother”) and marriage to Andrea (see Song 117 – Andrea).  As I wrote in the first verse: “February 9th, 1964 our lives became forever intertwined, When the Beatles appeared on Ed Sullivan, By Saturday we had 20 in your garage, The same garage where my Willys Whippet was later parked, Soon down to five, The Keynotes were in your living room, Charlie, Ray, Dale, Randy, and I became inseparable.” The Keynotes all went to Boy’s State at Utah State University. Randy and I hiked up over Fiddler’s Mountain to Brian Head one Friday night and Saturday. We had a surfing party at Rush Lake (see Song 052 – Rush Lake Blues). My cousin Roice Nelson Krueger paid us to do our first gig at his High School near Capital Reef National Park. We played for a dance at The Dixie Roller Rink, and left the only tape we made of our music there (and never got it back). My ‘Nother Mother never criticized any of the things we did, and I know she liked some of the songs we played (like “As Tears Go By,” “Blue Moon,” “Dear Heart,” “Downtown,” “Michelle,” “Mrs. Brown You’ve Got a Lovely Daughter,” “Never My Love,” “Silhouettes,” “Strangers in the Night,” etc.). The key line in this song for me is Maxine Shirts was the “June Cleaver of Cedar City for me.” For those who don’t know who June Cleaver was, she was Beaver and Wally’s Mom in the television sitcom “Leave It To Beaver.” When I wrote this song, our Mission President and his wife stopped by the house. His name was Todd Hansen, he grew up in Cedar City, and was Heidi Hanson’s little brother (see Song 131 – How Do You Show a Girl). He had good memories of Maxine, and his words provided a basis for the last verse. The other key line in this song is the last line of the chorus: “Guiding me, so I’d stay free.”

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