Those 70ish Girls

Oldies but oldies by Valerie Halla

The Cars, Jackson Brown, the Stones, The Beach Boys, the Turtles and the beat goes on. I’ve been doing a lot of California freeway driving and California dreaming since my husband has been in a skilled nursing facility. I have to drive over an hour one way to visit him. Traffic can be painful so to make the driving less stressful and less tedious, I have been listening to tons of 60’s and 70’s music. I let the volume blast. I’m also having a blast.

It’s been even better since I just bought a 2025 SUV with a far out groovy sound system. What a difference that makes since I’ve been driving a 2010 used car for 15 years. My new vehicle has full on speakers everywhere and the music sounds like you’re there with the band, rockin out or they’re maybe in the back seat grooving along. Their sound even comes out of the doors. I can listen to the Doors blasting their funk through my car doors. “Come on baby light my fire.”

I had not bought a brand new car since 1999, in the old days. These new cars have computer systems and safety features that make a bank seem like a kids playground. My new vehicle has computers to explain the computer screen, buttons on the dash, on the screen, on the doors, on the steering wheel and about four manuals that will take me ten years to read. Righteous.

I urge you to listen to the Eagles version of “After the Thrill is Gone”. It’s sad and you might cry or maybe just shed a tear or at least remember some far off lost love or high school heartbreak. Bittersweet. Yet still sweet. Rad.

When you drive and jive in your car nowadays flying down the highway or freeway in your RV or EV or SUV or hybrid, nobody has their car windows down. Sometimes when I blast the music, I’ll roll the electric windows down and sing loudly with my hair blowing in the wind (thanks Bob Dylan), and no one’s sharing the rockin rollin tunes with me. If I drive too fast, my car reprimands me. It’s like my robot monitor- or my mommas and poppas. The other people driving by probably wouldn’t like the oldies anyway. “We’ll have fun, fun, fun now that Daddy took the t-bird away.”

With all the stress and worry that I’m going through, dealing with the serious illness my husband has fought for almost two years, I find that music takes me away from the troubled times. The loud songs pump my brain away from it all, “Like a Bridge Over Troubled Water”.

Music is soothing. When some of the older songs come on, the screen will say that it’s been “remastered”. It sounds fuller and grander than the old record players or transistor radios I had used to listen to songs in my teens. The songs are oldies but they’re brand new to me, ready to lift my spirits and whisk me away to better times. So let’s say we enjoy some music, sing along, listen and slip away to yesterday or even dance a bit at the Hotel California.

I’m a Daydream Believer and I Get Around.

Cool.