James Burke: Cadillac Jukebox

"What are you thinking about, slick?" she said.

"You can't ever tell," I said.

That night she and I ate a piece of pecan pie on the picnic table in the backyard, then, like reaching your hand into the past, like giving yourself over to the world of play and nonreason that takes you outside of time, I punched on Alafair's stereo player that contained the taped recording of all the records on Jerry Joe's jukebox.

We danced to "Jolie Blon" and "Tes Yeux Bleu," then kicked it up into overdrive with "Bony Maronie," "Long Tall Sally," and "Short Fat Fanny." Out in the darkness, beyond the glow of the flood lamp in the mimosa tree, my neighbor's cattle were bunching in the coulee as an electric storm veined the sky with lightning in the south. The air was suddenly cool and thick with the sulfurous smell of ozone, the wind blowing dust out of the new cane, the wisteria on our garage flattening against the board walls while shadows and protean shapes formed and reformed themselves, like Greek players on an outdoor stage beckoning to us, luring us from pastoral chores into an amphitheater by the sea, where we would witness once again the unfinished story of ourselves.