More than a Feeling

Kathy Lansing

Ames, IA

The song is More than a Feeling by Boston. I was in a bar in Cedar Falls and it might have been ten cent draw night.

Greg Kilstofte was at a house party with Steve Evers from my hometown of Guttenberg. Steve introduced us when they came into the Stein.

I can see it right now and I can hear that song.

The smell comes back too. You walked in and they were always popping popcorn to cover up the seedy smell of spilled beer on the wood floor. Plenty of Lysol too in the grimy bathroom.

The night went on and well, we got married.

Two other song memories come back as I smile every time I listen to those 70s songs.

Maybe I’m Amazed by Paul McCartney. Greg and my first visit to the Poison Apple, the first disco in Cedar Falls. Our first slow dance… can still see the garish flashing lights, way too loud music and the smell of their signature drink, a sickening sweet red concoction, called the “poison apple” of course served in a huge souvenir glass that decorated way too many dorm rooms…🍷

Second one goes way back…. The song is Doctor My Eyes by Jackson Brown. 

I’m a 14-year-old awkward farm girl working at Les & Em’s Drive-In on the highway in Guttenberg. A teen hangout for the cool kids…. every afternoon the high school varsity football boys would come by after practice, hang out in the booths and play this song on the jukebox. I still feel the hot sun as I stared at them through the window, the smell of gravel dust an car exhaust as they sped off in their junky cars and the hot, greasy smell of the burgers& fries they inhaled. 

Still makes me smile 54 years later 🤣

More than a Feeling