A half hour later I awoke with my head on a hairy thigh. With a quick jolt I bolted straight up, humiliated. The hairy thigh was Leon’s.
“Morning,” he whispered.
I raked a hand through my tangled hair, mustered a weak “Hi.”
Yasgur’s dairy farm had grown deathly quiet, except for an occasional whistle. And Joan’s astonishing a cappella voice.
“Is this her last song?” I asked.
He scrubbed a hand across his chin. “Might be.”
“‘I looked over yonder, and what did I see? Coming to carry me home? Saw a band of angels coming for me, coming for to carry me home. Swing low, sweet chariot.’” Joan hit notes I could only dream of.
As she serenaded the crowd with my second-favorite gospel tune, I leaned into Livy. “Wonder if Joan Baez ever sang in a choir?”
“Maybe,” she said. “Her grandfather was a Methodist minister.”
That night—I would be willing to guess—Joan sang “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” with a five-octave range. I imagined bottles breaking all over the pasture when she reached her highest note.
She played one more protest song, “We Shall Overcome,” an anthem to the civil rights movement. She dedicated it to her husband and invited everyone to sing along.
When it was over, Joan waved and told the audience good night. She exited the stage, never to return. As the Woodstock Nation jumped to their feet, cheering for our Friday-night headliner, my heart stung. I had missed most of it.
John Morris appeared back at the microphone sometime after four in the morning. “That brings us fairly close to dawn. The word I get is that maybe the best thing for everybody to do, unless you have a tent or someplace specific to go, is carve yourself out a piece of territory. Say good night to your neighbor, and say thank you to yourself for making this the most peaceful, most pleasant day anybody’s ever had in this kind of music. We’ll give you a little bit of recorded music in a little bit.”
Since Livy and I had no tent or anywhere specific to go, and no dry blankets to keep us warm, we had no other choice but to carve out our own piece of territory right there in the bowl, in the drizzle. And pray the massive amount of body heat might keep us from freezing to death.
As for the good news, Leon and Johnny had no place to go either.
“Guess we’ll crash here. Night, neighbors,” Leon said, settling down on his back, knees up.
I settled down, too, on top of my wet blanket, happy that I was already next to him. Livy scooted in close to me, and Johnny lay down on her other side.
The four of us talked a little while, mostly about the music and which bands we were most excited about hearing over the weekend.
Shortly thereafter, Livy fell asleep. How she could do it in the cold rain blew my mind. It couldn’t have been higher than sixty-five degrees. And since I was soaked to the bone, it felt like forty. It seemed like I’d never get warm again as I stared up at the night sky. I tried to keep it to myself, but shallow breaths gave me away.
Leon rolled over on his side. “You okay?”
I nodded, even though I wasn’t. I’d missed most of Joan Baez. My blanket was soaked. I was soaked, cold, and hungry. As jubilant as I was to be at Woodstock—lying a foot away from Leon Wright—my body still screamed in agony.
“Softest bed I’ve ever slept on,” he said. A faint chuckle followed.
I forced a grin while my teeth chattered.
“You sure you’re okay?” he asked again.
“I’m fi-fine.”
Without another word, I felt him slip his arm underneath my waist, pulling us together. He pressed his full body into the back of mine, then wrapped his arm around my middle, resting his hand just underneath my breastbone. One move of his finger and he would have known the curve of my breast. “This better?” he asked.
I’m wrapped up in your arms,I wanted to say.What could be better than this?“Much better” was all I said.
He dipped down to my ear. The stubble from his chin grazed my cheek. “It’s not that cold, you know.”
“Maybe not for you. You’re a Ya-Yankee.”
His loud Leon laugh woke Livy. She peered at us. But thankfully never said anything.
