I want to hold their hand

<Breaking radio silence>

It’s been more than a year since I last posted. Why am I posting now?

It’s got something to do with the photo of the Beatles circa 1969 on the big billboard some 100 feet from my loft. I see it every day, and it’s like an instant trip in a time machine. I did a Google search to find out more about the image and found a good writeup on the LA Times’ site (co-written by Patrick Goldstein, whom I remember from back in the day!).

But I didn’t need to know the who, what, where, when or why of the photo session to analyze the sense of poignant nostalgia I get every time I look at the billboard (which, given its location, is pretty much any time I go anywhere). The guys in that picture look so young and indestructible. And now, two of them are gone forever, and Ringo and Paul (I will never call him Sir Paul) have aged–maybe more gracefully than me, but they will never again be the idols of my teen years. Just one more reminder that I am getting old, too.

I have to admit that I did buy the Beatles boxed set on iTunes and have begun listening to the albums (I’m most partial to the Help/Rubber Soul/Revolver period). It’s actually comforting in a way the image isn’t: The music, unlike the people who created it, is eternal and for me, at least, sounds as fresh and exciting as it did all those years ago.

Overall, I’m really glad the Beatles are finally on iTunes. And I’m not unhappy that Apple is working hard to push them, even if the marketing campaign does remind me of my mortality. If we Baby Boomers are lucky, maybe it will also remind those that weren’t around in those days that we were once young and cool, too.