Underage Disco Princess
Jun 21 | Written By American Baroness
I was an underage disco princess. Back in the day. In Boston. All the discos, a long row of them, were on Lansdowne Street, across from Fenway Park.
In 1977, I was 13, turning 14 at the end of the year, on December 27th, right between Christmas and the New Year, when nobody wants to think about buying another gift or celebrating with cake. My holiday gifts were always for Birthday-slash-Christmas. In essence, I always got gypped. I blame this particularly lousy birth date for having conditioned me to over-compensate. I say over-compensate, but I mean indulge. Myself. With stuff I couldn’t afford. I always had at least three outfits on layaway at the local department store. By 13, I was working weekends, the 5 a.m. shift, at our town’s donut shop, in part to afford my habit.
I was desperate to turn 14, not least of all because that was the youngest age allowed into the disco I’d heard about, Illusions, on their underage night—every other Friday from 8 til 11. My friends—Laura, Jackie, Joanne and Andrea— all from my suburban neighborhood, had been turning 14 throughout 1977, but I was the youngest of the bunch, and the leader. They all had to wait for me to turn 14 so we could go to Illusions, for the first time, together.
It is clearly marked in my 5-year diary that I went to Illusions on Friday, December 30, 1977. In a real disco, finally, belatedly celebrating my 14th birthday, I screamed along and danced to all my favorite songs, and every one of Donna Summer’s big, early hits. She was from Boston, too; and even in that racist, homophobic, blue collar city, she was worshipped equally by whites and blacks, gays and straights, the Italians and the Irish. And the Irish-Italians. She had three mega-hits that year, Once Upon A Time, I Love You, and…I Feel Love, a song I struggled to understand.
’77 had been a big year culturally. In April, I’d seen Annie Hall. It was rated PG, so I was supposed to have had parental guidance. But maybe because I was tall and wore glasses, I looked older, and I was never questioned at the ticket window. After Annie Hall, I dreamed of living in Manhattan. I wanted to be Annie Hall. Or Diane Keaton. Same thing. I know it’s a cliché, but I even dressed like Annie Hall. There I’d be, window shopping on Newbury Street, on my own, wearing khakis, white shirt, vest, African rope totebag, carrying a book, stopping for coffee and cheesecake.
“New York Style cheesecake, if you have that, please.”
Later that year, in October, I saw Looking For Mr. Goodbar, also starring Diane Keaton—and though it upset me that suddenly Annie Hall-slash-Diane Keaton seemed kind of slutty, I was more than a little intrigued by the story of an obedient Catholic girl gone bad. Sex was on my mind, though I had absolutely no clue what it was all about. I didn’t even know that French kissing meant with tongues. I thought it was just more European than the regular kind of kissing.
That first night at Illusions, I was decked out in one of the get-ups I’d been able to get off layaway, with Birthday-slash-Christmas money: a short, tight, scratchy, glittery tube dress that I topped off with a big wool, winter coat as a way to hide the enticing ensemble from whoever’s father drove us into Boston so he wouldn’t be freaked out. Or turned on. And, of course, LL Bean’s all-weather duck boots that I immediately ditched at the coat check for the new pair of pink, open-backed, sky high-heeled Candie’s I was smuggling in my coat pockets.
We’re in. It’s chaos as we beeline for the center of the dance floor. I’m in Heaven. We order ginger ale at the bar. It’s sweaty, we’re under strobe lights. The first song we hear is, wow…I Feel Love. I feel love. I really do feel it. I feel it as soon as I see him through the artificial fog. Olive skinned, big brown eyed, curly haired Kevin. From Revere. Hanging by the bar, with his friends, from Southie and Charlestown. They’re all puffed up, pretending to be confident, picking and choosing their prey, antsy, talking a little too loud.
They notice us. We notice them.
Kevin, after a quick scan, chooses…me? He approaches and we talk a little. It’s not easy over the music. It’s all cupped hands on ears. His friends have formed a loose semi-circle around us, and one of them says, loud enough for me to hear, “she’s too skinny!”, Kevin elbows this guy in the gut, horsing around.
But it’s on, I’m with him now. What is he, fifteen, and already the macho, misogynist he’ll inevitably become? But I’m already not that girl. I’ll leave. I’ll leave Laura, Jackie, Joanne and Andrea. I’ll go to Manhattan, for the first time, just 3 years later, on a bus, fantasizing all the way that I’ll magically wake up one day soon to find myself settled on the Upper West Side, like Annie Hall, tennis racket at the ready in my Ralph Lauren bag.
But that night, in Illusions, I stay. I feel love.