My wife Cathy and I attended a wedding last weekend.  The bride was an elementary school teacher and the groom a former tax lawyer who quit his practice to open a chain of marijuana dispensaries.  As we drove into the parking lot at the wedding venue, we saw in the spots reserved for the bide and groom a Ferrari sports car and a Porsche SUV – which is a couple hundred thousand dollars worth of transportation.  I had no idea that grade school teachers are paid that well.

It was a very nice ceremony and reception, but a few things struck me as sort of strange.  For example, the officiant (it was not a very religious ceremony), thought it appropriate to include an old joke in his remarks.  It was the one about a woman who accompanied her husband to a medical appointment.  After the husband had been examined, the doctor asked to speak to his wife in private.  He told her that her husband’s condition was very precarious, and that virtually any stress could have disastrous consequences.  The doctor told her that she would have to care for her husband with great love and tenderness, cook him carefully planned meals, prevent him from doing strenuous household chores and generally “baby” him for several months.  The wife said she understood, and went to meet her husband in the waiting room.  As they were walking out to their car, the husband asked, “What did the doctor have to say?”  The wife replied, “He said you’re going to die.”

That was not what I expected to hear at a wedding.  The joke, combined with the cars I had seen coming in, made me think of the song “Silver Threads and Golden Needles,” which was written by Jack Rhodes and Dick Reynolds, and first recorded in 1956 by Wanda Jackson, the so-called “Queen of Rockabilly.”  It has since been performed and recorded many times by many musicians.  I even recall being at a Grateful Dead concert where Bob Weir sang the song.

One of the best versions – or actually two of the best versions – is/are by Linda Ronstadt.  It was on her 1969 debut album and a different version was on her 1973 album, Don’t Cry Now.  That second version was released as a very popular single.  The version on this post is that from 1969, because that is the one I first heard her perform.

Linda Ronstadt needs no introduction.  She has been an amazing singer creating great music in many fields, including, rock, jazz, country, pop, Mexican, folk, etc.  She even sang the lead in the New York Shakespeare Festival’s production of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance.  She was the most successful female singer of the 1970s, and her talent has been displayed on hundreds of records recorded over five decades.

Unfortunately, Linda Ronstadt is no longer able to sing.  In 2013 she disclosed that she has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease.  A consequence of that disease is that she does not have the muscle control necessary for singing.

I would like to express my sympathy for her.  Cathy’s father suffered from Parkinson’s for a dozen years or so before his death, and many of those years were very difficult for him.

I also have a longtime friend named Kathy who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease a few months ago.  She lives in another state, but I regularly send her long-distance Reiki, hoping that might be some help to her.

Let’s leave that topic for now and listen to Linda Ronstadt as she sang beautifully more than 45 years ago.

Silver Threads and Golden Needles
By Jack Rhodes and Dick Reynolds

© Fort Knox Music Inc., Trio Music Company Inc., Emi Music Publishing Ltd. O.B.O. Beechwood Music Corp.