A Holland Memory

[Hank Briarstem]

It was the summer of 1972, I am certain – or as certain as an ageing lunatic can be. It might have been June. I recall being at a nice little hotel in Washington, the Watergate. Fine service, actually – I believe chocolates were left on my bed. They might have been soaps. Regardless they were quite tasty. There was noise in the next room – plumbers, perhaps, or burglars. I wasn’t concerned as I had accidentally left my wallet at home and was planning to exit without paying, in any case. My third wife’s second cousin Vita lived nearby so I was able to take my meals there when she wasn’t at home and the neighbors were distracted.

I had a long distance call from Holland. “Can you deliver the chicken salad?” The question wasn’t one of “can.” Of course I had the capability. The question was whether I would. “You Need a Mess of Help to Stand Alone” was flailing, as had so many recent Beach Boys releases. But I heard it either on the radio or from the throes of my imagination, and I took this as a sign. Why yes I would take the chicken salad to Holland. I knew it could be the last chance for the Boys to salvage something from a difficult period.

The key to a good chicken salad is the chicken. It must not be turkey. It must not be ham. In the former case, you have turkey salad; in the latter you have ham salad. No, in order to make an authentic chicken salad, one must employ chicken. I was at the supermarket once and inadvertently chose from the shelf a can marked “Chicken of the Sea.” I wound up with tuna salad, and it was good. It wasn’t, however, chicken salad.

But I digress.

The Boys had long since nicknamed me “Big Sir,” and I was of course honored by the tribute song on the planned new album. Who wouldn’t be? I understood that the chicken salad was Brian’s way of telling his band mates, “I’m with you. I offer you this chicken salad.” And so I was careful to choose the correct mayo (Hellman’s) and the choicest grapes, lovingly sliced with a sharp knife that later was to cost me the tip of my left thumb. I went easy on the celery to appease Michael. I knew that his opinion counted to Brian, though minimally if at all. Carl in mind, I squeezed fresh lemon juice.

I was generous with the ingredients as Vita was at work and the blinds were drawn. And I made a full gallon. I knew that Brian would expect me to deliver it personally to Holland, but my missing wallet was a problem. I knew a guy who knew a guy who had been with the CIA and ran a little ID racket out of a haberdashery in Arlington. I understood him to be a Beach Boys fanatic and hoped he might help.

Understandably nervous and a bit out of sorts after the bumpy ride in the produce truck – one hitches what one may – I approached the store and did as I had been advised. I sang the first few bars of “Surfer Girl” while bouncing on one foot. An unobtrusive door near the back of the shop – mostly hidden, as I recall, by a display of homburgs – opened a foot or two. I entered.

A tall man with a sharp nose, a dull smile and carefully parted dark hair, which he kept in a basket near his desk, looked at me, said – “Who are you, and who do you want to be?”

“Briarstem,” I said. “Hank Briarstem.”

“No fooling? You’re Briarstem?”

“I have five ex-wives who keep insisting on it in court.”

“Wow. That’s not a gallon of chicken salad?”

“Yes.”

“Brian’s favorite?”

“It’s a peace offering to the boys.”

“Could I taste?”

“You know Mike… that could be an issue.”

“Of course.” He wasn’t happy, but he understood.

Twenty minutes later, I had a ticket to Amsterdam, and I was transformed into a pest control salesman from Schenectady, fully conversant on the Japanese beetle. I even joked with my contact that if he’d come along we could “go Dutch.” But he feared being stuck with all the checks. In exchange for an autograph, he gave me cab fare, and I was whisked to the airport.

As fate would have it, or perhaps as fate wouldn’t have it, at Dulles I bumped into Van Dyke Parks who had just made a donation to a group of Hare Krishnas and who handed me a flower. His attention was drawn immediately to the chicken salad, and he guessed immediately my mission  -- Van Dyke is nothing if not perceptive.

“Two issues,” he told me. “One, I’m not sure Brian realizes what this chicken salad could symbolize to the rest of the band, especially Mike. They’ll take this to mean he has finished songs of which they are not aware, and they’ll pressure him – big pressure. You of all people know that, Hank. Two, this stuff is going to spoil before you’re able to get it to them. Food poisoning and recording don’t mix. Nice grapes, though.”

I stood at the horns of a dilemma, or rather at the Horns of a Dilemma, a brand new bar at Dulles. I wanted to honor the great man’s wishes, but I understood the truth of Van Dyke’s argument. I found a pay phone, reversed the charges.

“I can’t do this, big guy – we can’t do this. We both know Al will complain there isn’t enough salt, and Carl will be left to smooth things over. Maybe when everyone gets back to LA I’ll whip up a casserole – something special.”

A minute or two of silence followed – two old friends understanding, sorrowfully but completely, the truth of what I’d said. Then he told me  -- “To this day, I wish I’d listened to you and included ‘Shortenin’ Bread’ on Pet Sounds. I appreciate the good advice, Big Sir. Have the chicken salad with someone special.”

I left the airport a jumbled mess of confusion and melancholy, stepped into the road while in my trance and was hit a glancing blow by a taxi. While I avoided injury, the gallon of chicken salad, which had been launched end over end, landed in effluence and the food, all of its mysticism now lost, was left for the insects and fowl.

Somewhere in the distance, a radio played “God Only Knows,” and I cried.

[Douchepool]

15 Big Ones/15 enjoyed the lack of inappropriate music and the extra positivity.