1.
Raw winds roared out of Canada
Gaining speed across vast miles of Lake Superior
Driving icy snow into the earth at jagged angles
Cutting into my eyelids and face.
I slammed shut the car door
Trudged through snow toward the blurred neon sign:
“The People’s Club. Live Music.”
Shaking snow from my hair and eyes,
I looked for a strategic place to land,
An inconspicuous corner, a chair with back to the wall.
Peeled off my gloves, heavy coat, wool scarf,
Draped them over the back of the chair and surveyed the scene.
A century old tavern, frozen in time.
Green Bay, Wisconsin.  
Nothing special about the People’s Club.  
Nothing to separate it from thousands of beer joints, road houses, and gin mills
Still standing on street corners, roadsides, and freeway entrances,
From Kenosha to Hurley, from one end of Wisconsin to the other.
An old wooden floor, beaten down smooth by the steady poundings of leather-soled work boots,
Coming and going, night after day, month after year.  
Ancient tin ceiling, brown patina from decades of tobacco smoke and furnace oil soot, Battered lighting fixtures hanging sadly, tacky beer logos
Leinenkuegel’s, Schmidt’s, Pabst’s, Point, Oconto.  
The odd assortment of unmatched tables and chairs sitting, ready to serve.  
The long, beat-up, old bar lined an entire wall, defending itself with a dented brass rail, Its top and sides permanently scarred by cigarette burns and jackknife hieroglyphs. Sturdy, war torn barstools stood like tough old soldiers,
Testing their frames year after year against the weight of beefy machinists,
Thirsty loggers, unwinding hod-carriers, half-drunk seafarers,
And anyone else who wandered in.
The People’s Club: a home away from home
But the old clientele had long departed.
A new crowd of drinkers and talkers now bent their elbows on the battered bar,
Leaned on the old stools, smoked and drank and told their stories.
Young workers with rough hands and scraggly hair,
Wearing heavy boots and red and black checked shirts,
Stood with bearded bikers
And escapees from college dorms and drafty libraries at the University.
Chain-smoking women in blue jeans and suede
Talked with red-eyed dopers, overage hipsters, wannabe hippies,
Assorted hangers and faders, and everyone else.
Looking into the smoke-filled bar room, I searched for the musician,
My eyes passed across the crowd,
Half-recording the images and expressions of the People’s Club crowd.
Predictable music spilled out of scratchy speakers
Suspended awkwardly from dusty ceiling joists:
“Stairway to Heaven,” the inevitable choice of the people, droned on,
Competing with the noisy bar talk, swearing, story-telling and bad jokes.  
Monday night at the People’s Club.  

2.
Finally the “live music” appeared.
Two sound speakers stood on a “stage” of 10 by 10 parquet flooring—the artist sat on the same level as the audience.
A Gibson “Les Paul” guitar stood on its stand, waiting for the last set.  
Then I saw the girl, moving through the crowd.  
Long blonde hair loose, parted on the side, curving around a valentine face,
Dressed in jeans and leather vest.  
I liked the way she grabbed her Gibson smartly by the neck,
Threw the strap over her shoulder, plunked on the E-string and brought it into tune.  
On to the next strings in succession, a quick set of chords.
She adjusted the mike, pick between thumb and forefinger,
Strummed an E chord in two-two time, and then she was off.
“My body is the only place where we meet any more,” she sang,
Covering the new Bonnie Raitt song being played on alternative radio,
But with a voice clearer, younger, less worldly.
“Thought that I could handle a heartache like I did before,” she crooned,
Her hair falling to one side of her face as she pushed into the song,
Left hand gliding up and down the slender neck of the guitar,
Index finger pushed flat against all six strings with bar chords, like men play.
“I remember your warning: to never mention love,” she sang,
Hitting the E-string smartly, brushing her thighs against the standing mike,
“A little crime of passion is what I’m guilty of.”
Locked in my safe corner chair, I moved with the singer.
Knowing the lyrics, I sang to myself, studied her guitar chords,
Watched her facial and body movements as she cruised through the song
And quietly, too quietly perhaps, ended it.  
The applause was spotty.  
The audience seemed more interested in the singer than the song
A crowd of men had gathered near the stage, ogling the singer,
Armed with ash-dripping cigarettes and drafts of beer.  
“Rock and Roll-l-l-l!” one of them howled, to the crowd’s delight.  
Another yelled “Let’s boogie!” while she checked her tuning and started another song.  
“Kid” by the Pretenders was catchy, but the crowd wandered  
An original song received a smattering of applause.
Her attempts to make small talk between numbers could hardly be heard
Over the rising din of bar conversations, winter-time coughing, cash register clanking, Slamming doors (“shut the door, goddammit, it’s freezing out there!”)    
”Zeppelin! Give us Zeppelin!” shouted someone.  
“No, Hendrix!”
“Rock and Roll-l-l-l!”
Catering to the crowd, perhaps, she shifted gears, turned up the amplifier
And cranked up the familiar long lead guitar introduction to “Piece of My heart,”
Setting up the audience for that dramatic opening line:
“Didn’t I make you feel like you were the only man?”  
And she hooked them with the well known “C’mon, c’mon, c’mon, c’mon, c’mon”
So that the bikers and barflies and checked shirts and longhairs were all singing along, “Break-a, break another little piece of my heart, now baby.”
The singer gave it everything, scratching her vocal chords to give the song its due, stomping her western boots into the floor like Janis used to stomp,
Shaking her long hair at the right moment, perspiration rolling down delicate cheeks. “You know you got it,” she yelled huskily, “if it makes you feel good!  
And then that long familiar closing guitar riff.  
Applause.
She had connected.

3.
But triumph proved elusive.
A guitar string had snapped and the amplifier screeched.  
She turned it down, put the Gibson in its stand,
And opened her guitar case to find a new string.  
She removed the broken string and began to install its replacement,
But an obnoxious patron grabbed the guitar, pretending to play
A Green Bay version of Jimmy Paige.  
She pulled it back, but he bumped it against a chair and knocked it further out of tune.   
She found a spot at the end of the bar to tend to her guitar
The bartender brought her a glass of beer.  
A loud group of men surrounded her with asinine questions and dumb jokes.    
Watching this drama unfold produced a small battle within me.  
I wanted to restring the guitar for her and ask her to sit with me in my isolated corner,
To talk about the songs, and the chords she used.
But another voice inside me said, wait, she’s a pro, she does this for a living.
Why does she need my help?  
I could ask these clowns to back off, but she must be used to it.  
Maybe she likes to be the center of attention and its all part of the routine.  
So went the internal debate until she returned to the stage.
It was hard work.  
Turning down the amplifier to quell the squeal mad it harder to overcome the bar room noise
And a pair of Joni Mitchell songs drew tepid responses.  
Then the calls for “Rock and Roll-l-l-l!” and “Let’s boogie!” interrupted anew, making it harder to focus on her music.
Several drunken patrons edged closer to the pseudo-stage.
As she finished another song, one of them offered her a glass of beer.
Declining the offer made him more insistent: “Do you think you’re too good to drink with us?” he shouted mindlessly, egged on by the others.  
She prepared to begin again.
Needing a refill, I walked toward the bar and, passing the makeshift stage,
I caught her eye and suggested, politely, “I like your music, but this is a tough crowd and they’re kind of drunk and nasty.  It’s almost midnight, maybe you should do one last song and get out. Just an idea.”
While my glass was being refilled, I heard her voice: “This is my last song.  It’s been great playing for you tonight!” she said, cranking up the volume one last time and cleverly moving into another familiar opening guitar riff: “Midnight Hour.”
She sang it well, a little slower than usual, with steady rhythm guitar work that partly compensated for the missing percussion.
Her voice rang true, lips and tongue forming the lyrics with indigenous inflection, differentiating her from the well-worn recording.  
“I want to hold you in my arms’” she crooned,  
“And do all the things I told you in the Midnight Hour.”
Adding more volume, she finished off the song with its recognizable finale, winning a respectable applause.

4.
Protests were voiced as she began her exit.  
“Hey, why are you quitting so early?”  
“Thank you for your applause.  It’s been a great night.  
I really look forward to coming back to the People’s Club real soon,” she claimed,
And turned off the mike.   
“It’s only midnight!  The bar’s open until 3!”
“Why are you quitting? Keep playing, god damn it!”
She unplugged the amplifier, but a grinning gnome plugged it back in.  
Another picked up her her guitar, shouting, “Let’s hear some more songs.”
A brown toothed biker with scraggly thinning hair grabbed her by the shoulder
A giant wearing a baseball cap loomed behind him.
I stepped forward, screwing up my courage and stating with what authority I could muster, “All right, let’s get all the equipment packed!”  
She nodded “OK” and I turned off the amplifier switch and pulled out the plug.  
“Look at this guitar, man” I said to brown tooth as she opened the guitar case.  
“It’s a Les Paul model. Real special.”  
“Like that photograph autographed by Packer Coach Vince Lombardi over there.”  
I pointed to the other side of the room
And while he pondered the photo I was able to extract the Gibson from his hand and place it in the case.  
I started to collapse the folding microphone stand.
“Who the hell are you?” bellowed the biker.  “Her manager or her husband or what?”
As I snapped shut the case I pondered his question: who was I?

5.
I looked at brown tooth’s face and into his bloodshot eyes.  
He seemed decisively drunk, but more ominous was the hulking figure standing behind him.  
Then I noticed the logo on the giant’s cap” “UPIU Local 1113.”  
And I remembered who I was.
“Who are you? You’re not from around here!” bellowed brown tooth.  
“Guys, take it easy,” I said.  “Don’t get all worked up. I’m from the union.  
You know, the AFL-CIO.  Look, guys, I know you maybe want to keep the music going, But I’m just doing my job.  See, she’s a member of the union.  
And the union contract says the members can’t play after midnight without double overtime and 48 hours advance notice.
So, the union can’t let her play after midnight and there’s nothing we can do about it!”  She stared at me, eyes wide: were they green?
“The union? What the fuck does the union have to do with it?” hollered brown tooth.  “Fuck this union bullshit and let her keep playing!”  
“Wait a minute, man. Don’t talk about the union that way,” I said, motioning to his giant companion.
“Look, man, this brother next to you, he’s a union man.  You work at International Paper don’t you?”  
He nodded.  
“What’s your name?”  
“Bob” he croaked.  
“Bob, you understand what I’m talking about, don’t you?  The company tried to cut your pay, they tried to replace you with guys that were willing to work for half your wages, didn’t they?”
He nodded.  
“But only one thing stood between them and you: the union, the United Paperworkers International Union!”
Bob nodded again, a great, silent hero.  
“So the musicians are sort of like the paperworkers, and the union is important to them. And if you attack her union, then you’re also attacking the paperworkers’ union.  And then you’re going against your friend Bob here, everybody at the paper mill, and half of the people in this joint!”  
Brown tooth didn’t seem convinced, but the giant nodded slowly, a very good sign.
“We’ve got to get the truck loaded, man.  She has another gig tomorrow in Chicago,” I lied.  
“Hey, I’m sorry for any misunderstanding.  Bob, can you help me carry some of this stuff? Bartender, get this guy a double shot of  Korbell’s!” I motioned to brown tooth, slapped him on the shoulder and laid a $5 bill on the counter.  
“Let’s go, man, it’s freezing out there.”
I grabbed my coat and gloves, wound the electric chords into a large loop and slung them over my shoulder and grabbed the two speakers.  
The singer threw on a shabby old coat and gathered up the Gibson and the microphone.  Bob hauled the amplifier and a small suitcase of other equipment.  
We pushed through the crowd and she followed, not looking back.
The doors slammed shut at the People’s Club.
Falling snow covered our tracks.

6.
Steam from hot coffee curled over our cups at the Ramada Inn Coffee Shop.  
“C’mon, are you really from the union?” she asked, cocking her head slightly to one side.  
”Well, are you really guilty of a crime of passion?”  I countered.
“I asked you first!” she laughed and smiled at me with eyes as green as my own.