After the GHG “KP” and jockey sets in the early 1990s, I came home and got my younger son Jay really hooked on the Gas House Gang. He was ten then (and known as “JR”) and I ordered him the CDs as they came out. I do remember well that the Gang had come to sing on our “Silver” show in 1992 in Alexandria, three performances. I would go out in the lobby and sneak back in to the hall to listen to your quartet set each time, by the rear theatre door. When “I Still Can’t Say Good-bye” started, I simply walked back into the lobby. There was simply no way I could listen to that song and hold it together. As I wrote Jim back then, my folks were in their mid-70s then, and I was just not prepared to live that story. I have no earthly idea how Rob ever got through it as it was.
When I got Jay the recording on which that song was, I told him it was about a young man who had gone off to college and missed his father back home. Otherwise, I couldn’t have sat there with him listening to it. He’s 30 now, and I still haven’t asked if he knew I was feeding him a line then, or when he knew (or if he always knew) the real story.
BTW, Dad wasn’t ready to let me live that story either. He “said goodbye” in May of this year, at 95. I’ve not listened to the song since, and probably never will. And yet I am immensely grateful to the Gas House Gang for giving me the emotional experiences that piece and your whole repertoire has granted me in my lifetime.
~ Bob Sutton | Alexandria, Virginia chapter | Society Archive Committee