A Hit Before Your Mother Was Born

Written to Dad, a Beatles fan from just about the time I was born, who no doubt has swallowed his tongue:

So. My student worker, who is younger than Miss Sasha, has spent the last twenty-five minutes telling her friend the other student worker how she's discovered this great band called The Beatles. And she didn't KNOW they were so popular, and she found this record, and she was just playing a bunch of records to find out what she liked. How could you not like the Beatles? And did you know his wife is younger than even his DAUGHTER? Meanwhile, I'm sitting in my cubicle, mere feet away. The students and the twenty-somethings in my office discuss music on an almost daily basis, and on an almost daily basis, I hear conversations that'd make you want to take a hostage. Sometimes, I get up, walk around the cubicle wall and correct their versions of history or, as when I was asked if I'd ever heard of this thing "Alice's Restaurant," I sat in my cubicle and growled, "I don't know why I TALK TO YOU GUYS." So here I am, and she's talking about the Beatles, and I get up, walk around the wall, grab her gently by the chin and MWAH-kiss her on the forehead. She misunderstands. She's very pleased. She says, "Have I made you happy?" or something just like it. I cannot correct this impression. I just say, "Sometimes, you make me smile."