By Michael Patrick O’Brien–
In September 1988, singer-songwriter Nanci Griffith performed “Love at the Five and Dime” at a Salt Lake City concert. I’d never heard of either her or the song before. Now it is the only moment from the concert that I really remember.
I was there by coincidence. Some friends from law school gave their extra ticket which otherwise would have gone unused.
Some old newspapers I just found classify Griffith’s songs into the “folkabilly” genre, i.e. a “mix of folk and country music that combines the best of both.” The diminutive Griffith certainly had an organic original sound. The daughter of Texas musicians, she played guitar by age 6, started performing a few years later, and even toured with the Everly Brothers.
Griffith composed many of her songs and wrote her own lyrics too. They are poetry, as confirmed by her wild popularity in Ireland, a place that understands both paean and pain better than most. Music critics have described Griffith’s songs as “short stories” or “detailed vignettes.” The song that mesmerized me at her September 1988 concert is the perfect example.
“Love at the Five & Dime” tells the story of Rita and Eddie. Rita has a job making “the Woolworth counter shine.” One day at work she meets Eddie, “a sweet romancer and a darn good dancer.” The young soon-to-be-a-couple waltz though the aisles together while Griffith explains that “love’s on sale tonight at this five and dime.”
Eddie plays the guitar—makes “his mama” cry “cause he played in the bars”—and keeps Rita out way too late. They marry but lose a child and then split up after Eddie runs off with another woman. Yet, Eddie is back by “June” now “singin’ a different tune” with Rita by his side. They age, and settle down into life, but Griffith explains that they still sing and dance “to the radio late at night…”
Why would I feel instant affinity for a song which I had never heard before? Sometimes I think your heart and soul know they love something right away, but it takes your brain a while longer to catch up.
I did not think about much about “Love at the Five and Dime” during the three decades—over half my life so far—that followed the 1988 concert. Sure, once in a while I’d hear the song, pause, listen, and smile, but that was about it.
Then, when I heard news of Griffith’s recent passing, I thought about the concert and the song again. In fact, it was almost all I could think about for several days. Why had this particular song, one that I didn’t listen to very often, left such a lasting impression on me?
It was not economic memories or brand nostalgia. I don’t remember spending much time in a Woolworth’s store. Perhaps it was affection I inherited from my mother? She frequently visited her hometown store in Burlington—the largest Woolworth’s in Vermont. It sold all sorts of general merchandise on Church Street for almost a century, until an Old Navy replaced it in about 1998.
The “Five and Dime” nickname was factually accurate. For a time, everything in the store cost either a nickel or a dime. This includes food at the famous Woolworth’s lunch counter. One newspaper advertisement from 1942 shows apple pie sold for 10 cents a slice. For three dimes, you could get a full turkey dinner!
But these are all memories from my mother’s childhood, not mine. So again, why would I feel instant affinity for this Nanci Griffith song I had never heard before? I think it has something to do with Rita and Eddie—the five and dime lovers.
Like my concert-going friends who gave me their extra ticket, in September 1988 I was young and single, fresh on the path of an independent life, just starting to sample the taste of success and failure. With about four minutes of sung poetry and acoustic guitar strumming, Nanci Griffith gave us young bucks a glimpse of our own Rita and Eddie moments ahead.
We all have them, even Nanci Griffith. She lost one boyfriend in a motorcycle accident and married another, but they divorced a few years later. She enjoyed professional success and endured career setbacks. She battled several forms of cancer, and then she passed away in August 2021 at the relatively young age of 68. The end likely arrived much too soon, leaving songs unsung and stories untold.
The writer/cartoonist Allen Saunders famously explained in a 1957 Reader’s Digest article how “Life is what happens to us while we are making other plans.” It was a clever way to remind us to live while we are alive.
Griffith’s lovers Rita and Eddie—in youth, middle age, and the golden years—seemed to live life in real time, as it happened. And despite their flaws and their many ups and downs, they still made time to sing to each other, “Dance a little closer to me, Hey, dance a little closer now, Dance a little closer tonight.”
After Griffith’s September 1988 Utah concert, The Salt Lake Tribune said her songs “focus on finding love, happiness and meaning in a seemingly chaotic life and a fast-changing world.” Not only love was on sale at Nanci Griffith’s five and dime. Simple homespun wisdom was on the shelves too.
*Mike O’Brien is a writer and attorney living in Salt Lake City, Utah. His book Monastery Mornings (found here), about growing up with the monks at the old Trappist monastery in Huntsville, Utah, was published by Paraclete Press (more information here) in August 2021.
