Old Town is a pretty quiet place these days, but when the Prowler pads through its halls, this cat hears music.
It goes back to when I was a mere kitten, singing with the school choir under the big oak near what became Steamer's restaurant. We were loud and earnest, if not tuneful.
I returned years later as a grown cat, prowling through the center on a whisker-freezing winter night while singing Christmas carols and trying to play guitar with frozen paws. Is it any wonder our favorite stops were the California Cafe and the Wine Cellar, where the house musicians let us do a few tunes?
Fast-forward to a steamy summer day and singers in formals and tuxes offering songs in the amphitheater behind the main building. A larger audience gathered in the balcony than on the railroad-tie seats, where the temperature hovered around 105 degrees. The Confectionary was a popular between-songs stop that day for 30 singers who defied the no-dairy-products-before-singing rule for double cones with chocolate on top.
These days, you might hear rock music at Waves or folk at the Wine Cellar, but mostly it's silent, except for the implied music coming from Bruni Sablan's display of paintings of jazz greats at the Old Town Gallery. Duke Ellington, Gerry Mulligan, Louis Armstrong and Charlie Parker, all pictured there, are still playing in the heart if not in person. Sort of like the rest of the music at Old Town.
Other Old Town memories come to mind. The night this cat learned to stick to milk and leave the hard stuff to tougher tabbies. Ring shopping with the mate at the Indian Store. Playing at the toy store.
Drapes cover many of the windows these days, and For Lease signs abound, but some businesses endure, and the Prowler is keeping an ear cocked for the tunes to come when the former school starts its next life. Like all us cool cats, Old Town has several lives to live.
This article appeared in the Los Gatos Weekly-Times, April 10, 1996.
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