Rock Sisters Productions

November 2002. The Rolling Stones are on tour in California. It’s the British Invasion all over again, and this time, I’m legal and I’m ready.

The Rolling Stones were at the very top of my list of must-see-before-I-die bands. Through a series of unfortunate events, I’d missed others on the list.

Cheap Trick: I had tickets in hand–at the last minute, my mother wouldn’t let me use the car. Bon Jovi: I had tickets in hand–at the last minute, my ride got called in to work . . . and like an idiot, he went. Aerosmith: I had tickets in hand (and a car)–at the last minute, the show was cancelled when Steven Tyler came down with the flu.

I was all grown up now and had a car of my own. I was determined not to miss The Rolling Stones. Alas, word on the street was that this may be the legendary band’s final tour, and tickets sold out almost immediately. I searched eBay and pored over craigslist, where tickets were available, but way out of my league. Some field level seats were going for $2,500 a pop. It looked like the Rolling Stones were about to join the list of bands I had never seen–and might never ever see.

Enter my daughter, Melissa, not only the best daughter a mom could ever have, but a young woman who understands the need to be at a particular show on a particular date and at a particular time. This is a young woman who, in fact, called me on her cell phone from the field at SBC Park one Friday night, where she was grooving to the Black-Eyed Peas, having decided at the spur of the moment to crash a Dave Matthews Band concert. She is her mother’s daughter, and she makes me proud.

No, Melissa didn’t have tickets, but she had something even better . . . connections. She had wrangled us jobs as security guards for the San Francisco leg of the Rolling Stones tour, both nights, which meant we would don blue security coats and attend the show two nights in a row, for free! In fact, we would be paid about $250 for the privilege and would be given a sack supper both nights, including Rice Krispies Treats for dessert. Stones and sweets. It was a dream come true.

The first night, Melissa was rotated to various stations, including stints as the guard posted outside Sheryl Crow’s trailer, one of the guards posted on the catwalk in front of the stage, and the backstage guard posted at the banquet room (which, I must say, is a little like putting the fox in charge of the hen house). As Melissa stood outside the banquet room door, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards walked right past her. Although she’s young, she’s wise beyond her years when it comes to rock and roll, and the significance of the moment was not lost on her.

The second night, before the show started, both Melissa and I were assigned to frisk people and to check their bags as they entered SBC Park. That was an adventure in and of itself. There is nothing that will make a mom more proud than seeing her sweet-tempered, petite, college-age daughter rise up and assert herself as a tattooed, 6′4″, 250 lb. concert-goer tries to sneak contraband into the show, or politely refuse a bribe of freshly-caught salmon in exchange for entrance to the park. It was mother-daughter bonding at its finest.

Both nights, I was stationed on the field for the Rolling Stones performance, in the front rows, right in the $2,500-a-seat section. I was front and center for Brown Sugar, It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll and Sympathy for the Devil. I saw Mick Jagger strut his stuff to Start Me Up. I saw Keith Richards perform one of my personal favorites and one of his rare vocal leads, Before They Make Me Run. I saw Mick and Sheryl Crow duet on Wild Horses and Honky Tonk Woman. I believe I may have had tears in my eyes as the band closed out the second night with Satisfaction. The Rolling Stones Forty Licks tour, and my awesome daughter, gave me two nights I will never forget. No, you can’t always get what you want . . . but sometimes you can get all you want and more.

As Melissa and I hung up our blue coats for the night, the manager announced that they still needed security for a show the following weekend, in nearby Marysville . . . Aerosmith. Melissa and I looked at each other and, without saying a word, raced to the front to sign up. One week later, I was standing less than five feet in front of Steven Tyler and Joe Perry, a free Rice Krispies treat in the pocket of my blue coat, making sure crazed female fans didn’t climb the security wall to get to them. Again, it was a little like putting the fox in charge of the hen house