America of the early 1960’s belonged to motherhood and apple pie. Families spent weekends mowing the lawn and watching “Father Knows Best.” Mothers stayed home and took care of their kids. Public school had a dress code; girls wore skirts and boys had short hair.

One evening my sister called me down to the basement, telling me I just had to see what was showing on our old black-and-white television. Ed Sullivan had brought in new talent: four men with long hair, a band from England. The young girls were fainting from excitement.

We saw The Beatles and their hairstyle as passing fads. Little did we realize it at the time, but a wall was being breached, and our society would never be quite the same.

The next few years saw big changes — in myself as well as in America. I began keeping kosher and Shabbos. As America changed into pantsuits and bell-bottoms, I donned dresses and stockings. I switched from public school to yeshivah, and found myself as far away from The Beatles and their milieu as Jerusalem is from Greenwich Village.

However, I will forever be grateful to the Fab Four for how they helped me in my daily life. It happened several years ago, when an ominous letter turned up in my mailbox. The Jerusalem municipality was threatening to take us to court if we did not pay our back taxes. The city’s computer had erred, and the amount we supposedly owed in taxes had quadrupled. Determined to take the bull by the horns, I set off for City Hall, armed with all the documents at my disposal, a Book of Psalms, and a box of tissues (even the most hardened bureaucrat will often melt at the sight of a woman in tears!).

I was sent from one desk to another, each clerk feeling that the clerk in the next room might be better able to help me (translation: they passed the buck). After several hours, I found myself waiting to meet the tax department head. Now I would be facing the real test. I took out my Tehillim, hoping for Divine assistance.

Mr. V.I.P. was apparently at his worst that day. It was hot and sticky, and the building was not properly air-conditioned. As I waited, I watched one person after another leave Mr. V.I.P.’s cubicle looking miserable. My davening became more intense. Finally it was my turn. I found Mr. V.I.P. angrily eyeing the phone as a recording told him to “please await your turn.” Now was the time to soften him up with a joke.

When Bezeq, Israel’s telephone company, first computerized its service, the ditty of “please await your turn” was said between the music of The Beatles’ classic song “Yesterday.” “Yesterday / All my troubles seemed so far away / Now it looks as though they’re here to stay / Oh, I believe in yesterday.” Every time I heard this song on Bezeq lauding yesteryear in the face of its tentative embrace of new technology, I would laugh, although no one else seemed to catch the humor of the song in this particular setting. For some reason I thought Mr. V.I.P. would.

When I shared my joke, Mr. V.I.P. stared at me in shock. “You know about The Beatles?” After close to thirty years of living in a cloistered Jerusalem setting, I did not have the look of your average Beatles fan. “Where in the world did you hear of The Beatles?”

Mr. V.I.P. equated the Beatles with everything positive in the world. When he spoke of them, his eyes sparkled with a messianic fervor. As I listened to his passionate speech about how The Beatles had saved society (!), I tried to think how in the world I would continue this ridiculous conversation. A few months earlier, I had been visiting my father in California. Leafing through a magazine, I had read an article entitled “The Beatles and Israel.” Finally I knew why. G-d had prepared me for Mr. V.I.P.! Off the tip of my tongue now rolled enough Beatles trivia to make our dear bureaucrat feel that I completely empathized with his feelings about this vital topic.

At the end of our conversation, he declared, “Don’t worry about the error; it will be taken care of. And if you are ever in need of help again, just call me and remind me that you are the chareidi woman who knew about The Beatles!” I left City Hall with a heavier bank account and a lighter heart . . . and feeling a tremendous debt to a group of long-haired Englishmen!

Debbie Shapiro’s “Three Days” appeared in the Dec. 2000 issue. Born in San Francisco, her long and winding road led her to Jerusalem, where she has lived since 1970.