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Which Doobie You Be?
What’s Happening!!, “Black Water,” and the five-year-old girl who never forgot one silly joke
“The Doobie Brothers’ Room, please. I’ll talk to any Doobie who do be in.” It was 1978 and I was five years old, watching What’s Happening!! on TV with my mom. I’d never heard of the Doobie Brothers, but the silly wordplay was already making my mom and me giggle, even before Raj, the show’s teenage main character, delivered the famous line that everyone remembers: “I be Roger Thomas. Which Doobie you be?”
It was an early moment of pure joy and delight that I’ve never forgotten. Fun with words has always done that for me.
My mom and I repeated that line to each other for days and laughed hysterically — but we couldn’t watch it again until the show came on again in reruns (and yes, that is a nod to Rerun, iykyk).
Reader, can you imagine not having the option to rewind something, to watch something again at your demand?
