SHEPARD & DARK

October 30, 2013 ~ LouLou ~ 2 Comments

Ralphie I served 1966–78 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

THE SCREEN IN SANTA FE scheduled three showings of this Docudrama.

Huh? Sam ol boy lives in Santa Fe. I’ve had bar chats with him, everyone has, and he’s our mascot for independence, accessibility, and still a flush hand of rugged classic looks. Like he should be Ralph Lauren‘s model, not Ralphie.

I figured the theater would be packed so I brought earplugs. I take my films too seriously, and refuse to be interrupted with slurping and munching. Into the first scene; my concentration was so acute I would have protested if anyone said a word. Beginning with the footage; unbelievable home-made movies and photographs. You will see Sam as a youngster on the ranch where he grew up in Central California, Sam leaving home and working his way through puberty. Then we see that chiseled frame of masculine sensitivity as a young playwright in Greenwich Village where you meet Johnny Dark. The dialog between the two men and the dramatization of their feelings about the collected letters they exchanged over a forty-year period is something beyond a reality show.

It is as honest and genuine a continuum of conversation between two men that you’ve ever witnessed. The subjects: their father’s, destiny, fate, women, writing, dogs, tragedy, and loss. Just to name a few. So if you wrap the cinematography around the humor, philosophy and ending that left me in tears, you have a masterpiece of film for the audience.

Yes, there is a dusting of emotions on Jessica Lange.

I walked away feeling as if my life had not even begun. So much life squeezed into one man lead me to question my limits on adventuring. Several lines I recall in particular, to paraphrase Sam;

We can change our lives, our work, our wardrobes, our women, but we never really change. Our essence remains constant. I’ve always felt outside the whole thing, sometimes more than others. As a writer you have to be selfish with your time. I’m always moving, going on the road, I didn’t know that was how my life was going to turn out, but it did.

That kind of admission for a floundering but dedicated writer will last me a while. On documentaries; they don’t get enough attention. I hope this film tears that fence down and let’s the HONEST-REAL-BULLS come through.

DEADBEATS IF WE DON’T HAVE…

October 18, 2013June 20, 2014 ~ LouLou ~ 1 Comment

There is assurance that most of all, above the tasks, aspirations, dreams and commitments; we are dead beats without love. The feeling has to pass through our veins and arteries, as often as possible, from one suitor or another. You can love a moon in a black sky, as much as man in black suit. I believe the feeling it gives us is medicinal. It gives us something no other prescription can. That is why when sickness comes, all the love pours out from friends and family.

ADULT IS SHOUTING

October 15, 2013June 20, 2014 ~ LouLou ~ Leave a comment

The waking of an adult in a unwilling woman
Forever young is an idiom that I enjoy reading and humming in a song. In the honesty of thoughts, I feel the adult pushing through, and clawing it’s way into my perceptions, spirit, and creativity. The struggle is constant, because the adult has proven to be a protector, but lately she is interfering with my favorite toys. There it is, finally surfacing, and sounding off about trite irritations, suspecting, unyielding, distant, scrutinizing, and cowardly for being a little selfish.

This adult is more concerned with dust, and neat piles, then the sun beckoning my soul to a dance in the light, a trip to Greece, or a two-hour lunch and trip to the museum. The adult is pressing through the work plan, publication, interviews, the emails, and bills, the laundry, and a, the rain soaked rugs left outside, the weeds, and in between these tasks of productivity, the mind is rumbling like a tea kettle about to boil, about bumper sticker things I’d rather be doing. The rather be doing list drops down just before I go to sleep. I look at it blankly, and ask someone who never seems to answer; when am I going to begin the begin. If there is an absence of time to write, and the avoidance of time to play, then I am left with a very dry outlook. In the presence of my admission, is the sweep of rage that crosses over the keyboard. Yes, there is madness in an obsession to produce great things, bundles of money, inventions and art. In replacement, there would be gossip, self-absorption boredom, complacency, and trashy novels. Balance, as we know it today, means the consumption of everything we yearn for at more than moderate levels. That is also an idiom that I read about and hum in a tune, but it passes, and I am back to uneven feelings, and imbalances between laughter, and shouting.

I’M NOT LIEING

October 12, 2013June 10, 2019 ~ LouLou ~ 2 Comments

Photo credit to: LOREN TUPLER aka White Wolf.

The throw of the dice this week lands on adventures in livingness; friendships.

The subject pierced me yesterday morning, and came by way of Anais Nin, a passage in her diary.
“Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.”
― Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol. 1: 1931-1934 Today, the first in several months that the atmosphere is ripe with thought, and has brought me back to the writing of the moment. The delivery trucks have not opened their doors and dropped their ramps, the garbage trucks have already passed, and the traffic is so slight it feels like Sunday.

Fall is brushing nature with a varnish of sunshine all day, the sky is swimming pool blue, and so I sit in the garden on the lounge chair, shaded by the droopy elm tree. I hear some cheerful shouting on the sidewalk, a horn breaks the sanctuary, and then a dove lands on the wooden lattice and we watch each other. I breathe deep, close my eyes, and feel my noon time tuna sandwich thumping in my belly.

The stream of consciousness is threaded to the deeper blanket of anxiousness. I am going in circles, not physically like I have been moving from one bedroom to another, one closet to another to accommodate, the vacation rental guests. I am in the circle of chaos that seeps into every day activities. Tempers are flaring, combative street encounters rouse the hum of music on my porch, authoritarian behavior is exhuming from Managers and Owners, employees are jumping ship everywhere. People are relocating, selling possessions, or using succulent lips and breasts to lease men for financial support. We are all a bit edgy.

Just as we adapt to one highland of composure we lose another. On Yom Kippur I attended synagogue in Santa Fe. There were only a few empty seats, so I took one and opened my prayer-book. I tried to read the portion I missed but the two women behind me were chatting. The expectation of searching your soul does not come easy when two women are talking. The same annoyance follows me everywhere; I always end up seated next to the talkers. Whether it’s in on an airplane, a restaurant, or a movie theater, the talkers seem to trail me. The passages from Yom Kippur service remind us of: sensitivity, tolerance, love of thy neighbor, selflessness, jealously, and trust. There I sat, silently scolding the two women who continued to chatter and laugh. Rather than deter my soul-searching, I changed seats, and asked forgiveness for my intolerance. Above all my flaws and quirks, the altar of shame lies in the hiss of distrust. It is a hiss that rises from my gut, and enters my brain. It wasn’t always a malignancy; as a young adult I trusted everyone, unless they asked me questions about my Dad. In recent years, the tumor of trust has splintered friendships. The Rabbi chose the subject of trust as his closing narrative. He said that a person who suffers from lack of trust, runs the risk of becoming paranoid. I sank lower on my inner backbone. Yes, that seepage of paranoia has invaded my trusting heart. When I got home Rudy was painting the new double pane door to my room.

“How was the service? Hand me that screw will you?” He asked

“Guess what the Rabbi talked about?” I said and handed him the screw.

“Israel.”

“Well of course that’s embedded in the Torah. But his personal message was about trust.”

Rudy continued to insert the door into the archway with his screw-gun. “You inherited distrust from your father, I don’t know if you can rid yourself of it.”

“I have to!”

“Good. I’m so hurt when you don’t trust me, I mean after thirty years.”

“You still lie.”

“They’re not lies; they’re white lies, so people don’t get hurt.”

“But I know when you’re lying.”

“I know you do.”

“And the lies really hurt.”

“Well then we’re both guilty.”

“You still don’t get it.”

“Yes, I do. You’re not listening to me.”

“You’re right. I’m about feeling, and you’re about telling. ”

Why do we lie; is it to protect the other person’s feelings or

is it because we use deceit and dishonesty to get what we want, If we could change a single human gene; it would be the fib factor. Just imagine how different our life would be.

REVOLUTION RUMBLINGS

October 11, 2013October 11, 2013 ~ LouLou ~ 1 Comment

I‘am stalked by a sensation of revolution; the upheaval of a crusted and molded foundation erupts and the contents spill into chaos. The spillage of this eruption is sparing political leaders. Everyday they appear more childish and temperamental.Your referee whistle is blowing, and spinning your diatribe into tongue twisting hollow promises.

The annoyance of conflicting orders robs me of my Aladdin (magic moments), and the mental sweep to clear out my conscience. I feel like time is stained with stop signs, alerts, and too many laws. What happens is subtle, but when so much time is placed in soulless activities, life looses it’s Aladdin. Even if you’re sitting at the local bistro and dining al fresco with perfectly agreeable friends, and chanting; our souls ache for reprieve.

photo by Dick Spas.

HOW MUCH MORE NEWS CAN WE TAKE

October 7, 2013 ~ LouLou ~ 2 Comments

As a writer I read the newspapers; Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, and the Santa Fe New Mexico papers, where I live. I watch all the news stations. I quit MSNBC, cause Chris Mathews made me hyperventilate. I think Charles Krauthammer is the most knowledgeable and sustainable journalist of our time.

Do to an act of nature, lightening, I lost Cable for a month. This was when Syria broke. No one talked about it here, and I felt the communities disillusionment. When my service was repaired, I turned on the news. I felt more insulted than the time a young boy told me my legs were hairy. Who did you think you are kidding? You want us to watch both sides fisting each other like a street gang! Please someone tell them, the Press, chill out a bit and stop turning the news into a talk show. You talk to us as we were mutes. The Government has evolved as false as who we see in the mirror. If you are plain you see beautiful, if you are beautiful you see plain. I see you government, and I am ashamed.

I haven’t read the papers since June. This Thursday I went to the bank to make a deposit to cover my negative, and I looked at the newspapers on the customer coffee table., My eyes shut after two headlines. How much more can we take? I really have lost track of priorities.

Should I get a job because my writing remains unrecognized. I need a retirement guidance counselor. I don’t like the title of financial advisor; they sound too rigid. Should I respond to the dreadful vacillation of American Policy. How much more debating can they do? It’s like when I worked in corporate real estate. The meetings I attended and had to present were progress reports on whether I was an effective employee. I don’t know how I lasted as long as I did; my act was good, and I impressed some of the boys, but communication was too formal to bring out honesty. Maybe that’s what has evaporated in our government, or am I seeing it differently because I’ve aged into it slowly. I think it started when the cool shit act came about. Some artists have it, Musicians, yea they got it, gangsta’s got it, but they always had it. Those of us who feigned cool acts, became feigned. Rambling now. Got to sweep fall leaves and start editing 350 columns.

I’m listing to Nessun Dorma, and I was thinking how much I detest all this multitasking. I can now handle five projects at once; write, sweep mop the floor, water plants, contemplate resolutions to my finances, all the while feeling my nerves tighten, and even though I stretch four times a day; this crushing operatic play in life is over strung. I watch those Sandals vacation commercials and practically cry because how many of us haven’t had a vacation in years, or a chance to

play a round or golf or read More Magazine all the way through?

DON’T READ THE NEWS OR WATCH IT ON TELEVISION

October 6, 2013October 7, 2013 ~ LouLou ~ Leave a comment

[contact-form subject='[SMILEY%26#039;S DICE’][contact-field label="Name" type="name" required="1"/][contact-field label="Email" type="email" required="1"/][contact-field label="Website" type="url"/][contact-field label="Comment" type="textarea" required="1"/][/contact-form] I’m a creative nonfiction short story writer, and a columnist on arts and lifestyle. I have never said one word about politics; I am not a debater, academic, or political science major.

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government, or am I seeing it differently because I’ve aged into it slowly. I think it started when the cool shit act came about. Some artists have it, Musicians, yea they got it, gangsta’s got it, but they always had it. Those of us who feigned cool acts, became feigned. Rambling now. Got to sweep fall leaves and

start editing 350 columns.

I’m listing to Nessun Dorma, and oil treating my hair. I was thinking how much I detest all this multitasking. I can now handle five projects at once; write, sweep mop the floor, water plants, contemplate resolutions to my finances, all the while feeling my nerves tighten, and even though I stretch four times a day; this crushing operatic play in life is overstrung. I watch those Sandals vacation commercials and practically cry because how many of us haven’t had a vacation in years, or a chance to

play a round or golf or read More Magazine all the way through?

REARRANGING AND REMEMBERING

October 5, 2013October 5, 2013 ~ LouLou ~ Leave a comment

September is the month to rearrange; wardrobes, patio furnishings, and thermostats. Heaters go upstairs, fans go downstairs, down blankets are released from plastic zip lock bags, and coverlets are removed. We seal the windows with weather stripping and my list notebook follows me everywhere. If you live in the seasons then you understand that the menial work goes deeper as our bodies prepare for winter’s residency.

The interior change, what Anais Nin refers to as; ‘our emotional landscape,’ wakes to a chime of awareness. Now that I’ve completed all those mindless tasks, I’m ready to listen to the chime and renew the organism of emotion. On this brilliant film shooting day in September shadows of light, glaring light, brush the feathers of my wild birds as they tap dance from tree branch to feeder. Between the leaves that drop like confetti from the trees, the New Mexican sunlight feels like ten thousand flashlights in your face.

Summers postcard days flash on and off as I write; Natives dancing at the Plaza in the wildness of fiesta to Latin and Mexican music, while Anglos freestyle a sort of slow rock and roll hippie dance. I meet strangers and we exchange our exaggerated cheer and humor, during festivals, fiesta parades, and the burning of Zozobra. These yearly events chisel the face of Santa Fe into a collage of New Mexico colors; magenta, orange, lime, and yellow surface on paper Mache flowers, streamers, and costumes.

The phantasmagoria of my summer thumped one night in July during a Monsoon thunderstorm. My summer vacation rental guests were in the main house and I was in my casita sitting at the desk writing, with the door open. It was pouring rain, the kind of shower that explodes from the rain gutters like a tub faucet and those huge blue and white La Posada Hotel umbrellas seemed race up the street unattended. When the skirmish between warm air and thunderstorm collided, lightning seared the charcoal clouds and thunder bombed me out of my swivel chair.

How rigid my body felt; like hardened cement, but the phone rang and released me from this state of shock.

“ LouLou, I think we have some issues in your house.”

I rushed over in my kimono (a writing uniform) and found the three of them stiff as statues. Young headlight deer eyes, all piercing me at once.

“ We saw sparks, and all the electricity is out. I think the lightning hit your house. ”

I didn’t’t know what to say; suddenly I was responsible for this rarity of nature’s behavior. They clung to their cell phones, and watched as I feigned authority and calm by checking the blackened outlets. The electronics were silenced, appliances deadened, circuit breaker inoperable. I called my friend, White Zen, who doesn’t fluster easily.

“I have to get help now. Right now! What should I do?”

“I’ll call my electrician. He’s really good. Are you all right?”

“No, not at all right.”

“You want me to come over?”

“No, but thanks anyway.”

A few moments later, she called back.

“ I pulled Phil out of Smiths Grocery. He’s on his way, she said with humor, enough to release a molecule of laughter from me.

“ I can’t believe this. Do you know the chances of being hit by lightning?”

“ No, but don’t take it personally.”

The funny thing is, I did. Other house disasters; like the time the plumbing backed up, or the historic windows wouldn’t’close didn’t’t have any comparison to this cataclysm. Then my next door neighbor, the Architect, and professor of all topics informed me, “ Oh you’re in bad shape; you’re going to have to rewire the whole house.”

Phil arrived within ten minutes, and I greeted him with a hug, more for support of someone’s appearance with tools than anything.While my quests and I tried to answer his questions, all of us at once, he went down to the basement, as we followed behind. Phil replaced something in the circuit breaker, and the lights came back on. I clapped my hands but they didn’t’t join in; they went back to texting.

Then he tried the TV and stereo. The stereo is fried he said, but the television is okay.

“What about our Wi Fi connection?” I asked.

“The surge protector fried too. You have to call your provider. Good luck on that. I’ll come back tomorrow, after you get PNM (City Electric) out here to check which panel.”

“Which panel what?” I said.

He went into a Wikipedia explanation about the two hundred and fortyhouse voltage, and who is responsible for the outage. I followed Phil outside after failing to soft stroke my tenants. What made it even worse is they are musicians with the Santa Fe Opera and live sensitive structured lives. One gal remained board stiff and and unblinking, the young man offered all of his technical support but his hands were trembling. The leader of the pack, who greets life with radiant optimism, was busy eating crackers in rapid succession. I felt the responsibility of a mother, and so I assured them of my competence. Then I slipped into jeans and T-Shirt, almost falling over as I raced across the street to La Posada and gulped a Martini. While I was still trembling, staff and guests gathered around me.

The concierge said, “The lightning hit your house; I saw it from the window! Are you all right?”

“ On no, a bar guest remarked and rubbed my back, ‘Oh Loulou, something always happens when you have guests, a waitress commented, and another broke out in a euphoric smile and said, Wow LouLou! What was it like?”

“Ahhh. It’s not a humor story Ed; it’s a disaster!”

The electrical company showed up late that night, and poked little metal toothpicks into a box outdoors; a box I didn’t’t know existed.

“Sorry Mam. Our panel is working fine. You’ll have to get the electrician to make further repairs. Wow! That lightning sure hit hard. Have a nice night. ” Ha Ha, I said and stumbled into my room. No Internet, no television and no music. I slept with a pillow over my head.

The next day Phil returned to trouble shoot everything. My television and the house stereo blew out, so did the surge protector to our modem, and the electronic gate was broken. The guests couldn’t get their cars out of the driveway. We pried the gate open, and they backed out in jerky anxious motion.

A week later, in between substantial attempts to behave normally, all of us were still irritable, prone to trip, biting nails, and voices wavering over the tenseness that clipped our tongues. It was never the same after that; our simpatico shared residency turned into staged friendliness.

That’s the thing about lightning, it gets inside of you, and you are involuntarily rearranged. My emotional landscape is naturally in a state of alarm. I startle easily, imagine voices, and see too much in the dark.

Too be continued.

MUSIC and DANCE INSTEAD OF PILLS

September 15, 2013September 15, 2013 ~ LouLou ~ 1 Comment

ADVENTURES IN LIVINGNESS – CUBAN STYLE

SOMETIMES AN INTERVIEW WITH A MUSICIAN GOES DEEPER than a narrative history of recordings, concert calendar and early training. That happened when I met Jorge Gomez; founder, keyboardist and musical director of Tiempo Libre, an all Cuban born Timba band.

We met in a modest hotel room in Santa Fe, New Mexico where he and his six band members were invited to play for the second time at the Lensic Theater. It was steam-bath hot and muggy that Friday afternoon. As I stood in the doorway, Jorge wrapped up a recording session. After introductions’ everyone cleared out except Jorge and Raul Rodriguez, the trumpet player. Raul, propped up against the headboard of an unmade bed, one leg bent at the knee, the other straight out. He reminded me of Miles; cool in his skin and unflappable.

Jorge and I sat at the kitchenette bar, between us his keyboard on the countertop. Eagerness to begin was dilating from his eyes, so I began with my favorite question to all immigrants; how did it feel when you landed in the United States?

“Oh my God! It was my dream; all through childhood in Havana.”

“Do you love America now?”

His arms shot straight up, as he rose from his chair.

“Are you kidding? We love America! How can you not? This is the best country in the world. I’ve been all over: Europe, Asia, Mexico, and Caribbean. You have all the opportunities; you make your own life here, whatever you want.” He shifts his attention to Raul, agreeably excluded.

“You can’t do this in Cuba—right Raul?” Jorge leans forward and I’m struck by the indisputable untainted smile. Jorge continues to dramatize his arrival in Manhattan, with arms and eyes, “I got out because I had friends in New York. They helped me get gigs in the bars, weddings, and then we got into the clubs.” The room is silent except for Jorge’s satin smooth transitions from one question to the next. That alone is reason enough to meet Jorge for conversation.

“We were not allowed to listen to Cuban salsa music, or American music; only classical. I trained at the Conservatory all my childhood. I play all of them; Beethoven, Brahms, all of them.”

“Where did you learn Salsa?”

“From America! Yes. As teenagers we climb to the roof and we to wait till state programmed Cuban music goes off the air at 1:00am. Then we wrap aluminum around the antenna and turn our radio on. We pick up American music; like Gloria Esteban, Michael Jackson, everyone. We listened all night so we’d take the rhythms’ in our heads you know.”

“What’s the difference between Cuban Salsa and Latin Salsa?”

“Everyone claims this is their Salsa; it’s Latin, Marenge, Colombian… it is a blend of many cultures and musical influence. We take from each other. All the instruments I learn come from listening. They teach me everything; and I teach them.”

“Do Americans play Conga different than Cubans?”

“It depends on the person. See if the person is open to learn everything then he push through. For example we have been playing all these places like Michigan, Minnesota, Minneapolis…all those places that are so.” He pauses to express it precisely. Cold he says, laughing out loud.

“And I’ve seen American band playing Cuban salsa so so good, my God, so well. Blue eyes and blond hair.” Jorge breaks to howl out his enthusiasm and surprise, and demonstrate the memory.

“Who do you like to listen to do today?”

“I don’t know the names, but I have a lot of friends, and they call me and say, ‘I have a band, you come and hear me.’ So I go to the club and Wow! This is good music! Everyone is dancing. I love to see them dancing! I want to see them happy. If they want to sit and listen, good, if they want to sing along, good, they want to dance good. Everybody have a different reaction. My job is to transfer the energy to the person; that’s the idea. Not to play the music for me; I want them to be happy.”

“ How do you do that?”

“ Sometimes you are sick, and no matter how many pills you take you are still sick. Right?”

I nod and watch his facial expressions twitch in thought.

“Then let’s say I come and say, Wow! You look so good man, you are looking good, and he claps’ his hands and pantomimes the joy he’s transferring. ‘You wanna a coffee cake and coffee, yea, come with me, (clapping again) you want to sit here? Yea sit here and see the sun.’ Suddenly, you feel good.” He nods his head. “Trust me.”

Jorge is toe tapping in place, his arms positioned in a warm world embrace.

“You forget all about the pills. Trust me, that is the kind of energy I give.”

“I suppose you don’t get sick?”

“Never. For sure. Never. I don’t know what this head pain is… how you say, headache? Like friends say I have so many problems, so many headaches, I can’t go out. I say, ‘What! Come on we go the beach, to the sand. Bring your conga. What are you crazy! Come on!’ So he comes and we play on the beach in Miami.”

Jorge drums on the counter top. “Have a beer, have another.’ And everyone on the beach comes to us. The whole idea is to forget your problems. So my friend says to me, ‘I had the best day of my life.’ Yea! Be happy! This is youth; this is how you stay young. Life is so big.”

I shake my head, “Not in America; we concentrate on sickness and misery.”

“Yea! You don’t have sickness yet, but you are going to get it.” He ruptures into laughter, and takes a sip of beer. My father tell me one time you have to hear your body; your body going to take you in the right direction. Just listen and you are going to feel so good. Sometimes I can’t go to sleep at night. All the songs and ideas in my head and I can’t sleep. I must write it down, and the next morning I feel so good, because I didn’t go to sleep. I drink beer because I am too happy-over happy.”

“Where did you learn this happiness?”

“From all the difficult paths I have in my life. Childhood was very difficult;no food, no water, no electricity, no plumbing. What you going to do? Party, go outside, dance, play basketball, baseball. I get my friends and they say, my problems’ are bigger than yours. Bla bla bla.”

I’m laughing now as Jorge continues to articulate his life philosophy.

“ At the end of the day you are so happy because you see people less fortunate and some more, and you are in the middle, and you want to help those people, you can’t go it alone.”

He chuckles again. His smile is broad as his cheek line. A streak of sunlight crossed the keyboard, and Jorge’s eye and brows are in motion, as much as his legs arms and hands.

“ What you’re going to hear tonight is a lot of crazy crazy energy, good music, a lot of stories. You’re going to see a lot of soul. When Raul plays his trumpet you’re going to turn inside out.”

“What is Timba music?”

“A mixture of jazz, classical, rock, and Cuban music.”

“Sounds like a musical.”

“Yes, Yes! We are in preparing for that.”

Four hours later I was in the Lensic Theater, twelve rows from the stage. Lead singer Xavier Mill, Jorge, Raul, Louis Betran Castillo on flute and sax, Wilvi Rodriguez Guerra on bass, Israel Morales Figueroa on drums and Leandro Gonzales on Congas opened the set, and five minutes into it I was below the stage. Two and half hours later I was still dancing, along with half the audience. That’s entertainment! http://www.tiempolibremusic.com

The three-time Grammy nominated band will perform Thu, Sep 26, 2013 at a Special Event at the Arts Garage in support of AVDA, Inc. Arts Garage in Delray Beach, Florida.

THE ORDER OF DISORDER

July 23, 2013 ~ LouLou ~ Leave a comment

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THE ORDER OF DISORDER.

THE ORDER OF DISORDER

July 23, 2013August 16, 2025 ~ LouLou ~ 3 Comments

Whispers of The Past (Photo credit: tj.blackwell)

The order of this week is disorder. Not the trivial disorder of a closet, or a work in progress; this week is the unraveling of the self which comes with separating from someone you love dearly. It is the subject of: poetry, theater, film, literature, dance, visual arts and music — all forms of music from opera to rap. For all of you who have mothers’ and fathers’ close to death, and you don’t want them to leave.

Adults protect you from the brutality of death when you’re very young. They keep it behind locked phrases like ‘she had to go away to a better place; you’ll understand when you grow up.’

The camouflage of death may go on indefinitely until one day, you are hit over the head with a block of ice, and it splits you right down the middle. You can see your guts spilling out, and everything is all out of order. Walking is an effort. Thinking clogs with the big question: Why? Why can’t we all stay here together and live forever?

Flashback to 1966 — I was very young, not so much in years, but when I was 13 my mental and emotional age were more of an 8-year-old. I don’t know if I was ADD or DDT because those acronyms were not in vogue yet.

My development was arrested because I was raised on a fantasia of false identities, fiction, and privledge. I thought we were rich, happy, and would live together forever. The fantasia of falseness was abruptly taken away on June 19, 1966. On that day, I saw for the first time, my father weep uncontrollably. I was told my mother was in heaven. My father was seated on my mother’s avocado green sofa in our tidy mid-century apartment in Westwood. Nana — mother’s mother — was seated on the sofa next to my father. Nana and Dad had reconciled for the period of time my mother was sick with cancer. They both were sobbing. I was not. There was nothing inside of me but resistance; a blockage of emotion that remained there for so many years.

I was left in my father’s care. He was busy out chasing government subpoenas’ and running the Fontainebleau Hotel in Florida. He kept a command post on my emotions. He would not tolerate my grief, because he could not tolerate his own. So, I had to chin-up, chest out, walk up and down Doheny Drive in Hollywood where he lived and pretend I was going to be fine.

When I turned eighteen and left my father’s apartment was the first time I was free to unravel my feelings. The emptiness filled with confusion, anger and drugs. If college was supposed to be my best years, then I missed that chapter. Looking back, the real leap to personal growth came at that time when I was left unattended to wander through life with my own eyes as guardian, and my heart as my compass. That is when I missed my mother the most. It was my fortune to have my father back in Los Angeles, throwing his weight around from a distance. He kept me under radar by having a friend’s son working in the admittance office of Sonoma State College.

I remember days when my mental attitude needed electric shock therapy. Miraculously, I did find my way home, and to the matter of my mother, and growing up with gangsters. From a wafer of stability, very slowly, I’ve built a nice lifeboat to keep me afloat. My screaming, cantankerous, and intimidating father who loved me beyond measure is in this imaginary boat, and my mother who loved with a silent gentle hand she gave to me whenever I needed assurance.

All I have to do is look at her photograph placed in every corner of my house, and I regain momentum in my lifeboat. When I am particularly insolvent with life’s measures, I recall the years she spent fighting cancer so she could continue to hold my hand. How can I disappoint such a woman? I cannot, and I know that with more certainty than I know anything.

We all have a basement strength that rises up and balances us when we need it. Each time we cross that unpleasant road, and say good-bye to our friends, our pets, our parents, or our siblings, we have to find our basement strength.

You can read poetry and essays, listen to opera or rap and find five-thousand ways of expressing the same painful stab of separation. If the comfort comes in just knowing — we all have that in common — then all you have to do is tap the shoulder of the man in front of you, and ask, “How did you handle it?”

Or as Henry Miller said, “All growth is a leap in the dark, a spontaneous unpremeditated act without the benefit of experience.”

Any dice to throw, e-mail it to folliesls@aol.com.