Do You Want to Know a Secret?

Likely my dating confusion may be at least partly laid at the feet of Greg Clarkson who ruined me that beautiful spring for (many, if not all) other men. In the summer of 1963, we'd moved again from Los Angeles to Salt Lake City. I grew to my full adult height and from about 90 pounds to maybe 105 between the end of the last school year and my birthday at the end of the summer. My teeth were not snaggly new growth any longer, though it seems there were still a couple of molars to come, and the wisdom teeth that never did make it through the gums but were finally surgically removed when I was over 40. I could fix hair nicely, my own in a dark Gidget flip, and I washed and set my mother's to earn money. I worked cheaper than a professional in a beauty parlor (now called a salon). At the coming Christmas, I would receive makeup in my stocking - Angel Face pressed powder and the palest pink lipstick ever seen. Upon my body, curves existed where none had before and these made me feel just slightly awkward at the country club pool. (My parents eschewed the golf side of that club so I could make full use of the pool. It was a bargain to them to pay half-price and they knew I'd swim more than they would golf.) I turned 11 late that August.

The truck transporting our household belongings to Salt Lake was involved in a terrific accident along the way. Everything we owned was destroyed and my parents received a sizable insurance settlement. We gathered donated items from relatives to use in an apartment while we gathered ourselves. By early autumn, they had bought a house on the (then) far west stretches. Construction having just begun, there was still time to add a few custom touches and then we waited. We'd often drive out to the site after my dad came home from work. He'd hoist me up onto the second floor into what would be my bedroom and I could see all over the valley, lights beginning to twinkle here and there. I dreamed. This was to be the nicest home they ever owned, decorated nicely, with everything in it brand new. There was little development yet near Taylorsville. Everything needed to sustain life was also under construction to accommodate the booming growth in housing and residents. Oh, yes, there were gas stations and some mom-and-pop stores. But for major shopping, the library, and other necessities, we'd have to drive a bit. Dad would actually have a commute into the city.

Though some families were already moving into their completed new homes, the schools weren't springing up quickly enough to accommodate all the kids. The Valley West developer, whether a thoughtful Mormon father himself or under pressure from the new homeowners, devised a shortcut for the kids to take to the elementary school thereby avoiding Redwood Road. This heavily trafficked thoroughfare was used by everyone coming into and going out of the area and also by semi-truck drivers passing through. There were no sidewalks, the crumbly blacktop meeting the gravelly, weed-choked dirtpack irregularly. During the early autumn months, the shortcut flowed with a veritable river of kids going through the covered pathway and across a now-deserted sugar beet field. The school was an ancient, forbidding hulk of dark brick and no architectural relief, 3-stories and maybe 100 years old. Until the new schools were ready, the youngest children began their day at 6:00 a.m. and upperclassmen at 1:00 p.m., with school getting out at 6:00 in time for dinner, an imperfect temporary situation. When the snow flew, the shortcut became difficult and I remember trudging along Redwood Road in the afternoon, arms filled with books, heavy coat, gloves and boots. Soon enough I came to understand the honking, hooting truck drivers were not sounding "Hey, kids, get up farther on the verge to walk" messages, but "Hey, baby" salutations. Parents carpooled the kids home in the dark and snow, and soon enough John C. Fremont Elementary School was ready for us.

Normal school hours and a new facility, not yet even filled to capacity, made for a wonderful spring.  Softball began and counted as our PE portion of the day, with my 6th grade class pitted against the other. Remember the year: girls were not required to play softball if they didn't care to, but they had to go to study hall if they didn't play. Once a month for a few days, a girl could plead a physical excuse if she cared to. And then - the Promise Land - on softball days girls could begin to wear some form of trousers, but only on the diamond, not during the rest of the school day. That was OK enough for me. My father always, but always, treated me like his kid, not only like his daughter. I knew how to play softball. I was now bigger than most of the other kids and stronger, including the boys. I was fearless and skilled, sliding into base having never bothered me. I was pretty fast and I could catch a hurtling cannonball without dropping it. "Don't drop that ball, Les. Morgans play hard!" "OK, Dad!" But, oh!, the piece de resistance. My father owned a most wonderful wooden bat, 36" long and 33 oz. - a most manly bat and likely too much bat for me at the time. On softball days, I attracted some noise carrying in my bat and my bag, which I think was a bowling bag, with my pants and sneakers in it, for we also did not wear sneakers during the rest of the school day. These days were the highlight of my week and I learned much that spring. I learned never, ever to throw my bat again after making a young fellow drop to his knees in tears. I'd never much thrown my bat before that, but I got a little show-offy there on home plate, adding a little elan to my swing. I learned that some of the glee expressed by others on softball days had to do with me running the bases like the wind and getting in under a high pop fly. It wasn't so different from the swimming pool or the honking, hooting truck drivers.

"Hey, Greg Clarkson really likes you." A boy from the other 6th grade delivered this message and I flinched, I am sure. "Oh?" "Yeah, he thinks you play really well and you're cute." Uh-oh. "Oh." I walked away, completely unprepared for such an announcement and not knowing how to cope with it. Oh sure, I knew who he was. He was in the other class and may have been the only player more talented than I. Quite tall and very thin, he was strong and fast and tough. He stared me down at the plate and on the field. I always knew I had to play against Greg Clarkson and not so much against anyone else. The other pee wees kind of ran around and Clarkson was the only real competitor. I imagine he felt the same, in softball terms, about me. We always pretended not to be looking at the other, but now I noticed his hair was longish and curly, dark. Oh, not long hair as an original affectation like the Beatles who were taking over all of our pubescent or prepubescent minds. More like his mother had allowed him to skip one haircut because the Beatles had taken over his mind. Soon we began to exchange notes. I was comfortable with that, easily finding my voice in written word. He had miniature messengers at his command and the notes fairly flew back and forth. Then it was telephone calls. I began to use a phone upstairs so my parents, both with eyes bugged out at the notion of a boy calling me, would not be able to hear every (innocent) word of my side of the conversation.

The girls who were my friends were fascinated and began to suit up for softball so they could watch us on the field. The boys who were his friends seemed to watch him exclusively. Were they taking lessons from his example or had they been warned that I was his and they should not even look? We'd each dawdle on the grounds for a short time after school and finally a chaste, quick peck of a kiss was exchanged, some 20 child observers marking the occasion in silent awe. One afternoon he head gestured me to join him around the corner of the building. I looked toward my friends and weighed whether I would do this. I did. Around the bend, he wasted no time pushing a small parcel toward me, a jewelry box, to be precise. Taking it from him and feeling not on solid ground, I noticed he had dirt under his fingernails at the end of the day. Inside was a modest neck chain and a clear pendant with a mustard seed inside, perfectly appropriate for an 11-year-old girl heading for 12. Since that time I have heard a couple of different mustard seed legends, but when Greg asked me if I knew what it meant and I said I did not, he told me it represented "I love you." I did not respond to that in any verbal way, but I felt my eyes widen. Then he proposed what he knew to be my favorite tune as "our song", the meaning of which also had to be explained to me. We exchanged a kiss no more heated than the ones delivered in view of mesmerized 6th graders, he put the chain around my neck and we emerged onto the playground. I surmise Greg had older brothers or sisters because he was smooth - smooth! - and I knew nothing about any of the steps. But I liked the dance.

We became local celebrities, Greg Clarkson and Leslie Morgan. Even the teachers seemed aware of the chaste connection and smiled at us. The mustard seed pendant was much handled by young girls. I don't know what Greg had to deal with in his crowd of admiring boys. We held hands while walking in the hallway, though we would never have kissed openly and nothing, nothing changed on the softball field except that I tucked my necklace down the front of my shirt. The end of the school year approached following an idyllic spring and it was announced we'd have a 6th grade party day to include a movie in the cafeteria, "free dress" (slacks and sneakers ~ yay!), and if we brought our own records, we could play them and dance. A number of the moms provided better-than-school-cafeteria snacks and it was a red-letter day. Funny that I do not recall what movie was shown. But I remember that we sat close and held hands throughout as other kids exchanged looks and grins. No other young people so coupled up. What, we were enough for everyone, even if it was vicarious? When the music started, it was revealed that Greg arranged for our song to be played first. We danced, surrounded by silent classmates. He danced quite well, actually. Soon I saw some girls dancing together. When some fast tunes came on, some of the braver boys jumped on board. It was better than a prom.

He told me his family was moving to Alaska in the summer. I was good at geography and I knew his bike wasn't going to carry him to my house or the pool any longer. He reminded me we were nearly 12 - well, he actually was already. It wouldn't be so long until we could design our own lives and not be held hostage by our parents. My mother told me to invite him for dinner. She grilled steaks and did not act weird in front of Greg. My dad talked decently with him about baseball. He held my hand in front of them and kissed me goodbye at the door. They saw this. And then he was gone. He was an excellent letter-writer and he was allowed to call me once a month for 10 minutes. My parents allowed reciprocal phone calls. I did not cry or pine miserably, though I missed his company. Eventually it faded away, perhaps when we moved back to California in a couple of years. Or perhaps when the next youngblood said "My friend thinks you're cute." Or maybe Greg was attracted to a lovely young female in a parka. Anyway, it ended predictably, without rancor. I owned the mustard seed necklace for a very long time - decades. I do not know where it is now.

In my ears right now:  Oh, come on, what do you think?

Technical Difficulties and Yet One More Thing I Didn't Know How to Do

An esteemed sister blogger inspired me to write a post on a topic that pleases me. Oh, I had no difficulty finding the words and sharing the experiences. It was the illustrations that kicked up some trouble. I'm having an extremely difficult time capturing a decent replication of certain images, sort of like when I tried to take pictures of the extremely black cat, Virginia Woolf, and got only silvery glare with each exposure. No, there is no earthly substitute for what I am trying to photograph. Yes, I've tweaked lighting, exposure, distance from subject and more. So am I angry? I worked awhile at writing my piece, to no immediate avail. No, probably not angry this time. A little short-term disappointment. I can seek out advice. It will happen. Probably not worth derailing today over this. Sister Blogger, you will see that post, and soon!

Among the very long list of things I didn't know how to deal with was anger. Oh, the reader may believe that by the age of 3 or 4, I was utterly filled with it, but I'd witnessed few expressions of such an emotion, likely none of them very healthy. My parents finally separated for the final time when I was 13 years old. They divorced when I was 15. Theirs was a tragicomic pairing that included some of the deepest lows a married couple might suffer. I don't think either of them had any tools in their personal makeup to handle their troubles effectively. I don't know if either of them would admit to any highs in their relationship. It probably depends on when we asked them that.

For decades, we have referred to my father as Donald Duck because he sputters and spits, snarls and snaps about anything that pisses him off right now. Inconsiderate drivers, basketball games that seem to be favorably tipped toward the Celtics instead of the Lakers, people who laugh at other people who slip on the ice, mean people who take advantage of others ~ oh, my dad can go off. He spews for a short time, takes steps to remedy what made him angry if that's in his power, and moves on. He'd verbally spar with a much-larger neighbor - hey, he'd been a boxer, he'd be OK in a dust-up if one ensued. He had no trouble picking off the nun who whacked my hand with a ruler because I couldn't manage that pesky Palmer Method of handwriting. "If the Morgan kid needs to be whacked, you call us and we'll whack her, but don't you ever think of whacking her again!" I don't think he is a person with a huge well of anger left unapproached.

About my mother's anger, I'll have to use a bandolier full of educated guesses. I don't think I'll be far off the target. Otherwise, we'd have to ask her, and we're not going to do that. She was really bright and was not only her family's first high school graduate, she managed a scholarship to a good Catholic womens college. Before she could start there, she became pregnant. With me. Much high drama ensued - this was in 1951, for crying out loud - and it seems every member of that huge extended family had something to say. Granny wanted to adopt the baby (me) and raise it. Grandpa felt they were too old (aged 50 and 52). Grandpa thought one of his other daughters might know how to pursue a Mexican abortion and said so, thereby infuriating both daughters. Ruth didn't know how to obtain an abortion anywhere and my mother hadn't asked for one. My father's parents screamed from the midwest, "It couldn't be him. He had a terrible fall on a tricycle when he was 3 and can't father children." My parents wanted to marry and have their child. They did so. Later, my mother would suffer terribly after the birth of my profoundly retarded brother, and other assaults she wasn't prepared to endure. I believe my mother's fall from grace at age 17 broke her. I don't believe she has ever looked at my face without seeing missed opportunity, though she is well-evolved enough to now feel some guilt for that. I don't think she was ever fully whole again, and I know life continued to chip away small pieces from her. She morphed as addicts do. Anger, self-pity, codependency, resentments. The tiny lioness did not audibly roar for many, many years, but when she did, it was remarkable and terrifying. She is, today, an admirable recovering alcoholic of more than 25 years. I am not violating her anonymity with that statement. She announces it to anyone who will listen to her.

Through all of their tribulations, I never saw or heard my parents express anger at one another verbally. Never a shout, a curse, even a mildly angry statement. Neither of them nightowls, I imagine they only stayed up a few hours after I retired each night. Never once was my slumber disturbed by sounds of a wrangle. I have rarely heard either of them express a negative statement about the other. In 58 years. I know and understand both personalities - I possess some qualities taken from each of those personalities - and I just don't understand it. They had to have made one another insane! Not annoying. Crazy! Batshit. What did they do with it?

In the group of 40 cousins, and now their offspring so much time later, are wrapped up some of the angriest children I've ever known about. I can't say the aunts and uncles ever impressed me as angry. Granny henpecked (it's the perfect word) Grandpa, her voiced raised and her statements punctuated by a plume of Pall Mall smoke tossed over her shoulder. Gramps always, but always responded with a "Yes, Mary," and did whatever it was that she wanted. Fight over. No real anger exhibited. But then there were Uncle John's kids who tore into each other daily, drawing blood and not actually seeming to make up once the altercation was over. If we happened to be visiting when a fight began, I'd fade to wherever my father was located. I understand about young Sean who had multiple surgeries as an infant and was required to have his elbows splinted so he couldn't use his hands to disturb the surgical site. Yes, that would make someone angry, even a baby. But there was no one like Bill.

My cousin Bill's photo could have been used in a dictionary to depict "average, adorable, 1950s American boy". Blue eyes, red-blond hair, freckles by the bushel, and attitude. He was born scowling, I am sure. At the age of about 18 months, he was given a tiny pair of red leather cowboy boots by Granny and Grandpa. They were a struggle to put on him, but once he was placed upright, faster than a rattlesnake, he proceeded to kick Grandpa up and down the shins until Gramps bled. He once bit a (reasonable) dog and the dog bit Bill back before running off. The entire family collected to scour the neighborhood for this dog so it could be tested for rabies. Bill was so young that he gave positive identification to every dog encountered, from Chihuahua to German Shepherd. He had to be given the series of rabies shots which were apparently extremely unpleasant. But my favorite Bill story co-stars me. Their family was visiting at my home and Bill had been told repeatedly to leave the piano alone. He'd finally had enough and decided to take action, apparently. He flung himself to the floor where I was sitting, bit me on the rear end, and - my father swears this is literally true - came up spitting corduroy from my trousers. So you see, I saw plenty of anger from a short distance. I just wasn't sure how it applied to me. I didn't know to acknowledge I felt any of it, though I did. I had no siblings with whom to wrestle and fight. I surely wasn't about to bite dogs or humans. I kept stuffing my anger (which I hadn't yet named "anger") into my secret keeper compartment - rather emotional Tupperware. It was building up quite a head of steam by the time I was 8.

I was well attuned to sensing the emotional climate as soon as I awoke each morning so I could put on whichever self I was going to be for the day. By 8, I was figuring out anger between the parents, despite their quiet presentation. Or maybe because of it. Deadly quiet and no conversation was a pretty good indicator that I'd leave my bedroom and walk into rooms thick with palpable tension. I knew to lay low, not attract any negative attention, plan to play quietly. If the stereo played Ella Fitzgerald or Harry Belafonte and I could hear them speaking to one another, or hear Dad singing, I could let down my guard just a little. The first time it happened, I was 8. I woke up one morning. No Ella. No Harry. My mother seemed a little sniffly and red-eyed. My father was gone. Had the Merry Maids come in, they couldn't have eradicated his presence any more thoroughly. Not a sign of him, his possessions or that he'd ever existed. Between the hours of 8:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. Damned quietly, too!

My mother said that Dad had gone to stay somewhere else. That's it. I must have been some embryonic form of interviewer, because all manner of questions popped into my head: "Where did he go?" "With whom?" "For how long?" "When will I see him?" "Can I call him?" "Why didn't he take me?" "How long will I have to stay here with you at the wheel alone?" I asked not one question. Her face let me know I shouldn't ask. It would be many, many years before I'd learn to ask questions in the face of any terror, thereby gaining some secure footing for myself. It is the first time I remember feeling abject trepidation, as in "What's going to happen now?" Very soon that was refined to "What's going to happen to me now?" It is the first incident I can recall wherein the fear overruled the delusion that things were OK. Things weren't OK. And I knew forever after I wasn't crazy to fear terrible, terrible events. After all, I'd lived through one. It happened.

He wasn't gone very long the first time. He called daily. He visited and took me out on weekends. A month later, he was suddenly home, just as quietly in the night as when he left. When I woke up for school, I heard Harry on the stereo. "Day-o, da-a-ay-o." No word of explanation about what had just happened here. Never. Future separations became longer and sometimes more difficult. There were many of them. Once he took me out of school for 2 weeks and we traveled together to visit his family in the midwest. It was a good, healthy, fun outing for us. During one of the last separations, I'd become a little shopworn. My hair was falling out at an alarming rate from the front of my head. To the extent my mother had to drag bangs from the crown of my head to cover my baldness. "Stress; nervousness," said the doctor who cared for all of our extended family. "You two need to start doing something differently," screamed the relatives. They would, but not for awhile, and not to an immediate positive result.

Guess what? I'm still not all that adept at navigating the world. Sometimes I feel the need to apologize for myself and sometimes I don't. Today I do. I do not expect or wish for sympathy of any color for anything that has ever happened in my life. I have enjoyed many of the good things offered to the good, when I wasn't even particularly good. I haven't written as much about my heady, high spots, though there are many. But I feel compelled to tell the other stories first. When I write about what happened, it forms a clearer picture for me. I can see the seeds, germination and growth of all the maladaption and misery. If I can see the sprouts, I can pull them like weeds, or skirt them or spray them with some positive herbicide-like stuff. So I ask the reader's indulgence today. I'm not wallowing. I'm looking back upon the road to here.

If you smell something really malodorous and hear its grunting and roaring, it's that bear I've been wrestling. It has grown larger and stinkier as I've tried to ignore it, and it won't go away, so I'm going to have to look under the bed and in all the corners to stare it down, tame it, get engaged or feed it. I rather fibbed on e-mail to Girlfriend when I told her I was wrestling something I hadn't named yet. Well, almost fibbed. I was close to naming it. And now I can. It's anger. Again. Still making me feel lost and uncomfortable. No longer scaring me nearly catatonic.

Something that charmed me: It's chilly and rainy and I need to go out for awhile. I tend to be a shivery little old lady, so I'll bundle up. Spotted in my closet, and to be worn with a tip o' the hat to Cousin Bill ~ my red, leather Mae West cowgirl boots. And I intend to kick no one.

And That's What Made Me Run

I'm an adult now (at least if you count my years) and I hope I react to things from a plane of some slight balance vs. torturous highs and lows. But it wasn't always so. Once I was 8 years old and I didn't have the same powers of reasoning, the same collection of life experience, the willingness to speak out, the suspicion of authority that I do now. I didn't have many coping skills. I wouldn't have challenged something an adult stated for anything. I'd learned not to bother anyone with anything that was bothering me. Life's little kicks in the ass sometimes crushed me, and I simply accepted them, soldiering on. I know that my own childhood traumas likely weren't any more difficult than anyone else's, and in many ways I was a fortunate little girl. But everyone has struggled with something.

My mother's large Irish family were Catholics through and through. Active in the parish. My father's family were decidedly not. The Morgan family, my grandfather in particular, could get going about Catholics and the Pope. I was not baptized as an infant, as my father objected. Mom finally convinced him to allow the baptism when I was 2 - just old enough to raise the roof when the priest applied those few drops of holy water to my forehead. By the time Gary came along, my dad had already given in once, so Gary was baptized as an infant, more typically Catholic. In very young childhood, I was not served up a lot of religion. Weddings and funerals, Mass at Easter. We were rather casual Catholics, my mother and I. Sometimes when very young, I was allowed to go to other churches of other faiths with friends. Casual. It may have been restful, convenient, to have me away from home in a wholesome environment, someone else's temporary responsibility. I don't know.By second grade, it appeared that I had a decent brain. There had been some discussion of my skipping a grade, but it had been determined my intellect could easily do that while my soul probably could not. I was delicate and sensitive. It could harm me. I now know myself better than anyone else knows me. It would have harmed me. My mother and her family began to work my dad. Putting me in Catholic school would not only offer me more challenging lessons and a good foundation for my lifetime education, there were all the wonderful extra-curricular activities and, and . . . he finally agreed, reluctantly. We'd try it for my 3rd grade year.

During the summer, my mother, a person who is not of the same species as I, had to teach me to write perfect Palmer Method cursive writing with a cartridge pen as the Catholic kids had all learned that in 2nd grade. They hadn't taught us that at public school. I was not grand at catching on to perfect Palmer Method. My mother and I should never have been allowed to occupy a room alone together. Certainly no one should have thought it was a good idea to have her try to teach me anything. Not good for her, not good for me. And I was a messy child, for the first time ever. That cartridge pen was a challenge to me. I remember it as the summer of permanently blue-stained fingertips and incredible stress. Ah ~ and in the fall, when I went to Catholic school, my uniform blouse would be white and there had better not be any blue ink on it. A stray lazy thought in my head today: Grandpa lived about 2 miles away, wrote in perfect Palmer Method, was soft and gentle with me, had even taught me how to handle a pocket knife . . . . . hmmm.

In 1960 America, there were good girls and boys and bad girls and boys. I had some cousins who were bad, and very fun. They were free enough to be bad, take their lumps and move on. I was a good child. Adults liked me. I was quiet and helpful, clean and tidy except for cartridge pens, industrious and bright. I think I would have liked the child who was me. The exterior was a cute little package, smiling, always reading, always trying to please. Trying so hard to please. And when I failed to please, I suffered agonies. I will write from time to time about ways I've punished myself in life for failing to please. But at 8, the punishment was just silent self-excoriation. My family's poisons had made me, by age 8, a very grand secret-keeper. I had seen, heard and experienced things to which no child should ever be exposed. I never spilled about the worst of it until I was 50 years old. I'd learned to get up every morning, study my mother and determine what she needed me to be on this day and that's the girl I'd be. And quiet! No, it didn't make for good mother-daughter relations. Does it surprise anyone that I sought out adult females? Granny and my aunts, friends of my mother, neighbor women. Because I was pretty smart, it didn't take long for me to figure out that all of them were pretty regular, pretty normal, pretty right.

In southern California, the Santa Ana winds blow in early September. The conditions become hot and dry. Major wildfires typically occur at this time of year. The Catholic school was a good deal farther from home than the public. That was OK. I was on a new adventure. In September, my new saddle shoes blistered my feet and the gray wool skirt was hot and itchy, but I tried not to complain. The white uniform blouse was adorned at the collar with a maroon clip-on bowtie that pinched the sweating neck, but that was all right, too. At Catholic school, we were assigned far more homework and used many more books than in public school. I lugged the books without griping and always did extra credit. My dad oversaw my homework every night of life and he could see how much I was learning. By first report card, we already knew this "trial" was going very well for all concerned. I was also learning about the Catholic religion in a way I'd never understood it before. We attended Mass, walked the Stations of the Cross, made our first confessions and studied for our First Communions, studied catechism each afternoon, were given rosaries and holy cards as prizes for spelling bees, and were immersed even more than that. Oh, I was a wonderful, true believer. Age 8, tender, gentle.

At least some of the reason for my success at school was the influence of Sister Maren Therese. She was young(ish) and quite tall. Her hands were long and beautiful and I stared at her gorgeous, very fair skin. She had a lovely voice and she was very caring while still remaining firm. Our school lay right in the flight path of the Los Angeles International Airport, already a very busy portal in 1960. When the huge classroom windows were opened because we were not air conditioned, Sister could present a lesson pausing every few moments as a jet passed over and then pick up right where she'd left off, without missing a beat. I remember I loved those windows that latched very close to the ceiling. They were latched by use of a device that was a sort of a hook on a very long broomstick. Only Sister, the janitor and the boys were allowed to use this device. That was OK with me. I am not graced with much grace. I could have put the device right through the window pane. That would not have pleased Sister. Have I mentioned that I absolutely loved her? And I knew she thought I was a very special girl. Yes, the adult me understands that Sister thought all the children were special. But the 8-year-old didn't know that.

It was in the spring, and for some reason, I believe it was April, not that it matters in the least. The windows were open because it was gloriously warm, Sister speaking in her stop-start mode because of the jets. It was Friday and Catholics did not eat meat on Fridays. I'd had peanut butter, cheese and crackers in my lunchbox, in place of - say - a bologna sandwich. We were in the catechism part of our daily lessons. It is interesting to me that I can still recite entire tracts of Catholic ideology and the Mass in Latin. I paid attention, you see. I was a young, budding critical thinker. I weighed facts that were tossed my way. Nearly 4th graders by now, we needed to be learning about the afterlife. Oh, we knew about heaven and all aspired to go there. We knew we'd meet others in heaven who came from different faiths and that was all right. Anyone could go there as long as they'd made a conscious decision to embrace God's ways. And we knew about hellfire. Some Catholic art shown freely and openly to children, at least at that time, was lurid and frightening. We certainly didn't plan to go there. But Catholics had a much wider menu than souls of other faiths. Catholics had a few different forms of afterlife, and one's behavior on earth would dictate where one ended up.

It's been said of me that I experience events with all of my senses and then relate them descriptively in a way that others can almost feel the way I felt at the time. Sitting in the warm classroom, I felt safe and well-fed. I listened attentively. Always. Sister explained the afterlife reward system. When the light came on for me, I shot my hand into the air. When she called on me, I stood up to ask my questions. It couldn't possibly be the way I'd heard it. Could it? My mother and I, card-carrying Catholics, could enter the kingdom of heaven if we remained in a state of grace. My brother was headed for limbo of the infants - not heaven, but a state of maximum happiness reserved for those who hadn't been able to make choices in life. My father's best hope was purgatory - a sort of temporary hell from which he might emerge if he'd been a very fine person. Dad's downfall? He wouldn't be baptized and live a holy (read: Catholic) life. What?? I know I flushed. My ears roared. I smelled something like burning leaves. I don't believe I heard another word spoken to me that day. I ran most of the long way home.I was done with Catholicism, religion and Sister. Finished. Maybe another child would have run home and said,"Hey, Dad, we've got to get you converted while there's still time. And what are we going to do about Gary?" But not I. No. I went into my room for the weekend and soaked in it. Silently. New secrets to keep. The people I loved best weren't going to get into heaven. I began this post saying I'm now an adult. I know that God didn't come down into my classroom and traumatize me. Perhaps it would have been better if he had. Better than Sister doing it. I had lay teachers for the next several years and then we moved to Salt Lake City where there was no Catholic school conveniently located. My mother did not react at all when I said I didn't want to go to church any more. I'd been faking it for a few years and wanted relief from that. A person in better balance than I might have found some other spiritual comfort or joined a different church. I am of the generation that freely explored eastern mysticism. I could have done that, too. I was so shattered, I spent decades running from the entire topic. And keeping those secrets.

When I was pregnant, Ex and I talked almost daily about our life plan for our child. Everything from her education to the color of her nursery walls was discussed in great depth. What would we do about the God/religion thing? Ex was a lapsed Catholic, although not particularly traumatized. But he had no strong need to include religious practice in our child's life. We landed on a plan. When Amber asked, and not before, we would begin the traveling church tour, visiting every kind of congregation we could find, for a few weeks each. We'd spend time in the car on the way home talking about what we thought and felt. She was about 10 when she posed the questions. We executed our plan. We did Protestantism, Mormonism, Buddhism, and - yes - Catholicism. We did it for a long time. After about 2 years, over dinner one evening, Amber said, "OK, thanks. I'm done." Oh. As easy as that.

In my ears right now: The sound of my own voice. I'm repeating phrases in Latin. I could likely conduct a retro Mass.

Something that charmed me: I was attending a 12-step meeting in support of a friend who was to be presented with a cake and a chip for a significant period of sobriety. One AA member wished to share, and that's always preceded by an introduction of oneself. "I'm X. I'm an alcoholic and a recovering Catholic." I laughed out loud. It was probably inappropriate.

Back to the Future, or Everything Old Is New Again

I wrote happily about my far distant past and then felt a little low reliving some of those very early days. I found that musing about a different part of life was a little less painful and I had some donkey laughs. I was flooded with memories of a decade of early adult life and my fingers began to tap as quickly as the thoughts filled my cranium. To my surprise, I was writing (at least in part) about Ex. Without invective. With no vitriol. This was new and fascinating to me, as I have spent few moments in the ensuing years fondly remembering things past between us. I am a woman who did not let the door hit her in the ass as she walked away. Few pleasant words were ever again exchanged between us. But to my further surprise, after posting about the 1980s, I continued to recall little bits of debris from the 32 years spent together and I found it quite pleasant. Comforting. Pleasant memories burn less energy than angry ones, I've found. I believe I have grown a bit.

Friend Tag rang in on Comments to say he'd also experienced tremendous professional growth during the 1980s while also taking on marriage and parenthood. We spoke of some movies we enjoyed in common, and I'm still hangin' in the 80s. When I took my momentary little plunge, I went to YouTube and was perfectly poised to select music that would only make matters worse. But I stumbled over a fortuitous find that led me on a path to other discoveries. Pretty soon, I was laughing out loud. I danced, too!

Some adventure/comic movies of the day included Romancing the Stone and The Jewel of the Nile. These starred Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner and Danny DeVito. In retrospect, they look very 1980s, but we enjoyed them. They were fun and funny. They had some decent enough songs in the soundtrack. To call these films life-altering or even particularly memorable would likely be stretching it, and yet . . . something lingered in my mind. Billy Ocean. MTV. I don't want to say too much. I want the reader to view it. But, without giving up too much, I will say that one wants to wait until the back-up singers are revealed. I wonder if others will first grin widely, then laugh loudly, and finally replay the thing and dance with them like I did. I have got the elbow-bending leg-marching rocking thing going on! I can punch my fist high into the air just like they do . . . and I am reminded of having fun in earlier times. I can do the sideways shuffle thing like Billy Ocean and I wish - oh, I wish - I had a white tuxedo! I regret that embedding is disabled, but follow the link for some fun! Or perhaps I'm just too easily amused. "The tough get rough . . . !"

All right, enough of that. True story: Ex came home every Friday night, no matter whether he drove for hours or took the redeye. He came with dirty laundry to be exchanged for clean laundry and dry cleaning to be taken when he returned to whatever part of California on the Monday morning. The weekends were filled with errands and socializing with friends and family, at least a few hours of quiet and private conversation, prescription-filling, expense reports completion, shared meals. Sometimes I had a honey-do list for him ~ hey, I worked a zillion hours a week, too. And I was never good with drills or other tools with moving parts. If the gardener had let us down again, Ex tackled the lawn. If the cars needed service, he took them while I took the dogs to be groomed and shuffled paperwork for both of us. It worked out nicely. All we lacked was sufficient time to rest and relax. For much more than a decade. Spending more time apart than together pointed something out to me, and I believe to him. Being together for brief periods on the weekends reminded me of the things I liked and disliked most about him. It seemed to me that everything was experienced through a magnifying glass. Small irritations seemed too important. The good times felt over-the-top. Once in awhile I took a nap on Sunday afternoon that lasted from noon until 6:00 p.m.

He and I were polar opposites in many elemental ways. I am prepunctual. Always. I would rather arrive some place naked than late. Ex told time by the calendar and actually appeared to enjoy creating a little chaos by dithering. It is almost literally true that we always traveled in separate vehicles to the same destination. For more than 20 years. Air travel with him was an excruciating proposition for me, but - in fairness - we never missed a flight due to his sense of time management. However, on this particular Saturday, we rode together to the mall. Ex needed some new kicks and then we were going to see a movie everyone was talking about - Ghostbusters. We shopped awhile and he bought a pair of new Reeboks for a startling amount of money in 1980s terms - the Miami Vice model, if I am not mistaken. How's that for some 1980s aura? So pleased was Ex with his purchase, he decided to wear the new shoes out of the store, tucking the other pair inside the box and bag. I glanced at my watch and went on alert. If we didn't hustle, we'd be late for the movie. I set a pretty brisk pace to get us out of the mall, and Ex grouched at me for being too tightly wound. Yes. That has been said about me. Especially regarding punctuality. Exiting the mall, he got tangled up in the bicycle parking stand, whacking the top of his foot pretty hard. "You OK?" "I don't know. There's no time to check and see. My wife has a ticking stopwatch."

There was no discord in the theater. Ex and I were agreed on the finer points of popcorn. We both liked Diet Pepsi, and Bon Bons were a firm favorite of us both. We were completely in accord about where to sit in a darkened theater so one doesn't get a stiff neck, blasted out by the speakers or crawled over by late-arriving movie-goers. We settled into our seats and enjoyed the film like just about everyone else at the time. How can a movie starring Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray, Harold Ramis and Rick Moranis go wrong? Sigourney Weaver was lovely and talented, and I'd watch Annie Potts in any role. The special effects were grand, the dialogue quick and funny. I was having a wonderful time! Until he started. At first it was a slight wiggle of his leg. It escalated to a pretty rapid shaking of the same leg, and non-stop. "What the hell, Ex?" He said his foot was hurting a little. Probably from whacking it on the bike stand. Soon his entire body was gyrating. "Geez, Ex, do you think we need to leave?" I'm sure my tone of voice did not suggest to him that I thought that was a good thing. He said he wanted to see the end of the movie and he'd be all right. The twitching and shaking went on until I finally moved one seat away, putting my jacket, purse and the popcorn on the seat between us. I could still see him shimmying out of the corner of my eye, but at least I wasn't being jiggled continuously. Finally the movie was over. We said we'd enjoyed it. It was good!

Making our way out of the dark, Ex commented he needed me to slow my pace. His foot hurt. It was throbbing. I'm not cruel, and I had no other pressing engagement. I slowed down tremendously and gave him my arm. "What do you think is going on, Ex?" He wasn't sure. He just wanted to get to the car so he could assess what was going on. I suggested we check the foot in the theater lobby where he could sit on a bench. Who cared if people thought it was strange for a man to take off his shoe and sock in the lobby? We needed to see what was happening. He sat on a bench and brought his foot up across the opposite knee. It was enormous! Three times the size of his other foot, maybe more. Dark brown eyes looked into blue ones. Uh-oh. I told him I wanted to take off his shoe and he agreed. I tried to remove it and was stunned to learn that foot was not going to eject that new Reebok. His foot had swelled so tremendously, it was as if the shoe had been consumed by it. I couldn't squeeze a finger between foot and shoe. "I'm going for the car. Stay here." It scared me that he agreed to do that. Usually he soldiered on when I asked him to be cautious.

Running across the parking lot, I decided we were going directly to the emergency room. If I took him home, he'd self-diagnose and self-heal. I'd seen it happen before. It scared me that he didn't bitch about my taking him directly to the hospital. Well, Ex was not an infant, was not running a fever, was not unconscious, was not pouring blood from any part of his body. He was way low on the list of priorities in that emergency room. We talked. I brought him drinks and a snack, crabbed at the intake window that the man's foot was huge and throbbing and couldn't that possibly indicate some internal bleeding? Finally we were ushered into a draped cubicle where we waited another eternity. At least now, his foot was elevated. And finally assistance came. Now I can't swear the man was an M.D. For all I know, he could have been part of the custodial staff, but he was here to do something about this foot and I was happy to see him. He replicated my earlier efforts to try to do something about getting that shoe off. No way. Ex was grimacing from the man's attempts and the fellow proved humane. "I'm going to have to cut the shoe, and likely the sock, off. There's no wiggle room here." Yes, I knew that to be a fact. He used some of the marvelous flat scissors found in places like hospital emergency rooms and made a number of cuts so the shoe and sock could be peeled away in strips. As the pressure was released, I could see Ex's body visibly relax. The foot, however, swelled even more, right before our eyes. It was incredible! "My god, Ex. You're all swelled up like the Stay-Puft Marshmallow man!" The doctor or custodian, Ex and I began to guffaw in a way unbecoming in an emergency room. Obviously that good man had seen Ghostbusters. Ex quipped, "Just don't roast me in the streets of New York, please."


It was really pretty straightforward. His new Reeboks had been tied snugly. The whack on his foot at the bike parking stand broke some blood vessels and he began to bleed. A couple of hours seated in the theater allowed that foot to fill with blood until it became enormous. When the shoe and sock were cut off, the blood that had been constricted from the pressure flowed out and completed the largest single foot ever seen on an average human male. He was put on restricted physical activity and needed to keep the foot iced and elevated to the extent possible. It took a long time for his body to reabsorb so much fluid. I'm certain he was pretty uncomfortable for awhile, hobbling around trying to work, travel. He kept his brand new, single Reebok in the closet for years. I used to see him pick it up and study it closely. When we moved to our new home years later, he put that Miami Vice shoe on the patio and put a little potted plant in it. The plant thrived and grew, bursting its pot. Its root system grew and filled up that Reebok to three times its . . . I swear that's true!

In my ears right now: I imagine the reader already figured it out.

Something that charmed me: The story of Ex and his Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man foot was told and retold so many times that Amber can tell it perfectly. One can watch her face and see the laughter cross it at the funny moments, concern when she speaks of Ex being uncomfortable. She wouldn't be born until 6 years after it happened. But it is part of her landscape.

April 8, 1968

If you've ever spent a moment on this blog, you're aware that I'm sentimental and maybe sappy. I'm a person who feels things deeply, and it's been said that I am very loving. I nurture and encourage and cheer for those I care about. I feed and fetch for those I treasure. I'd make a very fine Labrador Retriever. I'm known to collect and bond to some odd little signs or icons such as an image that pleases me or a date on the calendar or a tune. I internalize those things and they become an integral part of me. The date of April 8th, and specifically April 8th, 1968, is such a thing. Why that date? Why not September 14th or some other target on the calendar? I wonder. Were the stars aligned in some way on the day of my birth that portended April 8th would be an important day for me some 15 years later and for the remainder of my time? I don't know. I'm not that brilliant. But I know about April 8th.

Because the date is special to me, I went searching to see what had happened on it in history. Oh. Ponce de Leon claimed Florida for Spain in 1513 and the U.S. House of Representatives met for the first time in 1789. In 1879, milk was sold in glass bottles for the first time, and on April 8, 1912, two steam ships collided in the middle of the Nile, killing 200. In 1935, Congress approved the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and on 4/8/1939, King Zog of Albania fled the country (for reasons I did not further research). On April 8, 1946, the League of Nations met for the last time and on the same date in 1952, the year of my birth, President Truman seized the steel mills in order to avert a strike. The Supreme Court later ruled Truman had overstepped his authority, which pleases the union representative in my soul. In 1963, Lawrence of Arabia was named the movie of the year at the Academy Awards and in 1974, Hank Aaron slammed that 715th career home run to break Babe Ruth's record of 714. Chicago was the first rock group to play at Carnegie Hall on April 8, 1971 and on this date in 1986, Clint Eastwood was elected mayor of Carmel, California. In 1992, on April 8th, Arthur Ashe disclosed he had contracted AIDS.

Some notable persons claim April 8th birthdays, including Ponce de Leon (Looks like he claimed Florida for his own birthday gift!), the American actress Mary Pickford, ice skater/actress Sonja Henie, U.S. First Lady Betty Ford, the comedan Shecky Greene, TV host John Bartholomew Tucker, Peggy Lennon of the Lennon Sisters singing quartet, conservative Republican U.S. Representative Tom DeLay [sorry, Badger!], Dukes of Hazzard actor John Schneider, John Lennon's son Julian Lennon, and the actress Robin Wright Penn. Whew! The world has also lost a few notables on April the 8th, including the actress Claire Trevor, singer Laura Nyro in 1997, Kurt Cobain of Nirvana fame, U.S. contralto singer Marian Anderson, rock producer Phil Ochs, the artist Pablo Picasso, and the Roman Emperor Marcus Antonilius. Yikes.

But what about my April 8th? The one in 1968? It was a Monday, the first day of what we called Easter vacation, now known as spring break. It was sunny and warm in southern California. Dr. Martin Luther King had been assassinated three days previously. Both the 40th annual Academy Awards and the opening day of National League Baseball were postponed from April 8th to allow the country to mourn. The new socialist constitution of East Germany took effect and WKPI TV Channel 22 (PBS) in Pikeville, Kentucky, began broadcasting. It was a busy day! Number one on the charts in the U.S. was Otis Redding's posthumously released (Sitting On) The Dock of the Bay. In the U.K., the Beatles would earn another gold record on 4/8/1968 for Lady Madonna.


Let's leave the world behind and go to Inglewood, California. It was a lovely Los Angeles suburb at the time. Truly a nice place to live, with good schools, a large shopping area, tree-lined streets, tidy middle class homes with flowers in the gardens. My Granny always wanted to live in Inglewood rather than L.A.-proper, because it was such a nice place. I was stretched out on the living room carpet, transcribing lyrics from one of the tunes on Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited album. The 33 rpm record spun on the Heathkit stereo turntable my father had built. I'd scribble some words and then lift the turntable arm, just to gently put it back on the vinyl to catch the next phrase or two. Bob Dylan is not easy to transcribe. I was killing some time. I tend to be (still today) prepunctual. I'd dressed, applied makeup and fixed my hair, leaving way too much dead time to deal with before 10:00 a.m. He was punctual. I didn't have to wait until 10:02 a.m.
Across my threshold that morning, with the sun shining over his left shoulder, stepped a young man. We'd only talked on the phone, and had specifically set up our first meeting to take place right at the beginning of spring break. I didn't know at the time that the really good looking youngblood would be a person who would become and remain important in my life. I just knew that I liked him. A lot. Immediately. This man and I have been many things to one another across the decades. And - oh, yeah - there was that 30-year stretch when we didn't know if the other still existed. I've written about the relationship before, with probably the best rendition being this one. However, an interested reader could go to my posts with the label 1968 and read from the oldest going forward if the story of two insignificant people allures.

No, the purpose of this post was to simply celebrate the fact that sometimes in life we meet another human being and something in the cosmos begins to whir. Sometimes we're fortunate enough to be able to recognize that something just clicked and this fellow human being is one we want to spend time with. Get to know better. Keep. It has been stated that when he and I are in the same room, the light bulbs spin in their sockets. I think that is a good analogy. That is the kind of energy produced when these two elements are placed in close proximity. I think about the John Lennon lyrics, " . . life is what happens while you're busy making plans . . ". It hasn't gone the way we'd have predicted. It hasn't gone the way we sometimes wanted it to. It hasn't gone according to Hoyle and it hasn't gone by the rules. It hasn't gone by the book and it hasn't gone the way anyone else might have designed it. And it hasn't gone.

Here are the photos, taken by our respective mothers. They were taken within a couple of years of 1968, at most, so this really is the way we looked. Blogger friend Kass had asked me in comments once if I had pictures of us at the time. I confessed that I did have some, but I was reluctant to show mine. Oh, I know what I look like, so that's not the deal. And I remember that white eyeshadow was outlawed the very next year after the picture was taken. I love my John Lennon glasses that had real glass lenses, and I remember that watch with the wide blue band. But I am troubled by the look on my face. I remember the morning well. It was my birthday. My mother insisted on taking the photograph over my objection. My mother and I were engaged in mortal wrangle at all times. So the face you see belongs to a very angry young woman at whom a camera could be aimed, but who could not be forced to smile. In fact, I believe I see a little jut to the jaw that says, "If I snap my neck from all the muscle tension, that's OK. But I will not smile."












Who knows where the time goes? I don't feel very differently. And what will happen next? I don't know. I'm not that brilliant. And I'm reminded that when people are put together, watching the chemical reaction is rather like looking into the kaleidoscope, all the little colored pieces moving into another configuration and then, yet another. One can't predict that.













I may not be brilliant, but I know the good goods when I see them. It's good to have connected with the Badger. Now I think I'll go learn some new things. Those are my most frequently used labels. That's what I do. Connect with others and learn new things. It's good to have you in my life, Badge.

In my ears right now:


Something that charmed me: I've been talking up April 8th for awhile now. Home dudes like me, of course, and they like the Badger. They also like to hear my stories of the days when I was young and dinosaurs roamed the earth. I was welcomed this morning with a flower on my desk and a cup of Starbucks. "Happy April 8th! Truly, 42 years, Les?" As some of the homes were checking out, Matt commented he was going to meet his new girlfriend's mother tonight. It is the good woman's birthday. Then Cesar said, "Hey, it's Thursday! It's my mom's anniversary." Oh. April 8th, huh, homes?

Photo credits for the final four shots respectively: Mother Badger, Mother Now, Limes Now, The Badger

Meaningful Things: Music and the Letter

I am a woman who loves to write. My father does, and my daughter. We're wordy sorts who feel an urge to tell our stories. Yes, we're all talkers, too. But we particularly seek out writing as a means of expression.

I am also strongly drawn to music and bonded to some of it. My music. It doesn't even have to be particularly good music for me to love it. I'm willing to listen to virtually anything at least once, and if I like a song, I'll probably always like it. I'll remember the first time I heard it and why it pulled me in. Sometimes I remember what the weather was like and what fragrance I was wearing. I certainly remember the company I was keeping at the time. Eventually some of the songs become a part of who I am, the artist a friend to me. And I like to introduce my friends around.

Um . . . and then there are my musical oddities. I (frequently) land on an old or new favorite and play only that song for ~ oh, say six months in the car. Likewise there will be one going in the office for 11 hours a day. I've been known to make co-workers nearly weep and Ex refused to go anywhere in the car with me for years. I like to enjoy my music by nearly complete immersion and then I move on to the next song. I think about how I'd play it or how I'd have structured the delivery of the lyrics differently. And yes, there is some hope for me. The medications do control most of the other obsessive behaviors . . . I'm kidding! And a music lover with similar taste to mine presents me with custom mixes frequently. They contain up to 25 different songs. I didn't know people listened to music that way.

I received a letter from a young man in the late 1960s. I was somewhere between 15 and 18, depending upon whichever year that letter landed. 1969, I believe, so either 16 or 17. The young man and I exchanged letters often, and this is unusual, because we were also seeing one another in person - extremely often. But he is a writer, too, and we both fell to written communication to supplement our face-to-face time. We each had that much need to express ourself to the other. It is fortunate that we developed the writing habit, because we faded from and reappeared in the other's life time after time. We spoke seriously at one time about collaborating on a book about a relationship that had many faces over time. I do not think it is an exaggeration to say we have exchanged a million words, or perhaps a googol, in person and in writing.

So the letter arrived with its 6-cent postage stamp. Sometimes I used feminine stationery. We both used college lined notebook paper. We were teenagers. Students. Notebook paper was appropriate to our circumstances. He wrote in fountain pen. He still does. This was a shorter letter. Just the one piece of notebook paper, written on one side. I'm sorry I don't specifically remember the letter's subject, but I do not. What I do remember is the writing in the left hand margin. It was a snippet of something, a poem or a song, and it was dreamy and beautiful. He had turned the page at right angles to write those words, as they were presented vertically when compared to the horizontal sentences of the letter. Although I did not have a complete frame of reference for the words, they made me think he was the most brilliant and sensitive young man I'd known.

When I next saw him or spoke to him on the phone, I asked about the words and he pointed me to a music album I've now owned on vinyl, 8-track, cassette, CD and MP3. I bought the record for myself with babysitting money and I proceeded to breathe in every word of every song . . . for 41 years now. Many of them are wonderful, but the one from which he wrote part of the lyrics is a thread in my personal tapestry. I introduced both of my parents, my husband and my child to the artist, but more to that song. They probably all liked it, but it didn't mean to them what it meant to me.

The words he wrote were these:

" . . All my sisters soon were gone
To Denver and Cheyenne.
Marrying their grownup dreams,
The lilacs and the man.
I stayed behind, the youngest still,
Only danced alone . . ."

The song is "My Father" by Judy Collins. Across the decades I've thought about my own practical Kansan father who wouldn't have ever promised such a thing as " . . we would live in France . ." or that "we'd go boating on the Seine and I would learn to dance . ." unless he had the paid tickets in his pocket. Of course, I'm not much of a dreamer like the woman in the song. I wonder which of us had it better.

The young man who wrote me the letter was an active Viet Nam war protestor. He was associated with a group called The Resistance (among others) and he participated in a protest organizing meeting at which he sat next to Judy Collins. He still grins when he speaks of it today. In 2000, my mother, my 10-year-old daughter and I sat in the champagne picnic area at the San Diego Summer Pops awaiting Judy Collins. It was cool on the bay. We munched and drank bubbly (not the child, of course). My mother hoped Collins would sing "Someday Soon". She probably would. It was a big hit for her. Amber hoped for "Pretty Polly". Unlikely, but I hoped so, too, in solidarity. When she walked out onto the stage, I nearly choked on my croissant cucumber sandwich. Where was Judy Collins, the cute folkie/hippie chick with the voice of an angel and the words that spoke to me, subject of Stephen Stills' "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes"? Who was this 61-year-old in the pastel colored suit and what had she done with Judy? Until she took the mike and said, "Hello!" That was Judy Collins' voice! What the heezy? And as she sang the evening away, reminiscing about a young singer/songwriter named John Denver who stayed with her family while trying to make a name for himself, I realized that Judy wasn't a cute folkie/hippie any more and Leslie wasn't 16, and we were still spending a wonderful evening in one another's company.

When she sang "My Father", I wanted it never to end. My mother recalled the song and tapped my foot under our picnic table. My daughter, a child who knew every word, sat with tears rolling down her face.

When I did some research for this post, I came across the YouTube shown below. Judy speaks of her father's blindness and how he was sent away to a special school. It reminds me of my blind great uncle, Ralph. And then she proceeds to sing her beautiful song, taped in the same year I learned the words.

In my ears right now: The reader already knew this!


I'm going to end this one a little differently. It's the lyrics that charm me:

My father always promised us
That we would live in France.
We'd go boating on the Seine
And I would learn to dance.
We lived in Ohio then.
He worked in the mines.
On his dreams like boats
We knew we would sail in time.
All my sisters soon were gone
To Denver and Cheyenne.
Marrying their grownup dreams
The lilacs and the man.
I stayed behind, the youngest still,
Only danced alone.
The colors of my father's dreams
Faded without a sound.
And I live in Paris now.
My children dance and dream,
Hearing the ways of a miner's life
In words they've never seen.
I sail my memories of home
Like boats across the Seine
And watch the Paris sun
As it sets in my father's eyes again.