Dinner, a pile of records and my new jazz idol

It wasn't on YouTube or through google, but in my disorganized shelf of Lp's that I discovered my new Jazz piano mentor.

Hubby said, "Let's have some music for dinner."

What do you want to hear?

Simon & Garfunkel? Gershwin?

"No, something different"

Then I spied it: Oscar Peterson Trio plus One. Hmm, that must have been one of my thrift store finds.
So after Tim blessed the food,  I dropped the needle on and we were treated to the best jazz I'd heard in  a long time. It was clean and sophisticated. And the pianist was incredible!

While listening and eating, we talked about a children's book idea that I was collaborating with an local artist on. We argued about stupid stuff.

But mostly over our bean soup and salad we talked about the great music playing  on the turntable!
Wow, I didn't know we had this. The 1964 album gave us an amazing menu of pieces and my new jazz mentor. Later I remember being introduced to him at Dick Grove Music school in Van Nuys, CA years ago. I still have the charts we studied by him.
 
Our feet could hold back no more. We flipped the vinyl to side two and my husband did something very uncharacteristic of himself and out of the ordinary. He grabbed my hand and led me to the family room to dance.

And I followed. I mean, I actually let him lead.

Not like our first dance lesson debacle.

It was a little bit 70's random arm jerking, 50's swing and fox trox. Spinning me forward and backward then back to front, we sidled and swirled and giggled our way through that bass improv, the piano licks and flugelhorn riffs. We'll be ready for Cody Johns' wedding next week. We'll be tearing up the dance floor!!

Then we lay on the floor exhausted in the pile of records.

What a great night!

No TV

A new/old  jazz mentor - Thank you Oscar Peterson.

Dancing, and it was only a Thursday night.

And a pile of records.

3 Weddings - None of Them in June - Number 2

The 1940's were Hollywood's golden era.

After a few stabs at college, a WWII tour in the Middle East and a trip to London, my father, Walter was ready to go west, young man, with an itch to act. It wasn't gold that attracted him to California, but silver - the silver screen.

So, Walter traded the Middle East heat and desert sands for California palms and rolling hills; he exchanged the four seasons of Massachusetts and a disappointed father, for two seasons in the Golden State and a chance at Hollywood.

1943. What a head shot!

He had studied acting at Clark University and was ready to give it a go, despite his professor father's urgings to finish college.

Yes, these were the golden days of Hollywood. And he had that 24 karat look.

His quest for stardom only led him to a day job as a taxi driver.

I don't know how many scripts he read, auditions he had or interviews he made, but the closest he ever got to becoming a movie star was driving Lucille Ball and John Wayne in his cab.

While in Hollywood, though, other things were brewing that would soon change his life. A mutual friend introduced him to a young woman named Isabel who lived, ironically, back in Massachusetts, not far from Walter's hometown.

Isabel MacDuffie - visiting her dad, E. 57th, NYC - 1940

So they wrote letters cross-country. For 2 years they wrote letters. Love letters that stoked their chemistry enough for a meet-up to be planned.

If it was 2014, they would have connected online and then decided to meet their mystery friend. Here it was a pen-pal connection. My father booked a flight to New England.

The first woman he saw debarking the plane was fat and he got scared for a minute. But then he laid eyes on a young woman with dark wavy hair, crystal blue eyes, thin and poised. He was pleased and very much relieved.

When he met her family, not so much.

All they did was talk about money, he said. I don't think Isabel's family was too taken by Walter either. He was what? A taxi driver? For a girl brought up in homes with names like 'Marimonte' and 'Lordvale,'  the disparity of pedigree was as glaring as a Timex next to a Tag. (Sorry, dad).

Whether it was Walter's dashing looks or the need to escape her family, or the fact that she was 28 and unmarried, she followed Walter out to California.

But wait, I forgot the proposal.

Their first visit was nearing an end. Walter was headed to the airport and he realized he was 34 and missing the chance of a lifetime. Strange family or not, this was a good woman and he needed to act fast.

So he headed for the nearest phone booth. He waited in line and called her and right then and there, asked her to marry him - over the phone.

Unbeknownst to him, two little old ladies were in line behind him, watching  and listening to his conversation. He hung up and turned to catch his plane. They stopped him abruptly.

"Excuse me, sir, did you just propose to that young lady over the phone?"

"Why, yes I did!"

"Well, I hope she refused you, " they said indignantly.

 

How gauche it was, in their minds, to offer marriage any other way than in person. Today, it would be the equivalent of proposing by text.

Yet it didn't bother Isabel. As you know, she accepted and Walter flew back to LA to plan his wedding at the Wee Kirk of the Heather chapel in Forest Lawn.

They were married October 17th, 1949.

"We were forty-niners," my mother would tell me with a twinkly smile, when I was a little girl.

Yeah. Forty-niners who struck it rich!!

The Dangling Conversation

Some song lyrics bear remembering. This is one of them written by Simon & Garfunkel released first in "The Big Bright Pressure Machine" and later in the "Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme" project of 1966.

It’s a still-life watercolor 
Of a now late afternoon 
As the sun shines through the curtain lace 
And shadows wash the room 

And we sit and drink our coffee 

Couched in our indifference 

Like shells upon the shore 
You can hear the ocean roar 
In the dangling conversation 
And the superficial sighs 
The borders of our lives 

Art Credit - Kaito x Gakupo by LikeaBoss78

And you read your Emily Dickinson 

And I my Robert Frost 

And we note our places with bookmarkers 
That measure what we’ve lost 
Like a poem poorly written 
We are verses out of rhythm 
Couplets out of rhyme 
In syncopated time 
And the dangling conversation 
And the superficial sighs 
Are the borders of our lives 

Yes,we speak of things that matter 
With words that must be said 
“Can analysis be worthwhile?” 
“Is the theatre really dead?” 
And how the room is softly faded 

And I only kiss your shadow 

I cannot feel your hand 
You’re a stranger now unto me 
Lost in the dangling conversation 
And the superficial sighs 
In the borders of our lives

It never was a hit, probably due to its heaviness, surmised the author. But the lyrics and the topic are universal and lasting.

It's a hit in my book.

3 Weddings - None of Them in June - Number 1

We are both part free spirit and part planner.

Not a great combination. So it's no wonder that my husband proposed to me in a Ford in front of my house.

This was before the days when a guy would ask 10 friends to help in a grand production of knee-bending, engagement ring revealing ceremony. No, he did not surprise me on some holiday with fireworks, pomp and video cameras running.

It was "will you marry me?" in an after-date conversation on a bench seat in a 1975 station wagon.

How un-romantic can you get?

I dizzily replied yes, sworn to secrecy, because who would believe that after the fourth date, we could be serious about such an important decision. Secret engagements do add some illicit excitement to the whole thing, though - something that every relationship needs.

Now if he had just popped the question 45 minutes earlier, it would have been the perfect setting.

We had just gone to the Queen Mary, an antique ship that first sailed in the early 1900's into the Hudson Bay in its New World glory and ended up docked on opposite coasts at the Long Beach Harbor for all the world to visit. Decked out with restaurants, shops, ballrooms, the floating beauty is a great destination for a date night out. Outside the stars glimmered after our dinner. We talked and dreamed and enjoyed each other's company.

But it wasn't till we were parked in front of my humble suburban house, that my husband realized we were at a crossroads and he needed to seize the relationship.

And seize, he did.

As I said, I tentatively agreed, wanting a little more time to decide. I'm very long on decisions. At restaurants, it takes forever to order. The pros and cons are too much for me to sum up in 5 minutes. The same was true for picking a spouse. Weighing the facts would have consumed me till I was 40, thus missing out on love, children and family.

Decades later, it's even better than when we started out in that tiny Newport Beach duplex, 100 feet from the boardwalk, the ocean waves singing us to sleep, the damp air making my cardboard hangers sag, smiling like happy faces.

And happy faces, we had.

But let me back up, because Tim had to fight just to get us to the first date.

We met at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa at a Saturday Night Christian rock concert. I had known his sparkly - eyed brother, Jimmy, because he taught home bible studies where a bunch of us teenagers met to study and socialize.

Timmy was my kind of guy. He had the beachy, long haired boy look that made my heart pitter-pat.
We would see each other at parties and get-togethers long before any romance had begun.

I started college at Biola University.

He called for a date. I turned him down for homework.

He called a second time for a date. I turned him down again.

A bit clueless, I didn't realize I was insulting him. For me, studies came first, play later.

Little did I know that he vowed  he would never ask me out again. "If You want us together," Tim ranted to the skies, "She will have to call me!"

And call, I did.

But it wasn't for love. It was for homework.

My Biblical Foundations class included an assignment to go street witnessing with an experience "soul winner." This person would need to commit to 3 evangelism excursions. When I asked a pastor's wife whom she might recommend, she suggested Alan Young and Tim Shaw. Well, Alan Young was on his way to the University of Jerusalem, so Tim was the only option.

He said that when the phone rang, he knew it was me before his mom handed over the phone.

And that was the beginning. Date number 1. Sharing Jesus on the Newport Pier preceded by dinner at a Chinese restaurant. How sly is that, of my scheming husband-to-be?

The second homework assignment/date was at a concert.

After the third evangelism/outing, I wrote my paper for the assignment. And I got engaged along the way.

18 months later we were married.

Calvary Chapel Prayer room. 11/19/77

After raising 5 children who are gone now,  the wonder, tears, sleepless nights, glorious days, loving and fighting that a long relationship survives and celebrates, we are back to just the two of us. Though now in a much more spacious house than that 500 square foot abode we started out in.

Ours was a November wedding.  Not a typical time of year to wed. Not a typical courtship. It's June that is known for the month of weddings and summer romances and falling in love.

And falling in love, we are.

California Road Trip

There is nothing like a trip up the 5 northbound, escaping the congestion of Southern California with Palo Alto, San Fransisco or Yosemite as your destination.

The delirious ascent on the Grapevine and the roller-coaster ride descending into the valleys is better than Disneyland's Matterhorn.

Down in the valley rows and rows and rows of grapevines fill the expanse, an endless linear repetition of low plants and stake props.

Telephone poles blur by and mesmerize. Hot dry, wind blows your hair strands into your teeth. No air conditioning. The sky is wide and powder blue, as blue as western skies ever get.


If it was a family trip, my brothers and I would play license plate games. "Fastest person to find all the letters in the alphabet wins!" Or "whoever finds the most out of state licenses is better!" Older, faster and smarter, my brothers always beat me. I'm certain we bickered in the back seat and drove our parents crazy.

The expanse of vineyards, garlic and strawberry fields gave way to golden rolling hills. On a lucky trip orange poppies might dot the gentle slopes.

Sometimes we'd sing. To ourselves or at the top of our lungs.

Oh you can't get to heaven (echo)
In a put-put car (echo)
Cause the put-put car (echo)
Can't get that far (echo) Repeat

Oh you can't get to heaven (echo)
On roller skate (echo)
Cause you'll roll right past (echo)
Those pearly gates (Echo) Repeat

Then the Redwoods or Sequoias would take over.

A coastal journey is another  edge-of-the-cliff story of steep mountains, Monterrey jagged pines, rocks and choppy seas to

Santa Barbara, Pebble beach, San Simeon or Carmel.

But my idyllic central California Steinbeck reverie is interrupted.

The trips weren't always picture perfect.

On one vacation, my dad, the adventurer pioneered off road toward the deserts behind Big Bear. My mother, gripped with fear, begged my dad to turn around back to our mountain home. She had just read a story about a family stuck in the desert, broken down car with no water. They had to do some desperate things to hydrate. My dad finally turned around and headed back to the cabin in Moonridge. They didn't speak to each other for the rest of the day.

 Yes, being a parent on a road trip is a much different story from being a child traveler.

Armed with backpacks bulging with word puzzles, pens, paper, books, games and snacks, we'd venture out, 5 kids in tow to camp in King's Canyon or Ojai. The two rowdiest of the 4 boys sat in the closest back seat at arms length in case dad had to quickly discipline them. Which was often. I think I've blocked out this memory.

My husband, reading over my shoulder here, is quick to turn my rose-colored recollections into reality. On the narrow dirt road leading up to Reyes Peak, he reminded me of how I flipped out fearing we'd drop off the inches away precipice into the rocky ravine, or be stranded in a desert without water, forced to drink our own urine. (The same fear my mom had in Big Bear).

With a four-month-old in the back seat, I can now explain my psychotic mom-moment as postpartum disorder. Oh My! Lions-and-tigers-and-bears-Dorothy-of-Oz, Oh My! And Dorothy wasn't even a mom.

Next month my g - children will take a road trip from Virginia to South Florida. It's a good 16 hours. Hope they'll stop in Georgia to break it up. Pretty gutsy move with a 6 year old, 3 year old and a baby.

To kill time the boys will watch Frozen, Disney movies and Spider Man on the screens behind their parents' heads. I would've done the same if the technology existed in the 90's.

But I hope they also sing

and play games

and lean their little foreheads against the van windows

watching the hypnotizing stream of stick-pines go by.

And fight too, even if they drive their parents crazy.

Just like we did.

Cath (sis-in-law), Bro Pete, me, Yosemite (70's)

L.A. Looks Better From the Getty

LA looks better from the Getty

On a day in December

When the smog is swept clean

LA looks better from the Getty
From the mountains to oceans
Next to white travertine

LA looks pretty from the Getty

You can't see the grafitti

Or the harsh wear of time

LA looks pretty from the Getty

With Vincent's blue Irises

Fresh in your mind

Get out of the gridlock
of the I-405
The shuttle will lift you
to Mulholland Drive
When the Santa Ana's blow
you feel so alive
Up here with the angels
We all can survive

On the opposite coast I walk among palm trees

And miss rainless summers

When I lived in the west

My New Yorker son
 Didn't care for the culture

But dear California

To me's always best

                             

The overcast mornings burn off to hot sun
Then dry desert winds
kick my hair in a swirl
I don't mind the asphalt-y smell of a new rain
That city is home to this Hollywood girl


LA looks better from the Getty
Next to Greek statuary
A mixed media skyline

LA looks better from the Getty
A 360 view
Of a city sublime

 

The Rules of Reflexology

I thought the storefront looked a little sketchy at first.

It was your average suburban strip mall shop. That phrase 'strip mall' always conjures up unseemly pictures. I prefer 'shopping center.' Nothing pretty about this boxy street side retail spot.

A blaze of orange color blinded me as the door opened, from the tangerine colored walls. The lobby resembled the sign-in area for a szechuan restaurant.

Further back each long wall was lined with comfortable chairs and towel covered ottomans.

I glanced at my friend who was generously treating me with an, "Is this place legit" look? Then the young Asian man at the counter greeted us and saw us to our chairs.

Immediately 3 large men in their 30's-40's came out and with no introduction or greeting silently proceeded to motion us to dip our feet in a lined bucket of water. The bucket had smooth ridges in the bottom to start the massage process.

His thick spongy fingers began kneading my neck. I couldn't help chattering and joking. When he worked a few knots out of my neck and I really started to relax, I blurted, "That's it. I'm off to La-La land!" The therapist immediately shushed me.

Oh!

That's when I learned:

Rule #1 - No talking during the massage!

 

After the 15 minute neck work, we pivoted around and reclined for the 45 minute reflexology foot massage. We arrived around 10 to an empty room. By 11am the place was packed,  customers lined up in easy chairs and rows of burly men in soldier-like formation attended to skyward toes and feet.

Reflexologists believe that each spot on the foot relates to an organ in the body and complete health can be improved by simply working on the feet.

It was very, very quiet there. Almost like being in a room of deaf people. The only sound was a little muzak that seemed stuck in the 70's, playing James Taylor and other 'easy listening' cuts.

Rule #2 - No talking on cellphones.

 

My attempt to take photos was frowned upon at first. But before long, the once serious therapists were snapping pictures right and left. This guy thought he was real creative in his photos angle, I guess.

I'd never seen a sight such as this in my obviously sheltered life. The Vietnamese brought us nail salons and now the Chinese are bringing us Foot Relaxation rooms.

Rule #3 - Leave a nice tip for Fan.

Fan was my therapist's name.

I'm a fan of Fan.

I floated out of that place with an old Beach Boys song playing in my head:


...Take good care of your feet...


             Better watch out what you eat


                                         Better take care of your life


                                                                  Cause nobody else will...

I owe my friend big time.

All That is Right With the World

Two  precocious little girls danced while we played Moon River. They flipped their hair in tandem and giggled till they were red-faced and breathless. 

Sometimes things are right in the world.

The Asian autistic boy moved to the Blues in B-flat sax improv. When the song finished, he shook his hands, lifted high,  like the deaf people do in applause.

Sometimes things are right in the world.

My husband looked on and felt like he was playing piano with me. We must be one.

Sometimes things are right  in the world.

The shy single woman sat quietly through the whole set, smiling, never budging, just happy and still.

Music.

Good food.

Little girls giggling.

Autistic boys dancing.

A husband who loves me.

This is all that is right with the world.

On Warhol and Becoming Immortal

Jane Doe

Plain Jane

Dick and Jane

Jane Eyer

Jane Fonda

Jane Seymour

Jane Holzer, aka Sweet Baby Jane

My sister-in-law once said, "Any Jane I've ever known has been anything but plain." These women listed above are no exception.

They are all either interesting, charismatic, smart, creative or beautiful. Nothing plain or girl-next-doors-ish about these Janes.

Especially model and actress Jane Holzer of the 60's. And what hair! I thought mine was thick, but hers is positively mane-like, as in the MGM Studios lion, Leo or CS Lewis' Aslan.

When haute couture model meets avant-garde artist, photographer and film maker Andy Warhol you get Immortality.

She was the Queen of Pop Culture and he was the King of Pop Art.

They ruled the world of fashion, art and film from Warhol's East 47th Street studio called the Factory. It was the ultra-cool art loft where Warhol took already famous celebrities and made them even cooler or took under-the-radar luminaries such as Edie Sedgwick (cousin of Krya Sedgwick) and super-starred them.

The simple set consisted of a common chair against a white drape. His subjects would sit absolutely still while he filmed them for 3 minutes. This was his process of Immortalizing.

Edie Sedgwick died at 28 in 1971 from barbiturate overdose. Warhol died at age 58 in 1987 from Aids.

Jane Holzer managed to avoid the drugs and decadence that swirled around the Warhol scene. That lead to the early deaths of many. She lives in Palm Beach, age 73.

Besides being beautiful, she was a smart Jane. 

Andy was pretty clever, too.

What I learned from Warhol is this: The key to artistic success may be in choosing famous subjects. And then running them through his Factory and declaring them Super-Stars.

That was the business that Warhol was in. Immortalizing celebrities in his famous screen tests.

His contribution to photographic art was the advancement of color treatments, filters and overlays. He was a pioneer in photo shop before the digital world of jpegs and tiffs ever existed. He paved the way for  photo applications that are so common to any computer or smart phone owner today.


If you go to the Norton Museum this month you can get one of those screen tests and experience first hand, the eccentric artist's method of immortalizing. You can pick up your 15 Minutes of Fame.
 

A vintage black movie camera sits on a wooden tripod. You just sit with one expression for 3 minutes. Developed as a sliver gelatin photo and, voila, you are an eternal being. The Warhol Foundation will send you your video via email.


You will be right there with Marilyn Monroe, Jackie Kennedy,  Mao Tse-tung, Jane Fonda, Wayne Gretsky, Michael Jackson, Campbell soup cans and the big bright flowers

and Sweet Baby Jane.

When You Feel Like You'll Never Do What You Were Meant To Do

I was sitting on a piano bench next to him. A man I respected for his musical accomplishments. A sought after collaborator. We were working on original tunes. And he liked them and we were interacting like musicians are supposed to. Speaking that secret language of minor 7ths, channels, and chord substitutions. 

It was the most delicious feeling.

Then I woke up.  

It was only a dream.

 

The last dreams before you wake can be the sweetest. A lifetime of unrealized hopes smacked me hard when I awoke.

My reality started with a cup of coffee over Hebrews 2, (appropriately, not the Hall of Faith chapter), fixed breakfast, dressed, put on make-up and drove 30 minutes to make a flurry of meetings.

I sent emails and created phone call lists into neat excel pages with shaded, boldened and italic tools. I especially like picking out the fill colors for cells. Love the paint bucket icon. But that's the only thing I love about Microsoft excel programs. Forget the formulas.

Then I had a meeting about next semester.  50 sessions of the same class. No variety, just focus and a Fall campaign and one topic. Planning money. Another excel draft listed possible classrooms, Monday through Sunday.

They say when you're working out of the realm of your giftedness, it's a real de-energizer. I left the meeting exhausted. It was like someone had pulled out the rubber plug at the bottom of my feet and every drop of drive spilled out under the conference table.

Doing what you're wired for energizes you. Which is why drowsiness sets in at the computer screen at 2:00 in the afternoon, but you can work on something you love till 1:00 am, no problem.

Break-time, I sent a blog link to a meeting presenter who's topic was similar to one of my blog posts,  just on the outside chance he might be interested. It had nothing to do with my job description, but was the most fun in my day. My email was never acknowledged. And he used to be the work place massage therapist and I thought they were like hairdressers who remember everything about you.

Lunch with co-workers consisted of conversations about recruiting volunteers. But my big meeting was about the next semester's classes. Figure out how we can get 4300 people into financial classes on Budgeting and Stewardship, handling money.  Numbers are not my thing. I got C's in Algebra.

Wednesday night church found me escaping into a prayer gathering. And instead of standing and lifting hands with everyone else, I sat with my butt in the chair. I tried to absorb the spirit in the room, but pretty much whined to God.

They sang:

"Water you turned into wine, Opened the eyes of the blind...."

They sang. I complained:

Yes, You can turn water into wine, but can You turn excel sheets into manuscript paper? Can you turn Word docs in to song sheets? Can you change  a semester of scheduled finance classes into a musical production schedule?

And for the young moms out there who never think they're going to be able to save the world or speak at a conference or sing in a band, can You turn their piles of laundry into piles of offers and engagements? Can You turn their children's bickering into poetry and spoken word? The endless messes into the beauty, symmetry and order of a dream come true?

Those are the miracles that we pray for. Yeah, we know You did the water-into-wine and lame-to leaping miracles to prove your deity. We don't need any more proof. We just need to make it through our senseless days.

Artist Credit: Laurie Pace

I don't want to hear 'seasons of life' cliches. I didn't study piano for 25 years for a short 7 year ministry stint. I didn't conduct choirs all my life just to sing alto with the hobbyists. Not to mention pay for a private college education. Nor did I spend hours practicing scales and Prokofieff just to get compliments on how fast I click the keys on my Mac.

Square peg - Round Hole. Misfit. Fish outta water. Waiting, waiting, trusting, waiting.

Trying not to worship the gift more than the Giver. 

The pat answers of  "better plans" and "higher ways"  ring hollow.  We ain't gettin' any younger here.