Welcome to my past.
I was born the year before WWII ended, and have since led what many people seem to consider a varied and colorful life.
I can’t remember when friends first started telling me that I should write my memoirs, but in 2015, I began posting brief chapters of reminiscence each week as “Throwback Thursday” essays on Facebook.
Before long, readers started telling me that I should compile these essays into a book. While a nice idea, this was impractical because of the sheer number of photos, many in color, involved in over 300 (and counting) essays.
I next considered a website, but upon inquiry, discovered that setting one up would be a very expensive proposition, and I’d still have to do most of the work anyway.
Since I’ve long been familiar with the elements of the free online tool Blogger™, I decided to turn the memoir essays into linked sections, each containing 20 stories. (Apologies for any disparity in type size as a result of importing material from other sources)
These tales are not in any kind of autobiographical order. Many of them are about fascinating people I’ve known, including members of my family. Some are based on my own artwork. They're all just the tiniest bit outrageous.
Welcome to my past.
Photo by Laura Goldman
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. STRANGER THAN FACT: PREPPY JOHN WRITES A STORY
2. CLEAN UNDERWEAR, FRIED CHICKEN, AUNT TONKIE’S BANANA ROLLS AND HOLLOW DIPS: DAD DOES COLLEGE
3. INCIDENTAL ENCOUNTERS
Or, TOM WAITS FOR NO MAN
4. BUT I WANTED TO BE A COWBOY: A DIALOGUE
5. THANK YOU MASK MAN
6. SUNDAY BEST
7. A JOYFUL NOISE: HOW I ACCIDENTALLY BECAME AN INTERNATIONAL BLOGGER
8. SUNSHINE BOYS
9. NAUGHTY BOYS OF THE LOUGH/A WALK IN DECEMBER
10. STUPA DREAMING: A CREATIVE PROCESS
11. DAD AND THE CHRISTMAS CHAIR
12. CARDPLAY: THE HISTORY OF A F*RT
13. GOOD FOR WHAT AILS YA, Or, TIA LAURITA FOR THE SOUL
14. WHEN MY SISTER WAS AN ONLY CHILD
15. STUPA FOR THẦY (I AM NOT HERE)
16. ALAN WATTS AND THE TAO OF POO(P)
17. SPECIAL DELIVERY
18. RETRO VALENTINE CODA
19. RAINBOW CONNECTIONS: THE ART OF SYNCHRONICITY
20. THREE LITTLE GIRLS, JUST A-SPLASHIN’ IN THE GENE POOL
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1. THROWBACK THURSDAY: University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, 1966
STRANGER THAN FACT: PREPPY JOHN WRITES A STORY
Before I transferred to San Francisco State’s then-highly-lauded creative writing program, I was a grad student in English at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, where I managed to get myself into a fiction-writing seminar taught by a semi-famous writer.
On the University of Wisconsin campus that year.(Photo by Ken Thorland)
Fortunately there were no bullies, blowhards, or nasty nitpickers enrolled, so the class worked well and was enjoyable. (It was also an experience that confirmed for me that I pretty much stunk at writing fiction.)
His unnamed protagonist, attempting to smuggle a family from East Berlin into West Berlin through the infamous “Checkpoint Charlie,” by concealing them in a compartment built into his VW, is betrayed to the Stasi (East German police), arrested and imprisoned.
"Checkpoint Charlie" in the 1960s.
We all thought it was an interesting premise, but, read in John’s somewhat monotonous voice and low-key manner, it didn’t quite come off. We offered a number of suggestions to make it “more gripping,” and the hero “more believable.” John wrote them all down and thanked us.
The next time John read to us, several weeks later, his hero had been locked in a solitary cell in an East German prison, where Stasi interrogators attempted to get him to implicate others in the escape plot; they stopped short of actual physical torture, but employed much verbal abuse and threats of violence.
A succeeding chapter detailed the hero’s fight to retain his sanity while locked in a barren cell, hearing the desperate cries of prisoners in cells all around him, fed only inadequate, stodgy, and monotonous food and beginning to show symptoms of severe malnutrition. We praised John for the realism of his hero’s elation when a sympathetic guard smuggled him an entire raw onion.
The class was large enough that our personal reading/criticism sessions were spaced weeks apart. The semester came to a close before we found out how John’s hero’s story actually ended.
Until, that is, some months later, when it was published in its entirety as A Guest of the State, the true-life recounting of John Van Altena’s’s smuggling attempt, betrayal, capture, imprisonment, interrogation and (after 17 hellish months) release from that Stasi prison.
The newspaper clipping quotes from an interview:" At night, you could hear prisoners scream and yell and beat their hands against the doors. you realize that it could happen to you in two minutes if you let yourself go."
As he was not a natural writer, and there were no autobiography-writing classes available, John had cleverly contrived to get help with his book by disguising fact as fiction.
John after his release from prison, with his ecstatic mother and stoic dad.
I don’t know how long John stayed in grad school, as I was off to California in 1967. I do know that he eventually returned to his small hometown, Milton Junction, Wisconsin, where he lives to this day.
John with the District Attorney who helped negotiate his release.
As far as I know, he went on no book tours, did no public readings. He did participate in a few seminars studying the Cold War era.
He wrote no other books, having just one story he needed to tell. I’m honored to have participated, in the smallest way, in helping him to tell it.
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2. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Booneville, Arkansas, 1930; Lafayette College, Easton Pennsylvania; 1930-1934
CLEAN UNDERWEAR, FRIED CHICKEN, AUNT TONKIE’S BANANA ROLLS AND HOLLOW DIPS: DAD DOES COLLEGE
When my dad graduated from high school in May of 1930, his family was poor and his prospects were few. The only job he was offered, in those early years of the Great Depression, was digging ditches.
Booneville, Arkansas in the 1920s.
At that point, he was an odd hybrid of a boy. Growing up in the semi-rural depressed town of Booneville, Arkansas, he went barefoot from May to September, partly from inclination, and partly because of the cost of shoe leather. He worked 10-hour days chopping (weeding and thinning) cotton in the hot sun for 15¢ an hour.
Dad (barefoot at center) in 1915 with his brother Horace and his granddad, Confederate Army veteran Augustus Roan Hill.
At the same time, he was an avid reader and a good student who won several National Honor Society awards. He spoke with a deep southern drawl, and was quite shy, especially around girls, but was elected “Most Popular Boy” in his graduating class, and became president of a school literary-debating society.
Dad as a young teen, toting baby brother Justin.
A high-strung and often oversensitive boy, prone to childhood illnesses, he’d grown into a tall rangy kid who’d led the school’s football team to a winning season in his senior year, and, at 170 lbs., had placed fourth in the hammer-throw event at the state track meet against much larger competitors.
Booneville High School, his alma mater, was also an anomaly. One of the state’s top-rated schools, it was oddly located in what Dad tactfully remembered as a “culturally ingrown” area. BHS actually charged tuition and functioned more or less like an elite private academy.
Booneville High School in the 1920s.
Courtesy of Cousin Wayne Hill, I have Dad’s Booneville High School diploma, bound in embossed leatherette, with his name stamped in gold on the front and rendered in fine Gothic lettering on the inside.
This document includes several pages, revealing that the class of 30’s official colors were pink and green (possibly because girls outnumbered boys in his graduating class); the class flower was the pink rose, and the class motto (in Latin) was: Non Progredi est recedi (not to go forward is to go backward).
I’ve never seen a copy of Dad’s high–school yearbook, The Reveille, but it was that modest publication that would entirely change his life.
.His uncle Charles Elkins, a go-getter entrepreneur and inventor (he would die a multimillionaire) was then based in Allentown, Pennsylvania. My Grandmother Hill, proud of her boy, had sent Charles a copy of the yearbook, in which Dad appeared prominently as “Best All Around” this and “Most Likely” that, including “Best Athlete.”
Uncle Charles with Aunt Lily at their Arizona dude ranch in the 1950s.
Although he hadn’t played football until his senior year (his father considered it a game for “bullies and brawlers,” and had refused permission until literally begged by the BHS head coach), Dad had such an instinctive feel for the game that the coach had him, at halfback, rather than the quarterback, calling the plays.
“As a result,” Howard wrote in his memoirs, “ I could call my own plays and be the hero whenever it suited.”
(An amusing side-note: his mother wanted to attend a game, but was sure she’d be unable to follow him in the confusion of play, so for that game he painted his helmet orange. Bad move.)
Charles showed the yearbook to a friend in the Lafayette College Alumni Association—which granted a number of scholarships each year—somehow concealing the fact that there were only 26 kids in the BHS Class of ’30. The alums were impressed, and Dad was in, and because of BHS’s sterling scholastic reputation, they even waived the usual scholastic entrance exam.
So, one day shortly after his graduation, Dad received a telegram (!) from Charles, to the effect that if he got himself up to Pennsylvania within three days (possibly for an admissions interview), he could go to college, and not just any old school, but one of the so-called “Hidden Ivies”—those small but prestigious Eastern schools that interacted with, and played sports against, the likes of Yale, Columbia, and Penn.
Grandmother Hill, of course, was over the moon, even though it meant that, the expense of travel being what it was, she probably wouldn’t see her son for years.
As family legend has it, she packed him a suitcase full of clean underwear, fried chicken, and Aunt Tonkie’s banana rolls, and he sat up for several days and nights in the cheapest train seat available, made the deadline, and was accepted into Lafayette College’s Class of 1934.
Charles gave Dad a place to stay and found him a temporary summer job at a cut-rate drugstore, and that fall he matriculated as a proud college man.
So imagine, if you will, that erstwhile shy barefoot country boy, speaking in a deep-fried Arkansas accent laced with Elizabethan idioms and pronunciations, plunked down in the middle of a cluster of ivy-covered and venerable buildings (Lafayette was founded in 1832, when the Marquis de Lafayette himself visited Easton on a post-Revolution tour), playing sports and attending classes with young Northern gentlemen, many from families of means.
The Lafayette Campus
In his college-yearbook write-up, Dad is referred to jocularly as “The Silent Son of the Southwest,” a nickname with several origins.
This was all the more remarkable because, unknown to most of the other students, he was slowly going deaf from otiosclerosis resulting from a childhood ear infection.
The football team, for which he played end and frequently carried the ball, gave him a spot in the huddle where he could lip-read the plays as they were called, and devised a system of hand-signals for his benefit.
He also competed in track for four years, the last as team captain. Using a bamboo pole, he set a Middle Atlantic pole-vaulting record long before the advent of fiberglass poles, and a college record that lasted into the 1960s. He attributed his skill to a time-honored method of fording streams in Arkansas by propelling oneself over them with a sapling.
Dad setting a pole-vaulting record in his first attempt in competing at the sport.
When we attended basketball games at the Lafayette gym in later years, we kids would always search out the big bronze record plaque hanging on the wall with his name on it. I was with him the day that record was broken (by a guy using a fiberglass pole) in the 1960s. Dad was the first out on the field to congratulate him.
His success as the school’s heavyweight boxing champ (at 180 lbs. and with no previous training) he attributed to the many fistfights he got into as a result of being teased by playmates while in elementary school.
Although he had little money and didn’t talk much, Dad became a well-liked and –respected member of the student body.
“Athletes at that time” wrote Dad, “received no special favors; we carried the same number of hours and took all the required subjects.”
Dad’s scholarship covered only tuition and textbooks, with no provision for food or lodging. Fortunately, he was adopted early on by one of the most prestigious fraternities, Phi Gamma Delta, when he came to work as a waiter in the frat house in exchange for meals.
“They put an extra bed in the sitting room of a three-room suite for me,” he recalled, “There was no closet, so I kept most of my clothes in a suitcase, and was happy as a lark to be there.”
A happy letterman
We kids always loved hearing about the technique perfected by the Phi Gam kitchen crew (most of whom eventually became distinguished academicians and businessmen) of scooping “hollow dips” of ice cream for the frat tables, so as to leave more of the dessert for themselves. Before long, Dad was invited to pledge the fraternity.
He would not only play sports for four years, but work on the college newspaper and win the Avondale Architectural Drawing and Sketching Prize. He met my mother, fell in love, and decided to become a dedicated Yankee, only returning to Arkansas for brief visits thereafter.
His B.S. degree became somewhat irrelevant when the only job he could find post-college was behind the counter of a soda fountain at the Dixie Cup Company; nonetheless his personability and imagination would eventually take him to the top of the company’s Market Research Division. On the way up, he incidentally invented the Dixie Cup dispenser, for which he received a $15 bonus.
My parents settled near Easton, and Dad maintained close ties with Lafayette—I remember attending sporting events and theater productions there. Fortunately, a new type of surgery cured his deafness in the 1960s.
He served on committees, hobnobbed with college officials, and, in 1984, was a prime mover in putting together the Class of 1934’s 50th reunion, after which concentrated effort he pretty much retired from heavy-lifting Lafayette duty.
Dad and my mother with Lafayette President David Ellis and Mrs. Ellis at the 1984 Reunion of the Class of 1934.
Dad scores on the Jumbotron at age 94.
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3. THROWBACK THURSDAY: San Francisco, California, 1974; Occidental, California, 1990s-2008
INCIDENTAL ENCOUNTERS
Or, TOM WAITS FOR NO MAN
For instance, one morning I came downstairs and heard piano music and an odd sort of grumbling coming from the front parlor. I peeped in, and there at the old upright was none other than Mr. Tom Waits, whose two first record albums (Closing Time and The Heart of Saturday Night) had been heating up alternative-radio airwaves for the past year or so.
He looked up, spotted me, and said: “Oh, hi. I’m Tom. I’m just waiting for Ray Bierl.” At that moment, Ray, one of the talented musicians who lived at 885 Clayton, came bounding down the stairs.
“Hey, Tom, have you met Amie?” he asked.
We chatted a bit; it seemed that the two of them had gone to school together, or maybe just hung around together as kids (memory unclear). After a little more conversation, they left to get a bite to eat.
And that was that, just another morning at 885 Clayton.
Fast-forward a couple of decades to the early 1990s, when I was living in Occidental, CA, and working part-time at a lovely store called Hand Goods, which sold both imported handmade objects and the work of local artists and artisans.
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| Hand Goods interior; floor painting by Bess Farah. |
I was alone behind the counter one day, when who should saunter in but Tom Waits. “Hi Tom,” I said, “Can I help you? He looked at me with a “Do I know you?” expression.
“Early ‘70s”. I said. “885 Clayton St.” “Ray Bierl. Amie."
“Oh yeah,” he said, his face clearing, “What do you hear from Ray?” I allowed as how I’d lost touch with Ray when I left San Francisco (we’ve since re-connected on Facebook).
We chatted a bit more, then Hand Goods’ owner, Nancy Farah, bustled in. “Hi Tom,” she said “Does Saturday afternoon work for you?”
From the ensuing conversation, I gathered that Nancy’s angelic daughter, Bess, and Tom’s 10-year-old daughter Kellesimone (aka “My name’s not KELLY; it’s KellesiMONE!") had struck up a friendship, and the two parents were arranging a playdate.
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| Tom with Kellesimone (R) and Casey. |
Tom, his brilliant wife/co-creator Kathleen Brennan, and their two (eventually three) children had recently settled in the environs of Occidental, and I soon got used to Mom or Dad coming in and out with the kid-pick-up and delivery routine.
At the time, I liked to imagine how flummoxed fans of the low-down, growly-surly, outcast, eccentric piece of performance art that was the public Waits persona would be to see this ordinary-looking soft-spoken husband and father behaving quite normally and apparently cherishing family life.
Tom and Kathleen
I and other village habitués got used to encountering Tom and/or Kathleen, just two more locals, shopping at the Bohemian Market or buying widgets at the hardware store, and to not seeing them for stretches of time they spent on tour, or at their place in Southern California.
Fast-forward again, to the late 2000s, when I moved to the outskirts of nearby Forestville to share a house with Marcus, a college friend of 40 years’ standing.
With Marcus near Hand Goods in Occidental
A native of England, a brilliant poet and biographer, and a grand guy, Marcus was also a dedicated Waits fanboy. I was still working in Occidental, and whenever I mentioned that I’d spotted his hero, he had to know every detail. When he visited the village, I often noted him looking around, just in case….
Marcus, it must be said, could also be a bit of a snobbish Brit at times. Such an occasion was the April Saturday that I suggested that he accompany me to the annual Occidental FoolsDay celebration, for which everybody dresses up in ridiculous and colorful outfits and parades through the village having a grand time.
“No way!” exclaimed Marcus, “I’ve got more important things to do than ponce about in silly clothes acting like an idiot.”
So I went solo, accompanied by my trusty camera, and, as usual, had a blast. And after the parade, whom should I see, relaxing and chatting with a group of friends (mostly costumed) at one of the public picnic tables? Why, Mr. Tom Waits.
FoolsDay is an ongoing nonstop photo op, and although Tom didn’t seem too bothered about the occasional lens pointed furtively in his direction, I remember thinking that the guy should be able to hang out with his friends without his face being plastered all over the Internet. (This was, thankfully, before the selfie epidemic really emerged.)
Me and my shadow that year.
Nonetheless, I admit, I couldn’t resist the opportunity to prank Marcus, so I took a nicely framed “Stars: They’re Just Like Us” shot.
Back home, looking at my photos of the event on my desktop computer, I heard Marcus come in, and pulled up the Waits photo onto the screen.
“So how was your little parade?” he asked. “Great,” I replied, indicating the screen. “There were some interesting people there."
He glanced at the screen, then did a classic double-take. “No way!!!” he howled.
“You could have been there,” I reminded him.
“You’ve got to email that to me!” he said, ”My friends at home will never believe it.”
Just as I had expected. In reply, I clicked “delete,” and “empty trash.”
“No way,” I said.
Marcus kind of forgave me after I sent him a later, could-be-any-guy shot (below), that I’d kept, of Tom exercising his own right to photograph people poncing about in silly costumes.
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Interestingly enough, playmates Bess Farah and Kellesimone Waits both grew up to be visual artists:
https://www.facebook.com/handgoodsoccidental/ (Hand Goods)
https://www.facebook.com/ray.bierl (Ray Bierl)
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4. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Mammy Morgan’s Hill, Pennsylvania; The week before Halloween; 1950
BUT I WANTED TO BE A COWBOY: A DIALOGUE
MY MOTHER: Oh, you look so cute; let’s get a picture!
MY MOTHER: An old-fashioned girl.
ME: (See photo.)
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5. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Occidental, California, 2008
THANK YOU MASK MAN
With Grant Nolan, photographed by his partner John Iveli, in Altered Images, their amazing Occidental store.
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6. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Mammy Morgan's Hill, Pennsylvania; c. 1958
SUNDAY BEST
So there we are, off to church on an autumn morning. My mother (L) and sister Susan (R) are stylish in fall fashions.
( Hey, I was barely-turned-fifteen and they were lucky I was wearing shoes.)
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7. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Various places in Northern California; South London, England; and All Over the World; 2007-Present
A JOYFUL NOISE, Or, HOW I ACCIDENTALLY BECAME AN INTERNATIONAL BLOGGER
When I was a kid in the 1950s, one of my favorite TV programs was The Children's Hour, which had started as a radio broadcast in 1927, and migrated to TV from 1948-1958.
Young performers on The Children's Hour.
It was essentially a showcase and launching pad for talented youngsters pursuing professional careers, and over the years produced, among others, stars like Rosemary Clooney, actress Ann Sheridan, Eddie Fisher, Frankie Avalon, Connie Francis, Joey Heatherton and the multitalented Bernadette Peters.
As I watched the pint-sized singers, dancers, acrobats, ventriloquists, magicians, and actors prance through their paces, I became enthralled by the idea that kids my age could perform at such a professional level.
This perhaps explains why, in 2007, when I happened on a YouTube link called “The Best Child Singers in the World,” I clicked on it immediately.
The video was fairly disappointing at first, primarily featuring (back then) clips of little Michael Jackson or Madonna wannabes gyrating precociously and wailing overdone pop songs.
I was about to move on, when suddenly, gleaming like a genuine pearl in a binful of gaudy costume jewelry, a segment of this video appeared:
Joe Snelling as high "vocalise" soloist in "Salva Me."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2O5540WjuE (Libera/”Salva Me”/solo by Joe Snelling/from the 2007 PBS Special Angel Voices: Libera in Concert/3:32)
And just that quickly, I was hooked. (This is not an unusual turn of events, by the way. This boys’ singing group from London is currently approaching 200 million hits on their YouTube channel.)
I eagerly searched for additional Libera videos, wanting to know more about these kids, and quickly found the rest of that concert, recorded in Leiden, Holland, for the US Public Broadcasting System. It was this event, the first of three PBS specials, that became the source of Libera’s first substantial YouTube audience.
This was followed by my discovery of more videos, and of surprisingly numerous fan-sites devoted to the group. What I didn't find, however, was any kind of organized and sequential history of this remarkable collection of young singers. So (of course) I decided to write one.
I had no idea what I was getting myself into. The endeavor first took the form of an email newsletter that I called “A Joyful Noise,” and periodically sent out to music-loving friends, with information and attached video links.
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| Screenshot from a video taken in Krakow, Poland. |
Somehow one of these effusions got into the hands of the host of one of the many UK Libera fan forums; Craig asked if he could add a link to it to the group’s “Resources” section. I was flattered.
As I learned more and more about the group’s history, however, it soon became evident (in those less tech-savvy times) that updating the newsletter on the site was a real pain, so I decided to turn the whole thing into a blog.
Thus began the Libera Historical Timeline, now approaching its 16th year, with 25 substantial sections and readers in over 95 countries.
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| Performing to a live crowd of 1.7 million, a vast TV audience, and Pope Francis in a a World Youth Day festival. |
(And I interject here, for your benefit, and that of those who have asked over the years “Isn’t there a shorter version?” a very brief “Introduction to Libera,” laced with lots of photos:)
https://intro-to-libera.blogspot.com (INTRODUCTION TO LIBERA)
To give you an idea of the whole, here are a few excerpts from Part One of the TIMELINE, which contains, in addition to the group’s history from its beginnings to 2007, an overview of Libera dynamics:
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“Unlike many other boys' choirs, which are often presented as a fairly uniform group with a few elite soloists, all Libera members are encouraged to try their solo wings, to let their personalities shine through, and to speak (and even joke when appropriate) between their disciplined and polished performance of songs, thus becoming familiar and beloved individuals to their fans
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| Neo, Marc, Gregor and Arthur. |
.…“Then there's the fact that the boys don't come from the hothouse environment of a dedicated choir school, but from different schools, backgrounds and areas of South London. (The group now accepts boys from all religious denominations and those with no religious affiliations.)
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| Waving farewell at the end of a concert. |
…’We're just normal children, really,’ the boys often comment in interviews, never mind that they get VIP treatment from their adoring public when touring, and that the numerous websites and blogs dedicated to them indicate a huge growing international fan base.
"...Unlike the majority of choral groups, the boys aren't arranged in static blocks singing the same parts. They often move and flow into small groups, lines and subtle formations while singing, and in a given grouping of half a dozen, for instance, each may be singing an entirely different line of a five-to-eight-part harmony.
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| Singing in small-group formations. |
“…It hardly needs to be said how important it is, when considering the Libera phenomenon, to make the distinction between children who perform for the joy of it, and performing children who are attempting to carve out show-business careers; Libera definitely fits into the former category.
“Soloists, of course, occasionally get more exposure than the other boys, but otherwise seem to fit seamlessly into the all-for-one-one-for-all ethos.
"One reason for this is that the older boys are kept keenly aware of the fleeting nature of their youthful fame (and changing voices) by being enjoined to take an active role in mentoring and teaching their eventual replacements, younger boys who may even (occasionally) be ready for performances and public acclaim at seven or eight years of age.”
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| Tiny eight-year-old Freddie Ingles is dwarfed by older singers while simultaneously speaking on TV and being translated into Japanese. No pressure. ********************* |
The whole Timeline thing, of course, would be impossible without the Internet and social media, and one of the unexpected benefits of this endeavor for me has been the ongoing online contact with dozens of fans from other countries.
Libera aficionados come in many different flavors: some years ago, for instance, after the group’s version of “Carol of the Bells” hit the top of the Billboard Classical Charts and became a #1 download on iPod, they attracted several paparazzi-like stalkers that had to be firmly dealt with with evasive tactics and reports to authorities.
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| 2019 "Carol of the Bells" Video |
On the other end of the fan spectrum are many serious music scholars (Libera’s founder/director/composer/arranger, the late Robert Prizeman [1962-2021] is considered one of the finest choral composers of his time).
Then there are the avid admirers in Japan, Korea, the Philippines, and other countries that show up in mobs, stand in line for hours, squeal at any sighting of the group, and, if not restrained by barriers and security guards, attempt to swarm the boys and hug them like squeaky toys.
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| A full house and a rare-in-Japan standing ovation. |
(Check out this phenomenon in this brief early video introduction by the irrepressible 2007 gang:) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWhfdla-Fe8 (Introduction to Libera Video/2006/2:40)
At a San Francisco concert, as the boys prepare for an autograph session.
One of those 100th-concert celebrators was a Frenchman named Patrick (his Libera “handle” is Fan_de_LoK), who, with his wonderfully OCD co-manager Quentin (aka “The Furby”), maintains Libera Passion, a site that combines a fan-discussion forum (in French) with a large and astonishingly well-sorted data accumulation, complete with interlinked records/photos/videos/lists of all past and present singers, songs, recordings, interviews and concerts.
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| Libera Passion members' section |
With the growing flexibility of Twitter, the roving Patrick can now attend a concert, send information to Quentin, and by the end of the first half, fans can access not only the (tweeted) song list and the names of the actual singers and musicians performing but a chart showing who sang which first-half solos/duets and who spoke between groups of songs, followed by a second-half equivalent; and rehearsal/concert photos posted by Libera (no audience photography allowed during concerts).*
(*The touring group is protean, with personnel and soloists changing from concert to concert as singers mature, take on lower parts/age out, and new little ones are added. Libera also travels with its own staff and chamber ensemble, so IDs can be big news for fans.)
The complexity of LIBERA PASSION is enlivened by cross-pollination with the Libera Dreams Fan Forum 0(https://forum.libera-dreams.com ), whose correspondents pounce, announce and pronounce on all latest Libera news and both expected and unexpected appearances/videos/recordings/activities.
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| Libera Dreams screenshot |
There are also pure-data sites, like the Libera Boys Choir Database
https://liberaboyschoir.home.blog) (by “Song Jia”), and the granddaddy of OCD projects, the Libera Member Timeline (maintained by “Dinedorelle”), a vast spreadsheet that aims to catalog (with photos), the career of every single lad who has been a member, however briefly, of the group.
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| Tiny section of the Libera Member Timeline, not to be confused with the Libera Historical Timeline. |
My Timeline fits somewhere into the middle of all this online activity, keeping up with events, reviews, videos, CDs/DVDs and tours, but with no necessity to stay on the day-to-day cutting edge or to generate spreadsheets.
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| From the music video of "The Moon Represents My Heart," sung entirely in Mandarin. |
Items that I do include have to pass a single test: will this be important/useful/relevant to a reader ten years from now? The result is a comprehensive document that introduces the group and presents its story in historical sequence, illustrated with video links and photo highlights.
When people ask me why I do it, I generally reply that, even apart from the glorious and original music and arrangements, and the colorful personalities concerned, the ongoing story of Libera provides the same kind of hook as following a favorite sports team.
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| A giggle of miniboys. |
The “players” come in as tiny “miniboys” at age 6-8. It’s fascinating to see whether they wash out, stay in solid background roles, become “utility men” (with expertise in second duet parts, high-note descants, or small-ensemble work), or soar as soloists. Watching this for 15 years has been as fascinating as any baseball series. (And the music is way better.)
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| Libera singers (top row) Sam, Lucas, Rocco, and Taichi present their little brothers Victor, Theo, Romeo, and Koji as "miniboys" (6-8-year-olds entering the group on probation). |
The act of reporting on Libera became especially interesting during the pandemic, when many other groups without visible means of support were forced to disband.
With tours and concert dates canceled for the foreseeable future, and their beloved leader Robert Prizeman sidelined with his final illness, Libera forged ahead, performing a live-streamed zoom concert in June of 2020, and streaming a social-distanced holiday concert in December. They recorded a brilliant CD, called IF (released in 2021), and filmed two accompanying music videos.
Each song on IF was chosen, composed, arranged, and/or placed by Prizeman, as he essentially created his own elegy, including the haunting “Once an Angel,” his final tribute to many years of singers.
Prizeman had obviously foreseen that this time would come (although possibly not so soon). Years ago, he appointed, as assistant directors, two young men, Sam Coates and Steven Geraghty, who had been involved with Libera since they joined in the 1990s as tiny trebles. Over the years, he generously encouraged and mentored Sam and Steven in rehearsing, conducting, and arranging pieces for recording and performance.
When Prizeman died in September of 2021, the transition was virtually seamless. The group continued to work on other projects (soundtracks, videos, video games, radio and TV appearances) and resumed live UK-based concerts in December of 2021, after which they announced a Korean tour in April of 2023, a US tour for the summer, and a tour in Japan in the fall.
Perhaps the aspect of the pandemic schedule that most embodied the Libera combination of gorgeous sound, adorable kids, great humor, and determination was the 24:19–minute zoom concert broadcast on June 6th, 2020, at the exact moment that they would have appeared at a favorite venue, the beautiful Arundel Cathedral.
Apart But Together contains six songs, from spiritual to classical to Charlie Chaplin’s “Smile.” It showcases the voices of several older soloists in their prime, who would have otherwise missed their moment.
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| Soloist Tadgh Fitzgerald, in his prime, appears before a background of boys performing remotely. |
It provides blooper footage of the process of getting dozens of faces and voices—including the newest “miniboys” and quite a few alumni—together electronically from separate locations; and a delightful segment that shows how the youngsters amused themselves during lockdown.
All of this is brilliantly packed into less than half an hour, the whole tied together by often hilarious and slightly cheeky narrations by charming spokesboys.
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| Singing from home. |
Take a look.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oX3-YQTL50s (Online streamed Libera concert APART BUT TOGETHER/June 6th,
So, if I had known what I was getting into all those years ago, would I still have done it?
Absolutely.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCd0Y5kNcb6DKSDyAkQXtMpg (Libera Official YouTube Channel)
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8. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Joy Ridge, Near Occidental, California; Late 1980s
SUNSHINE BOYS
In 1987, I abandoned my bicoastal lifestyle to take up full-time residence in rural Sonoma County.
Among these were the Schmidt sisters—Mary, a brilliant administrator, and Heidi, an accomplished artist. Both of them, during the time I was mostly gone, had married fellow “Faraloonies,” and started families.
And how.
With the assistance of husbands Christopher Szeczy (Mary) and Peter Zweig (Heidi), the sisters had manifested a remarkable propensity for popping out little blond boys.
One day they all came to visit me in the garden surrounding my cabin (in the background). How could I resist getting out the camera.?
Aron, Nick, Matthew, Jonathan, and Daniel are now all big strapping guys, with their own families and activities, but I still love this photo of them as a slightly restless (but adorable) clutch of sunny-haired kidlets.
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Shared with Public
9. THROWBACK THURSDAY: 885 Clayton St., San Francisco, California, and Worldwide, 1972-Present
NAUGHTY BOYS OF THE LOUGH, Or, A WALK IN DECEMBER
As I’ve written here before, the rooming house at 885 Clayton St. in San Francisco (where I lived from 1967 to 1978) doubled as the headquarters of the San Francisco Folk Music Club.
One such visitation occurred in 1972, when a recently formed Celtic-music quartet calling themselves the Boys of the Lough ("lough" is Irish for “lake” or “sea inlet ”) spent about a week with us in December on their first US tour.
At that point, they were the forefront of a new traditional Celtic music wave that would produce such groups as The Chieftains, The Bothy Band, Clannad, The Pogues, and the whole Riverdance thing. (The Boys are still touring the world, by the way, though some of the faces and instrumentation have changed.)
That original group of musical pranksters included: Irish roaring-boy Robin Morton on bodhran (hand drum) and concertina; deceptively quiet pinpoint-precise guitarist and Scot Dick Gaughan; Irish-flute and tin-whistle savant Cathal McConnell (who, as All-British-Isles champion on both instruments, was no longer allowed to compete in music competitions because he inevitably won); and the grownup of the group, virtuoso fiddler Alistair (Aly) Bain from the Shetland Isles.
To give you an idea of the level of musicianship I’m talking about, here are three brief clips from those early days:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rJlIM1Rekg (Dick Gaughan on guitar/ “Strike the Gay Harp” /”Shores of Lough Gowna”/Early 1970s/2:41)
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| Dick Gaughan |
(Cathal McConnell on tin whistle and Robin Morton on bodhran on TV playing a set of reels/late 1960s/1:21)
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| Cathal McConnell |
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| Robin Morton |
All of the Boys were also capable of lusty vocals and harmonies, and each could tell a fine tale. In short, their repertoire was comprehensive, expert, lively and frequently comical to the max.
As I recall, there was seldom a dull moment that week, especially, as often was the case, there was drink taken.
During the day, the lads managed to conduct themselves more or less like gentlemen, if you didn’t count Robin spouting off-color jokes nonstop, Dick ignoring everyone to hunch muttering over his guitar, and Cathal, when he had no instrument in hand, sitting in a kind of daze, compulsively whistling the flute lines of fiddle tunes under his breath.
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| Me with John Roberts (R) and Tony Barrand at the 1972 Philadelphia Folk Festival. |
As evening approached, and especially on those nights when the Boys returned to 885 Clayton high on the energy of a successful gig and surrounded by fellow randy and well-oiled musicians to play on into the night, I learned, as the only unattached young woman in residence, to take preemptive measures.
I began to lock my bedroom door after dark, and to keep a watch out for roving hands when I ventured out. I was routinely propositioned by Robin at least once a day, (mostly in fun). Dick made one pass and gave up. I will, however, not soon forget the time that the two of them decided to get Cathal —not your ladies man—skunk drunk and convince him that I lusted after his body.
The refreshing exception to all this was Aly Bain, the only married man, who apparently honored his vows (in spite of all the groupies who clung to the outskirts of the ongoing jollity), and either 1) never seemed to drink to excess or 2) could hold his drink impressively.
On one gray chilly afternoon, when, the house was full, the alcohol was flowing, and the music waxed noisy and enthusiastic, Aly unexpectedly approached me, and said “I’ve got to get out of here for a bit; want to go for a walk?
As we climbed the steep hill of Parnassus St., Aly told me about his wife Lucy, and how he was missing her and their home. I in turn asked him about the Shetland Isles, and since the Winter Solstice was approaching, inquired what they did where he grew up to celebrate the holidays.
This is what he told me (and I won’t even try to imitate the musicality of his Shetland lilt):
“We’re up near the Arctic Circle, you know, and by December, we’d barely see the sun at all, daytimes, so around December first, people open up their houses. They put a table in the parlor or the front hall, and keep it stocked with food and drink all day and all night.
“For the entire month, all folks do is reel from house to house, drinking and eating and making music and dancing, and falling asleep and waking up to do it all again.
“You’d see old ladies, pillars of the kirk the rest of the year, and they’re lit up like Christmas trees, and you have to watch that they don’t get you in a corner and start telling rude stories and trying to get under your shirt. There’s kind of an unspoken rule that you don’t mention things like that later on, so as not to embarrass the ladies.
“All this is the only way you can get through that part of the year without going mad until the light comes back.” (Here he smiled like the sun breaking through) “And of course it always does,” he said.
Traditional musicians in the British Isles are a truly incestuous bunch; it seems that everyone has played at one time with everyone else, or knows someone who has.
Dick Gaughan only spent a year with the Boys of the Lough, leaving in 1973 to become one of Scotland’s leading singer-songwriters. Robin Morton left in 1979 to form his own Scottish folk-music label. Both were replaced by other fine musicians.
Cathal McConnell and Aly Bain long formed the nucleus of the band —which broke up in 1979, only to re-group in 1980—for over 30 years, until Aly stopped touring in the early 2000s.
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| In 1980, with Dave Richardson on mandolin. |
With a changing rota of brilliant musicians and guest artists, they have recorded well over 30 albums, not counting appearances on CDs by other musicians. In 1992, they appeared to a sold-out crowd at Carnegie Hall.
The latest edition of the group
Cathal has since won numerous awards for his singing and playing, recorded several of his own albums and appeared on those of other artists, and is the last touring member of the original Boys of the Lough.
He’s collaborated on projects, tours, and albums with a Who’s Who of Irish/Scottish traditional musicians, as well as with artists like Emmylou Harris, Roseanne Cash, Kate & Anna McGarrigle, Iris DeMent, Joan Osbourne, and James Taylor.
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| With Jay Ungar |
In 1993 Aly published his autobiography, the delightfully titled Fiddler on the Loose. In 1994, he received an MBE (Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire), awarded by the Crown to individuals as recognition of the positive impact they have made in their work.
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| Aly receiving a doctorate at St. Andrew's University. |
He also has a wall full of other awards, including several honorary doctorates. The former First Minister of Scotland, Jack McConnell, called him, simply, a "Scottish icon.”
(All of this and more can be found at:
This time of year, as the days grow shorter, inevitably at some point I'll think of Aly as he was back in 1972 San Francisco—a bit road-weary, a bit homesick, his voice lightening as he talked about December in the Shetlands—and the rare beauty of his smile as he recalled that, yes, the light always comes back.
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10. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Graton, California, Late 2010s
STUPA DREAMING: A CREATIVE PROCESS
People sometimes ask me where I get the ideas for my collages. I usually say that it’s less a matter of idea than of impulse.
“Excuse me?”
“That big gold thing at the Buddhist place. Somebody said it’s called a “stupa.” But what’s it for?”
Actually, I wasn’t surprised at the question, as the Sae Taw Win Burmese Dhamma (Buddhist practice) Center was located quite close to her elementary school in Graton.
STW is mostly a pretty modest affair, a scatter of rustic buildings located on pastureland. The startling exception to this low-key presentation is the extraordinary construction that sits in the center of an adjoining manicured lawn.
It’s a formal vision in gold, white and red, a large cone-like spire surrounded by a cluster of smaller ones, looking as otherworldly and out of place in funky Graton as a divine rocket about to launch.
My young friend and I went to Wikipedia:
"A stupa (Sanskrit: स्तूप, lit. 'heap') is a mound-like or hemispherical structure containing relics (typically the remains of Buddhist monks or nuns), that is used as a place of meditation."
The original stupas, it seems, contained actual relics of Gautauma Siddhartha, the original Buddha, and were simply low mounds, minimally decorated.
Eventually stupas became resting places for relics of saintly monks, nuns and other teachers. Over time the structures became more ornate, acquired spires, and, especially in Southeast Asia, became taller and more elongated. The presence of actual relics has, in some cases, apparently became somewhat optional, more of an idea.
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| The wonderful Dr. Thynn Thynn, Sae Taw Win founder, with the second stupa. |
I have no idea whether the Sae Taw Win stupas (another has since been built or beamed down) contain any such.
So my young friend’s curiosity was satisfied, and that, I thought was that, until, several nights later, I had a vivid dream, in which I was surrounded by nine strangely surreal stupas, each in one of the rainbow colors, plus a pearlescent one and a multicolored one.
On waking, my first impulse was to try to draw or paint these dream-stupas, but my usual media—colored pencils and watercolors—just appeared washy and drab. Frustrated, I turned to my ongoing collection of collage materials.
Taking out a folder I call “Deco (decorative) Bits,” I made nine piles of paper images, each in one of the desired colors/combinations. Then I went to my “Beings” folder to find inhabitants for each, after which I shuffled, winnowed, cut and pasted.
The results are the stupa-like images below, satisfactorily dream-like, and inhabited not by relics but by one or more lively avatar figures.
In this case, a question became an idea became an impulse, and a stupa was obviously for dreaming.
Looking back on my earliest years, I remember my dad seeming really emotionally invested in the concept of a Christmas tree.
I seem to recall that for each of us children (my brother David came along six years after I did), it was a kind of coming-of-age ritual, once we’d copped to the mythical nature of the guy in the red suit, to be allowed to stay up on Christmas Eve and help create this magical apparition, while the kid(s) who still believed were in bed.
Dad and I, being much alike, bumped heads a lot when I was growing up, but eventually became the best of friends. One day, much later in life, I phoned him just before Christmas, at his lovely retirement village on the other side of the country.
"But where did you put the presents for your parents?”
“That’s good,” he said, “I really wanted to give you kids some special memories.”
In the pursuit of a good night’s sleep, I learned, as I grew older, that staying away from books and screens in the two hours before bedtime was a useful tactic. One activity that I found calming in that time-frame was a simple game or two of solitaire.
The rest followed with almost Mozartian fluency (and, from all accounts Wolfgang Amadeus would have heartily approved of the subject matter).
Sue and Raggedy Andy
That angora sheep- (or goat-) skin rug, probably found at a farm auction, was a great toy. We used to pet it, comb it and braid it.
Concerned over a baby bunny.
A rare impish smile.
We got put to work early.
Not so enthusiastic about this beekeeping lark.
Not too enthusiastic about peas, either.
With Mickey Shanahan. They were the two oldest of the Arnts Family batch of 22 cousins.
With Dad, taken by my mother.
The focus of the retreat was the presence of the extraordinary Zen Buddhist monk, poet, peacemaker, activist, writer and teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, known to his followers, friends, and admirers as simply “Thầy,” (teacher).
Although most of my companions weren’t Buddhists, we were all drawn to this event: some from previous knowledge of Thầy and his books and poetry, some out of curiosity, and some simply by the spiritual nature of the occasion.
At this point, however, a slight traffic problem developed: we were so numerous that many were still making our way uphill as Thầy finished his ceremony and had started back down.
Beloved spiritual teacher Ram Dass once humorously described Thầy as “a cross between a cloud, a caterpillar, and a piece of heavy machinery.”
As his small, intent, brown-robed figure passed by, I suddenly experienced an astounding wave of pure energy that literally rocked me back on my heels,
Commercial holiday or not, I’ve always enjoyed the concept of Valentine’s Day. When I was living in San Francisco, for instance, I cut red velvet adhesive contact paper into heart shapes that I edged in gold paint.
Could all that mahogany be hiding a streak of hippie heartwood?
(It's constructed like a tablet, with leaves that open upward)
They were married for over 60 years.
Morgan in a hilarious spoof video as Dolly Parton...
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| Red |
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| Orange |
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| Yellow |
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| Green |
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| Blue |
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| Indigo |
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| Violet |
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| Rainbow |
Pearl
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11. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Mammy Morgan’s Hill, Pennsylvania; Booneville, Arkansas; Bethlehem, Pennsylvania; 1913-2010
DAD AND THE CHRISTMAS CHAIR
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From Cousin Wayne Hill: "Dad said it had been in the family for generations and that 'every Hill baby got rocked in it'”. |
On the run-up to Christmas, my sister Susan and I helped my mother send Christmas cards and decorate cookies, but our house remained essentially free of holiday trimmings.
It was only on Christmas morning that we kids would rush downstairs to find the tree standing, like a radiant miracle beamed down from Planet Santa, strung with fat colored lightbulbs, covered with ornaments and dripping with tinsel “rain,” all of this topped by an angel with shining hair, silver cardboard wings, and a single white bulb illuminating her halo.
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| Not our actual Christmas tree, but close enough. |
Later on, when our grove of conifer trees (Dad had planted it with free seedlings from the state reforestation program) had matured enough to need thinning, he’d chivvy the whole family—in my case often reluctantly—out on expeditions to choose and cut a tree and drag it home by sled.
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| A later tree-hunting expedition in Vermont with Dad on left, my mother, me, and brother David. |
Dad and I, being much alike, bumped heads a lot when I was growing up, but eventually became the best of friends. One day, much later in life, I phoned him just before Christmas, at his lovely retirement village on the other side of the country.
He was alight with anticipation, as a crew of family members were about to descend to spend a few days with him, bringing along a tree for his apartment.
Enjoying his enthusiasm, I suddenly thought to ask: “What was your Christmas tree like when you were a kid?”
“Well,” he said, “we didn’t have a Christmas tree, because conifers didn’t grow in that part of Arkansas. We had a Christmas chair.”
“A what?”
“My dad would take his big old ladderback rocker and set it in the middle of the parlor, and my brothers and I would hang our stockings on it. The next morning the stockings would be filled, and there would be a present for each of us on the seat of the chair.”
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| Dad as a lad; the chair behind him might be the one in question. |
"But where did you put the presents for your parents?”
“We never gave them any, and they never gave any to each other. At our house Christmas was only for the children.”
“That’s so sad that you never had a tree.”
“Well, actually, we did, just not at home. Our Baptist church had a really high ceiling, and every year the congregation would raise money to get a great big pine tree shipped from the Ozarks. There was a church party on Christmas Day, with a gift hanging on the tree for each kid.
“The best Christmas I ever had was the year I got to be a ‘tree helper’ the day before. You had to be small enough to go up a ladder without knocking the tree over and coordinated enough to climb around hanging the ornaments and gifts without breaking the branches. I used to just love drinking in the scent of pine all around me.
“Then at the party, you got to go up and get the presents and read off each kid’s name. All of them were staring at me like I was the Second Coming. I’d never felt so important in my life!”
I suddenly wished I’d heard this story before I got so grumpy in my teens about going on those Christmas-tree expeditions. Spontaneously I said: “I remember when we used to go out and cut the Christmas tree.”
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| A family tradition: brother David and niece Morgan bring home the tree. |
“That’s good,” he said, “I really wanted to give you kids some special memories.”
“Well, you did, Dad. Merry Christmas. Love you.”
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| Dad enjoying Christmas 2008 at the age of 95. |
Dad has been gone for a while now, but every year around this time, I think of that small boy, happy and gratified to wake up on Christmas morning to presents on a chair.
And I always picture him, later on that day, perched, glowing like a little Christmas angel, in the scented upper branches of the tallest Baptist tree for miles around.
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12. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Sebastopol, California; c.2016
CARDPLAY, Or,
THE HISTORY OF A F*RT
(With Apologies to Mark Twain)*
In the pursuit of a good night’s sleep, I learned, as I grew older, that staying away from books and screens in the two hours before bedtime was a useful tactic. One activity that I found calming in that time-frame was a simple game or two of solitaire.
One evening, I found myself staring idly at the expression on the face of the Queen of Hearts, and the first line of this opus popped into my head.
The rest followed with almost Mozartian fluency (and, from all accounts Wolfgang Amadeus would have heartily approved of the subject matter).
CARDPLAY
The Queen of Hearts, she smelt a F*rt.,
“Who did that?” was her cry,
Her King said: “Moi? Je suis le Roi!"
Her Knave said: “Oh, not I!”
The King of Spades turned several shades
Of yellow, blue, and red,
“I fear, alack. It was my Jack,”
“’Twas NOT!” the fellow said.
The Queen of Spades, she blushed and said:
“I cold not, an I dared,
Produce that Stench, so foul and French
As ripest Camembert."
The Queen of Clubs cried: “There’s the rub,
For ‘tis a Manly bent
Foul winds to break; make no mistake,
Some Gent did vent that scent!"
The Diamond King mused: “Here’s a thing
To make us think the harder.
You must concede, ‘tis rare indeed
—A F*rt that hath no F*rter."
The Diamond Queen cried out: “Come clean!
Who aired that stink of stinks?”
The Knave of Clubs, that naughty cub,
Smirked: "Twas my King, methinks.”
“Now, by my sword!” the Club-King roared,
“What matter who propelled it?"
The Diamond Knave piped up so brave:
“Then she that Smelt it, Dealt it!”
“A pack of lies!” the Heart-Queen cries,
“For all here have denied it.
Had I the art, so fair to f*art,
Think you that I would hide it?”
The FOOL then laughed: “Why, ‘tis my craft
To fashion entertainment
We could do worse than to converse
On my distinct attainment.”
“At fluting f*rts, my nether parts
No rival have, nor equal,
Come, no more fuss; let’s all discuss
The matter of a SEQUEL.”
(So if one day, at cards you play,
Set all of these apart,
And you may trace, upon each face
The History of a F*RT.)
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13.THROWBACK THURSDAY: Farallones Institute Rural Center, Occidental, California, and various Sonoma County Locations; 1979-Present
GOOD FOR WHAT AILS YA, Or,
TIA LAURITA FOR THE SOUL
This was the sequence: it was my second day as an intern at the Rural Center, and I was wandering around the communal kitchen, feeling a little lost.
Laura breezed in, with a friend, in close conversation; the friend left; Laura opened and closed the door to the industrial-sized refrigerator; and the lid of a large enamel canning pot that had been stored on top of it dislodged and fell, scoring a direct hit on her noggin.
I was quick enough to prevent her from slumping to the floor, helped her to sit on a bench at the kitchen table, fetched a cold compress for her head, and murmured words of reassurance.
When Laura’s eyes re-focused , she peered dazedly at me and demanded: “Who are you?”
Had I known it, this was the beginning of 40-some-years-and-counting of friendship and chicken soup.
With Laura at the Rural Center
At the Rural Center, Laura was often addressed as “Tia (Aunt) Laurita,” for her caring nature, her no-nonsense approach to problem-solving, and her bilingually fluent command of Spanish, learned as a Peace Corps volunteer in Ecuador.
Brilliant, articulate, funny (she can crack you up in several languages, including Yiddish, Papua New Guinea Pidgin, and Quechua Indian), and nurturing by nature, Laura is a firm believer in the healing powers of her chicken soup, which comes in versions ranging from soothingly bland to volcanic.
One day in 1985, when we’d both moved on, and were living just down the road from each other, I came down with an Awful Crud, and the only thing I could stand to eat was Laura’s magical brew.
As I recovered, I was so grateful that I decided to express my thanks in the form of a poster with drawing and calligraphy, which hung in Laura’s kitchen for years.
When she and her husband John (another Rural Center graduate) moved into their current home 24 years later, she brought me the poster (which neither of us had thought to frame). The artwork, unprotected, had acquired a number of kitchen-standard spots and spatters that had blurred some of the colors and letters. “Can you fix this?” asked Laurita.
Fortunately, by this time I had become an old hand at mending and restoration. I disguised the spots with tan correction fluid, refreshed the colors and the blurred calligraphy, then cut out the central image and re-mounted it on a background appropriate to Solar Works, the successful company that Laura and John have run for years.
Laurita and John
I’ve kept the original just in case, and a replaceable photocopy in a washable plastic sleeve now occupies its place.
And, I’m happy to report, when I’m under the weather or feeling down, Tia Laurita is still showing up on my doorstep, dispensing love, smiles, laughs, and chicken soup in equal and generous portions.
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| Still BFFs. @@@@@@@ |
14. THROWBACK THURSDAY:
Mammy Morgan’s Hill, Pennsylvania; 1941-1944
WHEN MY SISTER WAS AN ONLY CHILD
Recently I came upon a greeting card featuring the artwork below, painted by beloved American artist Bessie Pease Gutmann (1876-1960) in 1940. It struck a chord: now where had I seen that image before?
GOOD MORNING (1940), by Bessie Pease Gutmann (1876-1960)
Dad must have had to lean precariously over the railing surrounding the stairwell to get this shot. No wonder Sue looks slightly concerned.
My sister Susan was born in August of 1941; I didn’t come along until October of 1944. WWII was raging abroad, and my dad was sidelined at home because, on top of having a wife and young child, he was very “hard of hearing” (a condition happily rectified by surgery in the early 1960s).
The walls of our living room, built in the early 19th century. were at least 18" thick, with deep windowsills.
Sue was a winsome, agreeable (though often shy) little girl, an ideal subject for a developing photographer. Dad delighted in setting her up for portraits that, in the mellowed black-and-white images that emerged from his homemade darkroom, sometimes resulted in photos that resembled Impressionist paintings.
I've always thought that this shot looks like a painting by Mary Cassatt.
When I came along, I had little patience for these setups, and Dad’s early attempts at angelic were marred by my attempts to wriggle out of camera range.
With a new little sister...
...who just wouldn't stay still.
Like I said...
Together again in 2022.
I’ll have to ask Sue, but I think she may have been secretly happy to be relieved of her only-child responsibilities.
My mother and Sue with matching topknots.
Classic peekaboo.
Gussied up for Easter.
On the rocks.
@@@@@15. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Spirit Rock Meditation Center, Woodacre , California; October 23rd, 1993; Sebastopol, California; January, 2022
COLLAGE: SPACE STUPA FOR THẦY (I AM NOT HERE)
On my 49th birthday in 1993, a group of friends and I carpooled to rural Woodacre to attend a “Day of Mindfulness” retreat at Spirit Rock Meditation Center.
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| Spirit Rock |
The focus of the retreat was the presence of the extraordinary Zen Buddhist monk, poet, peacemaker, activist, writer and teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, known to his followers, friends, and admirers as simply “Thầy,” (teacher).
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| Thầy |
Although most of my companions weren’t Buddhists, we were all drawn to this event: some from previous knowledge of Thầy and his books and poetry, some out of curiosity, and some simply by the spiritual nature of the occasion.
It was enormously well-attended, with over a thousand people sitting on blankets and cushions, filling a natural grassy hillside amphitheater that sloped down to a flat stage area.
Although the day’s program included music, talks, guided meditations (sitting, standing, walking, eating, breathing), a picnic lunch, stretching exercises, informative presentations, etc., those attending were asked to refrain from talking for the entire day. Being part of that large silent attentive crowd was an amazing experience in itself.
The moment of the proceedings I’ll always remember came after Thầy’s Dharma talk (discourse on the subject of Buddhist practice). As always, what he had to say was clear, simple, kind, and soft-voiced—fortunately miked to carry gently to the farthest uphill rows.
Then the tiny monk descended from the stage and began a walking meditation, one of his favorite practices, moving slowly upwards on a path on one side of the amphitheater. We were told that he would walk to a hilltop altar, perform a brief prayer and ceremony, and return to the stage. All of us were invited to follow him.
The crowd began walking after him, about six deep, joining in with slow steps as he passed. From time to time, as happened during the entire day, a clear bell would sound, and everyone, as instructed, would stop moving and thinking, and take three breaths while silently repeating a two-line haiku-like poem printed in the program.
It was a hypnotic experience: the slow careful placing of feet on the rocky path, the bell, the breathing, the attentiveness of those around us, the lovely sunny day surrounding us.
At this point, however, a slight traffic problem developed: we were so numerous that many were still making our way uphill as Thầy finished his ceremony and had started back down.
Accordingly, we divided into two columns with a six-foot-wide path down the middle to allow him and those immediately following to pass between as they descended.
As his small, intent, brown-robed figure passed by, I suddenly experienced an astounding wave of pure energy that literally rocked me back on my heels,
I looked at the faces around me and saw stunned expressions that probably matched my own, the zone of astonishment passing down to those below us. I’d never understood before what it felt like to be in the presence of a spiritual being who was undeniably the Real Thing. Whoa.
After that day, though I felt no need to drop out of my life and “follow” Thầy, or to become a nun at his Plum Village Monastery in France, he seemed to turn up everywhere; his writings and sayings featured more and more frequently in bookstores, online, on calendars and notebooks, on refrigerator magnets, for heaven’s sake.
There he was, perfectly at home on Oprah, speaking as simply and quietly as he seemed to do everything.
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| With Oprah |
There he was in documentaries, being hugged by the Dalai Lama, and on YouTube, giving Dharma talks, and leading exquisite chants for world peace.
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| With the Dalai Lama |
Eventually I got to thinking of him, not as a guru, exactly, but as the loveliest kind of spiritual uncle.
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| With the World Bank Group on a panel on community-building. |
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| With Dr. Martin Luther King, who nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize. |
When he passed away, on January 22nd, 2022, at the age of 95, I found myself moved to make the collage below. Its title comes from Thầy’s instructions for his “continuation:”
“I have a disciple in Vietnam who wants to build a stupa [shrine] for my ashes when I die. He and others want to put a plaque with the words, "Here lies my beloved teacher." I told them not to waste the temple land...I suggested that, if they still insist on building a stupa, they have the plaque say, I AM NOT IN HERE. But in case people don't get it, they could add a second plaque, I AM NOT OUT THERE EITHER. If still people don't understand, then you can write on the third and last plaque, I MAY BE FOUND IN YOUR WAY OF BREATHING AND WALKING.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqfcWWJHKFc (What Does it Mean to Go Home to Yourself?: Thich Nhat Hanh Answers Questions/6:36)
Parallax Press - Mindfulness in Daily Lifehttps://www.parallax.org
16.THROWBACK THURSDAY: Sebastopol, California, Late 2000s; Sonoma, Napa and Marin Counties, California; 2007-Present.
ALAN WATTS AND THE TAO OF POO(P)
One day in the late 2000s, I was driving into Sebastopol on Route 116, and halted at a red light.
As I eased to a stop, I couldn’t help but notice, looming above me, the tanker truck pictured below, with its sweetly scato-rhetorical inquiry, a somewhat incongruous take on a much-imitated ad campaign for milk that ran from 1993 to 2014. Smiling, I grabbed my camera and shot this photo through my windshield.
Just recently, I came across the pic in my online collection, and idly began to wonder who the truck-owners were, whether they were still in business, and whether they were still posting that existential inquiry on their heavy machinery.
I called the phone number visible in the photo, and learned that Environmental Pump Services was not only still a growing concern, but had greatly expanded since its beginnings in 2007, when it was founded by local bros Eric Hawley and Blaine Cristando.
The Hawley and Cristando families
In addition to dealing with human waste products, EPS now serves commercial and residential clients in Sonoma, Marin, and Napa Counties, specializing in the pumping and cleaning of grease traps and grease interceptors; the removal of used kitchen grease and cooking oil; service on septic systems (plumbing and cleaning) for residential and commercial customers; as well as pumping and hauling away winery waste.
They’ve received an A+ rating from the Better Business Bureau, are a Diamond-certified company with 100% grade in customer loyalty, and have an almost perfect score on Yelp! (The only negative comment concerned an ill-advised traffic move by an EPS truck.)
What’s more, true to their name, they channel ALL the by-products of all this activity into production of methane gas, fertilizers, biodiesel fuels, and other energy sources.
So, my point? After learning all this, I reflected that people in many countries who are forced to do this work are often considered lowest-caste, and are frequently ostracized, underpaid and undervalued.
But here are two guys (and their crews) more than willing to overlook the stigma and the general level of messiness involved in dealing with the smelly byproducts of human existence, and, what’s more, to do it with the humor and pride that displays that jaunty little slogan on their trucks, their web-pages, and even on the coveralls of their septic cleaners.
The great Zen philosopher Alan Watts maintained that one of humanity’s most important cosmic questions is “Who cleans up?” Many people, he said, put a lot of industry into avoiding the answer or not taking on the task.
But there are a special some, like the owners and workers of Environmental Pump Services, who step up and cheerfully announce: “We do!”
You know, I’m kind of in awe of them.
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| Who Cleans up? |
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17. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Sonoma County, California, 1990s-Present
SPECIAL DELIVERY
In the early 1990s, I acquired a desk that was being tossed to make room for convenient built-ins at the store where I worked.
As you can see from the photo below, this is no lightweight piece of furniture. Solid pre-WWII mahogany, it’s a serious chunk of fine carpentry that’s followed me weightily through five moves and a lot of creativity.
Commercial holiday or not, I’ve always enjoyed the concept of Valentine’s Day. When I was living in San Francisco, for instance, I cut red velvet adhesive contact paper into heart shapes that I edged in gold paint.
On February 14th, I would flit around town, occasionally affixing the hearts to public surfaces, and handing them out to random strangers, bus drivers, and passers-by. (“Does this mean you love me?” asked an elderly man. Of course it did.)
What a hippie.
Later on, I turned to watercolors and calligraphy to create valentines for friends, and to leave in public places for strangers to find.
Now to the desk. That long drawer on the right is only two inches high inside, but 22 inches wide and deep. Thus for years I only really used the front two-thirds of it, and random items got pushed to the back.
Until, that is, this past week, when I was looking for an item I was sure I’d squirreled somewhere inside the desk, and got to the back of the drawer for the first time in way too long.
It handed me a valentine from myself, made a quarter-century ago, with a message that I especially needed.
Could all that mahogany be hiding a streak of hippie heartwood?
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18. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Bangor, Pennsylvania; c. 1936
RETRO VALENTINE CODA
My dad, although he had a great big heart, was a straightforward kind of guy who didn't toss the "L" word around indiscriminately.
That's why I was quite surprised recently, when going through a collection of cards and letters my mother had saved for years, to find this unabashedly mushy valentine from my parents' courting days in the 1930s.
(It's constructed like a tablet, with leaves that open upward)
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| These photos were taken over 60 years apart. The first was a wedding portrait from 1937; the second, taken by my sister Sue, was a spontaneous accident. @@@@@ 19. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Sebastopol, California, 2019-Present RAINBOW CONNECTIONS: THE ART OF SYNCHRONICITY Back in pre-pandemic 2019, I volunteered for a program sponsored by the Sebastopol Library, which always seems to be humming with events. I was lucky enough (or was it serendipity?) to be chosen as an interviewee by an absolutely lovely young woman named Anya. Not only did we have a cracking good interview (I was her “Ambassador from the Olden Days”), we became the best of friends, collage buddies, and —after she entered UC Berkeley last fall—fond correspondents.  We also enjoy giving each other small gifts; one of her first to me was a multifaceted crystal on a beaded string that hangs in the west window of my studio. On clear days, its many surfaces interact with afternoon sunlight to scatter mini-rainbows throughout the room.  One day a few years ago, I was listening to my favorite Pandora channel and working on the three collages below kind of simultaneously. My workspace was full of newspaper, calendar and magazine pages, cutouts, scissors, glue sticks, etc., and one of the nearly finished collages somehow slipped from the table onto the floor. By the time it landed, a vivid splash of rainbow had colonized its center.  This was my first inkling that light could be incorporated as a collage element when the whole was photographed. Wowza!    Amused, I glanced at my computer screen where the title of the piece was displayed, and burst out laughing. It’s called “Collage.” And here it is: |
20. THROWBACK THURSDAY: Mammy Morgan’s Hill, Pennsylvania; San Francisco, California; Marin County, California; South Woodstock, Vermont; New York, New York; Phoenix, Arizona; and Various Other Places; 1944-Present
THREE LITTLE GIRLS, JUST A-SPLASHIN’ IN THE GENE POOL
Last week, when I shared a poster (on Facebook) of my great-niece Cami starring in the title role of the musical Matilda, I was reminded of a significant part of our mutual heritage.
I can’t trace it back more than a century, but it seems to have come down through my free-spirited Grandfather Hill to my seriously creative and inventive dad, and has cropped up unexpectedly among their descendants for the last three generations.
One (literally dramatic) illustration of this concerns three girl-children: me, my niece Morgan, and the aforementioned Great-Niece Cami.
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| Me at about age 13 as "The Mah-velous Mrs. Murgatroyd." |
Morgan as a youngster in a national school theater competition.
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| Cameron as "Matilda" at age 13. |
Exhibit A: In my early years, often at my instigation, my siblings, friends and I would spontaneously dress up and “put on a show” anytime we could rope a few people into watching us.
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Putting on a show. (Left) I'm doing some kind of pseudo-Hawaiian number (note the "hula skirt" made of cat-tail reeds belted over granny panties). The earnest piano accompanist is Ronnie Kutza, and the drummer (using a cookie tin as a drum) is my brother David wearing a towel and a mask we got from sending in cereal box-tops. It had a Mylar™ panel you could see through, the latest in technology. On the right, hamming it up with friend Ellen Shaul. |
When I went to high school and joined the Dramatics Club, however, it became clear that I had no talent whatever for acting from a prepared script, and I languished in tiny parts until I wisely sidestepped into dance.
I also attempted acting classes (at which I pretty much stunk) in college, but it wasn’t until I almost accidentally danced my way into the ongoing environmental-theater cast of the Original Renaissance Pleasure Faire that I realized that, while I couldn’t act worth spit, hey, I could make-believe like a champ.
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| Dancing as May Queen. |
Leading a RenFaire procession as Mistress of Revels with Master Will Wood.
Thus I became a professional actor for a decade of Wench/May Queen/Harvest Maid/Mistress of Misrule/Mistress of Revels, about a dozen Great Dickens Christmas Fair roles...
As a Dickens-Fair angel on stilts
...and the most make-believe of all, Mad Maudlen, for which I received the St. Cuthbert Award for Pageantry.
As Mad Maudlen
(Not to mention that summer traveling the US with a circus/vaudeville troupe called “Dr. California’s Golden Gate Remedy.”)
Exhibit B: Then there’s my niece Morgan, another little ham from the word go, who as a child in Vermont adored dressing up, putting on plays, and taking part in school drama competitions.
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| She comes by it naturally: little Morgan shows her 'tude in a novelty photo shoot with her dad (my brother David) and mom Susan Fuller. |
Although she now moonlights as creative director and print designer for the Diane von Furstenberg fashion empire, she continues to stage fantasy dress-up photo shoots and make creative videos with her many performing friends.
Morgan as Malibu Barbie
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New York City Morgan (L) and Vermont Morgan (with pal Roxy). |
...and (with friend Jacob, R.) as a tea-sipping bunny in pink.
Exhibit C: Great-Niece Cami, meanwhile, is an acting/singing/dancing triple threat who seems to be on the way to a professional performing career.
Cami's Instagram post of the two of us (me in a Dickens Fair Costume).
Before taking the stage as Matilda in February of 2023 shortly after her 13th birthday, she’d appeared in Frozen, The Sound of Music, Freaky Friday, Willy Wonka, Big Fish, It's a Wonderful life, White Christmas, and The Nutcracker, to name just the biggest of her onstage moments.
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| As a tiny tot in a school talent show... |
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| in White Christmas... |
...in Willy Wonka...
...kicking up her heels in Freaky Friday...
...as the Ringmaster in Big Fish...
...as an angel in The Nutcracker...
...and as Matilda.
So there you have it: three generations, three little girls, and one logical explanation:
Genes just wanna have fun.
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