Dad's second grade class photo.
Centralia, Illinois

Happy Birthday Dad

My father would have been 84 years old today. I thought I'd post a few of my favorite photos of him throughout the month. 

Dad's 40th birthday.
I was born two years later. :-)

Mom and Dad's wedding, June 1st, 1971 (on his 40th bday, see above)
They got married at a park at midnight--my Mom's idea--in Tulsa.
A friend officiated. 

Me and Dad. He's making sure I don't eat the dandelion.

Dad's birthday, a few years later (me in the background--maybe about 8 years old?)
I love this photo. And I miss our yellow 1970s kitchen.

Dad and me, crashed out in his favorite armchair.

Hanging out on the banks of Lake Michigan.
Shortly after Dad moved to Sheboygan, WI (post-divorce) to work for Kohler.

More photos to come this month. 

Getting this in just under the wire (for Pacific time, anyway)....

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GLORIA STEINEM! 

80 is the new 40!!!

John and I are packing to leave for England (gonna meet my UK family---including my step-grandchildren!) so this is all very last minute. Thus, here's a cool infograph from Makers.com......

And this photo is my favorite. Of course.

I love that she's a catwoman!

Cheerio for now, luvs! 

THIS is 40

Yesterday, August 19, 2013 (at 2:18pm, if you want to get really precise)  I turned 40. I'm happy about it.

I'm thankful that I survived my twenties, a very difficult decade for me (I'm hardly alone on that one; most people my age say they hated their twenties). It wasn't all bad; I did have some great times in my twenties. But I wouldn't want to go back.

My thirties were decent overall. Things started out crappy. I had a few minor nervous breakdowns between the ages of 30 - 32. But by the time I was 33 (2006) I'd hit my stride. I was feeling happy and confident, and had finally landed a job I enjoyed. My love life was spotty--as it often was back then--but I had some great adventures. Even with all the mistakes and missteps I made during my thirties, I don't regret a thing.

So now I've made it to age 40. I'm a published author, I'm happy, I'm content, I'm married. Comfy home, purring cats, fantastic friends, great husband.

It's all good.

******************************

Now for some fun.

This milestone birthday has got me thinking. I've been writing a lot about my early childhood, and I'm amazed by how much I remember, especially about 1970's pop culture. I was born in 1973 and was only seven years old by the time 1980 rolled around. But, as I've discovered, I've retained a lot from that decade.

1970's Kid
My mom was a housewife (I guess "homemaker" is the correct term now) for a good part of my early childhood. She kept a small transistor radio in the kitchen of our house in Greensburg, Indiana--this was before we moved to "the big city" of Indianapolis in late 1978--and my first memories of pop music involved Paul Simon, The Carpenters, and John Denver, piped through that little radio in the kitchen.

The song: Paul Simon  50 Ways To Leave Your Lover.
The memory: I was about four years old and my mom was standing in the kitchen, making me a peanut butter sandwich for lunch. She was singing along to "50 Ways" as it played on that little kitchen radio. When it got to the "Hop on the bus, Gus!" part, I collapsed on the floor in a fit of giggles, picturing a little man named "Gus" hopping up and down on top of a school bus. My mom started laughing at me while I laughed my crazy little "Snoopy laugh" (as she called it), and the more she laughed, the more I laughed, and the longer the song played, the more we both laughed until she had to sit down on the kitchen chair and I was rolling around on the floor and my stomach hurt from laughing but I couldn't stop so I just laid there, all giggly and out of breath. It's one of my favorite childhood memories.

The song: The Carpenters Top of the World. (Oh man. Watch the video I linked to. It's adorable. Why can't we all be sweet and innocent like that again?)

I loved this song when I was a wee one, even though I didn't quite have a handle on the lyrics, as you'll see.

The memory:  My dad worked in advertising, and occasionally his colleagues and their wives would come over to our house in Greensburg for dinner and/or cocktails. I was about four or five years old, so naturally I took it upon myself to provide the evening's entertainment whenever my parents had "company" over.

The grownups would be sitting in the living room, enjoying cocktails and smoking cigarettes and talking about Billie Jean King or Barry Manilow or the energy crisis or whatever grownups talked about in the seventies. The living room was in full view of the staircase that led up to the bedrooms. We had this giant brown leather beanbag chair, and I'd drag it over to the bottom of the stairs, climb to the top of the steps (it was only about seven steps--we had a split-level home) and shout:

"I'm on the top of the world, looking down on creation, and the only essplanation.....I CAN FLY!" 

Then I'd take a running leap and cannonball down the seven steps into the big brown beanbag chair, to the delight of (most of) the adults. Their applause and laughter were like catnip to me, so I did it again and again. After about my fourth encore, my dad would say, "Okay, you're getting all wound up now. Time for bed." And then my mom would shepherd me to my bedroom even though it was WAY before my official bedtime and I hadn't even had dessert or watched Donny and Marie or anything. (Shut up. I liked The Donny and Marie Show). So unfair.

Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry. 

Some years later, I learned that my dad's boss (one of the guests who frequented my parents' little cocktail hours) used to nudge my dad and say, "You gotta get that kid into commercials."

Alas, my parents didn't heed that advice, and so I was doomed to a childhood of anonymity.

The song: Any and all John Denver songs prior to 1982
The memory: Jeez. So many. My mom loved John Denver, and his music was ubiquitous in our household when I was a little kid. He was almost like a member of the family; the sweet hippie uncle I never had. (My mom's brother is a very nice guy, but he's a rich Republican--a white sheep in a family of black sheep.) I was devastated when John Denver died. It really was like losing a relative. I wish he was still around. I think he could have had a career resurgence, now that the Baby Boomers are all old and nostalgic.

If I could narrow it down, I'd probably say my favorite John Denver-related memory happened in 2000, when I was 27 years old and in love with a sensitive artist type, a 23-year-old painter who ate, drank, lived and breathed 1960's and 70's acoustic folk music. He loved the Mamas and the Papas, Simon and Garfunkel, Peter Paul and Mary, Don MacLean, Jim Croce, and John Denver. This guy--okay, let's go ahead and call him Louis, since he was the inspiration for that character in my novel and he's also very unlikely to read this--was the only person I'd met outside my family who shared my love for John Denver and his music. Louis and I drove from Indianapolis to Shades State Park in the summer of 2000, singing along to John Denver's "Take Me Home, Country Roads" on the tape deck for much of the journey. Yeah, that was a good time.      



I kinda like writing about this music/memory stuff. I'll be posting more bits like this in the coming weeks.
 

Happy Birthday Roger Taylor!

"(Growing up in Birmingham) you could either escape through football or music. 

And I wasn't much good at football."

Funny guy. Great musician too. He's known for being the quiet, mysterious Duran who left the music biz in 1985 (just after DD's Live Aid performance) and sought refuge in the English countryside. A true introvert, I think his circuits were just completely fried after seven straight years of having to be "on" all the time, and I imagine the Duran Duran's 1984 tour was the whale that broke the camel's back, to turn a phrase. He was also a newlywed and wanted to spend time with his wife, Giovanna, which is another typically Roger Taylor-ish reason for craving anonymity. Speaking of Giovanna, one of the things I dug about Roger was his love of edgy women. Instead of the Platonic ideals pursued by his bandmates, he was taken by his future first wife's shaved head/purple mohawk (accounts differ) back when she was working the cloakroom at the Rum Runner, where Duran Duran got their start as the house band.

Although they split in 2004, these crazy kids were married for 20 years!
No small achievement in pop stardom.

Fun fact: Roger's son is tight with Andy Taylor's son, and they hung out a lot as kids. Now they're all grown up and they've started their own band together! How cool is that?

Roger, of course, did eventually come back to the DD fold. The first time was in 1995, when he was coaxed out of hiding to play drums on the track "Perfect Day" for DD's album of covers, entitled Thank You. Then Roger saw his shadow or something and disappeared yet again. 

You can watch the video here (EMI is pissy about embedding).

Roger rejoined Duran Duran for the second time in 2001, when all five original members reunited for a new album and tour. He's stuck with them ever since (knock on wood), perhaps deciding that the pop life isn't so bad after all. 

Roger Taylor turns 53 today. And he's aging quite nicely, I might add. 

 

Posting this in honor of John Lennon's 70th birthday.



Poet, artist, lover, dreamer, rebel.

Well my instincts are fine
I had to learn to use them in order to survive
And time after time confirmed an old suspicion
It's good to be alive
And when I'm deep down and out and lose communication
With nothing left to say
It's then I realize it's only a condition
Of seeing things that way

This is an early birthday shout-out to my writer's group friend Becca: a classic video featuring her (ex-?) boyfriend William Shatner.



Funny, funny shit. I would have loved to be in the audience during his performance. Preferably stoned out of my mind (in keeping with the spirit of 1978, natch).