Solstice

Los Angeles, California

It was not triumphant, but it was a return to salsa dancing. We had been talking about it. California fully opened up, eliminating the restrictions in response to the Covid19 pandemic, on June 15th. Daylight was increasingly stretching into the evening. The solstice was on its way. And we had been talking about our return to share a dance floor with others, and not just at my house.

We chose a Sunday night at a club in Tarzana where we had danced in the past on Sunday nights. I cannot exactly remember when we were last there. I know we were there on New Year's Eve 2019. Joel was sick. He had been feeling better, but then his cough got worse again. Covid? We now know that it arrived sooner than we had thought. So, maybe it was. I left for Phoenix about eight weeks later, so I am assuming that we danced during that time between December 31st and the beginning of March. But memory does not serve. Regardless, our return to salsa occurred on a Sunday night, just a few hours short of the solstice. I reminded Joel: The last time we were here, Trump was still president.

Walking in was particularly odd. There are now metal detectors at the door. Joel said: Good. Imelda was not there, and will not be there taking money and fastening wrist bands. Bad. We walked in wearing masks, greeting the only two people we knew: the promotor, Jose, and the bartender who amazingly remembered our standing order even after more than fifteen months. Music was playing, and the dance floor was empty, until...

We were the first and only people on the dance floor. Later that evening there were more people, but it never became crowded. A few people we knew, including Joy and Alex, arrived and joined us on the floor. I worried about my stamina, but it was not a problem. What was a problem was the ridiculously sticky floor; the even more ridiculous volume of the music, and a later-evening crappy DJ playing an abundance of bachata, which we can dance to but it's not the first thing on our menu, and other music which was not salsa. A lot to complain about, but it ultimately didn't matter. We were back.

We didn't stay late. At a certain point when we were dancing cumbia, the DJ (crappy DJ) cut into the song with a different cumbia. At that, Joel was done. I came home, my dress sticking to me from sweat, but feeling the familiar peace of mind that comes with doing something physical that you love doing, and which especially comes in the resumption of doing that thing that you love after a protracted and crazy hiatus. I showered, climbed into bed, and slept well.

The following day was the solstice. There was still light in the sky close to 9:00 PM. Joel and I talked about salsa. How can we carve the time out of his schedule to do more salsa? There was a time when we danced three or four times a week. A consistent time when we danced twice a week. And that would be the goal, now that we are post-pandemic and just a week post-solstice. Life is busy, but carving out the time for something that feeds your soul seems essential. The truth of this is that the pandemic has taught us something. It taught us YOLO. You truly do only live once, and we learned that we can lose a full year out of that life. So it is now all the more important to realize that making time for the things and the people we love is NOW. Otherwise the equinox will be upon us and we will be still making plans for the future. Now is the time to realize plans. And for Joel and I, now is the time to dance. Thank you for reading my blog. And for you new agers and druids out there: Happy Solstice!

Blue

California, California...

This week celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the release of Joni Mitchell's album, Blue, released in 1971. And that summer is so very clear in my memory.

It had been two years since the summer I had spent in Hawaii with my friend Pam. After the vehicular deaths of our friends and Waikiki roommates, Larry and Ray, there was a swift unraveling of that group of friends. I think it was painful to be together, painful to feel the absence of two such integral members. And we were so young, without the tools to handle grief other than to try to get away from it. As if.

In 1971 I was back at home, and back in school at a local community college. But it was summer, and I was not working. I was also not in a relationship, but hanging out with some high school friends, including Debbie, who we called Clev in abbreviation of her last name. Clev was my best friend through most of high school, and who would remain so through college. And I think it was she who heard about the party.

Parties in those days were casual, or perhaps more appropriately called loose. It was pretty much just a gathering of kids and a smattering of a variety of consciousness-bending substances. If you were lucky, there might be beer. Usually there was cannabis, more or less always available. In this era of Covid, I squeamishly remember how much was shared in those days. Sometimes someone would forage up one beer, and we all drank from that bottle. For certain, we passed things around.

Somewhere during that night I found myself in conversation with David. We had graduated in the same class at the same high school, and I recognized him by sight, but had never known him. I had never even spoken to him. But now we were in a lively conversation. He seemed to like my hair, worn in a loose shag cut. And he said that he remembered me from high school. He added that he remembered my eyes. What about them? I asked. That they were different. I later told Clev that he had said that. Do you think he means different from each other?!?

David drove me home in his funny little Fiat, which another friend described as being shaped like a top hat. Sometimes I see these models in old films set in Europe, and I am reminded of him. On this night, he had lost his ignition key, and scrounged around in his car for a tool to start his engine. He found a carpentry device, a square ruler, and remarkably it started up the little Fiat.  Losing his car keys wasn't the only clue that led me to feel he was a bit too untethered for me. I directed him through the back streets to my house, a circuitous route, designed to not be able to replicate. And when he asked for my phone number, I transposed two numbers.

The next day he showed up at my house and rang the doorbell. I went outside and sat with him on my parent's lawn, under a walnut tree where a neighborhood boy had long ago carved our initials inside of a heart. My friend, Therese, was spending the night, and we were leaving in the morning to drive up to San Mateo, where my sister and her husband had recently moved. And it was there, in San Mateo, that I happened into a record store and saw Joni Mitchell's new album, Blue. I bought it, and at the same time I also bought The Who's Who's Next. David would take me to see The Who later that year. A stunning concert, part of the Who's Next tour, at The Forum in Los Angeles. And we would see Joni Mitchell several times in the coming years at the Universal Amphitheater, which became one of our favorite spaces to see outdoor, summer concerts.

Perhaps my travel from trying to elude David to beginning a relationship that lasted five and one-half years was partly attributable to Joni's Blue. Blue taught me that it might be ok to be tortured in love as long as you were also enraptured by it. Her songs were about emotional intensity and sexuality, as well as the freedom of a love affair danced away in a taverna on a Greek island. I didn't just listen to Blue. I lived it. River became the anthem to my heartache just as Carey remains an anthem to freedom and joy. It still shows up on the playlists I create. All I Want will forever be about the hopes I had as I fell completely into love with David. He was my first. He was passion, heartache, and ultimately is now my friend. And all of the memories of those years, our return to college together, and the final tumultuous breaking apart, are entwined with Joni's music. There was a time when I could not listen to her music anymore because it evoked a memory of despair. But that is long past and this summer, Blue will be in rotation.

A close friend once made a comment to me, derisively, about someone she knew "being in love with love." I said nothing, but felt grief for her. There is nothing, nothing in my experience, no drug, no epic experience that compares with falling completely and passionately in love with something or someone. Nothing that makes life worth living more than those pivotal moments of euphoric transcendence whether brought about by theater, a concert, dancing, or especially time and intimacy shared with a lover. Without those epiphanies, my life would be flat. And if you haven't experienced this, I suspect that, whether you know it or not, you haven't fully lived. Life is good mostly, but those moments -- the rest of life is only spent living in the comfortable spaces between. Those other times are my drug.

There is certain music that I think of as the soundtrack to times in my life. Stevie Wonder's My Cherie Amour will always bring to my memory a ride from Waikiki to the Honolulu International Airport, sitting in the back seat of some large American sedan, on Larry's lap. All of us singing; Pam and I later crying at the airport as we regretfully left the summer on Seaside Street behind us, and boarded the plane to take us home to LA... barefoot. The Rolling Stones' Beast of Burden takes me back to my first car with a built-in cassette player, a brand-new convertible VW Bug, white with a black top, which I kept for ten years and then sold to the actress Maura Tierney for $100 more than I had paid for it new. And, Luis Enrique's Yo No Se Mañana, which is Joel's and my very special song. My life's playlist is long.

I have written here before that Sondheim's Move On, and his No One is Alone have helped me move through rough patches in my life. And, I suppose I did move on from Joni and from Blue. But, oddly, as I look back, Joni also gave me a sense that no one was alone with feelings of angst and passion, those feelings that my generation wasn't quite sure how to manage. We mostly got through it all. And Joni was there. And still is. I listened to My Old Man recently and realized how well it not only fit my feelings for David back in the day, but describes the relationship I share with Joel. He's a dancer in the dark.

So, as I finish writing this post, I will download the CD I have of Blue into my iTunes. I will listen to it a lot, especially driving around during our splendidly warm summer nights; the nights of my youth and now the nights of salsa dancing. Though older, I don't feel my age in my heart, nor in my soul. Am I blue? Sometimes. But this summer, Blue will represent something different. It will stand as a brilliantly evocative soundtrack and, in its glimmering hue, for all of the passion and intense emotions that it underscored. Thank you for reading my blog. And, thanks for it all, Joni Mitchell! 💙

 

Lemons

Still LA...

It was stunning for me to check into WWSD and discover I had not written in close to three months! And this coming off of a year where I wrote regularly. So what stopped me in my blog-writing tracks after the Ides of March? Well. several things. Importantly, I was fully vaccinated. And by the end of March, so was Joel. An unobserved Lent passed at sundown on April 3rd, and by mid-April I was able to return to Cathy and my pilates sessions. I began seeing friends. Lisa and I walked and shopped on Montana Avenue in Santa Monica. We had lunch indoors at Forma, sharing some wonderful sole and our favorite, Burnt Spaghetti (just take my word for this).

Joel and I began seeing each other every week. And Lynnette came to stay at my home in May, which was for me, a joyful reunion. We visited our friend Larry, and met his puppy, JoJo, named after our hopefully-stabilizing President Joe Biden. Life was moving towards a sort of normalizing, not-normalizing, new normal. If that doesn't make any sense, that is good. Because coming out of this is complicated. Very complicated. And it shouldn't really be making sense at this time.

I didn't stop writing altogether, however. I have kept journals since I was fourteen years old, and incorporate journal-writing into my morning ritual following meditation. And I also created a handwritten cookbook comprised of many of the recipes I cooked during the pandemic year, dated and in chronological order.

What has this felt like; this somewhat-return to the prior life? Well, for me, it has felt strange. Going to restaurants with friends, though I have only done it four times, feels like I am going through the motions. We use the word surreal a lot, but it does fit in these circumstances. I began scheduling work in my home and medical appointments that I had let go for too long. I had highlights installed in my hair. But now, when workers and even my longtime housekeeper Ana, are in my house, I will suddenly hit a wall and my brain screams: Ok, you need to leave! Of course, I don't act on this. I smile, I bear down, I wait. The tools I have to deal with stress usually help me a lot. A whole lot. Mostly in knowing that feelings like that will come and go and can be tolerated, even if they feel kinda awful. Knowing, or even asking yourself, what you can tolerate goes a long way in mediating anxiety.

The mistake I made was in over-scheduling. Almost every day there was something: medical exams; contractors coming to bid work; work being done; resumed pilates sessions; lunches with friends; detailers coming to finally clean up my car, and two days spent in Beverly Hills with medical and beauty appointments. And it was in the 90210 that I snapped. I was talking to Lynnette by phone as I parked in the structure, then left my car quickly without either mask nor the address of the salon. I got out on the street and realized I didn't have time to take the elevator back to my car. But I didn't know whether to walk up or down the street. I know Beverly Hills. Or at least I used to. But I got disoriented, and then I panicked. And then I started to cry. People tell me that I am brave, and I sometimes believe this. But the entire year (maybe the last four-plus with what happened in our country) finally imploded on me, and I began to unravel. Then, I guess the remnants of that brave part of me stepped in. I asked at an eye care center if I could purchase a mask and they kindly gave me one. And after walking a few blocks west, I turned and walked east and found the salon. There is no partial unraveling that can't be re-raveled, even if that's not a word.

With all of this, I do realize that there is a part of the past year that I am loathe to let go. It was the clean slate of each day, knowing that what was not accomplished in that day could easily be accomplished in the next or the one after that. In my post-vaxxed life, what I don't accomplish in a day must be put off as the following days have appointments or outings scheduled. I wouldn't want to give those things up. But I am striving to have balance. My friend and Chinese medicine guru, Cathy, who still guides me through my pilates practice, advises that there is nothing wrong with taking a weekend or a week off the grid and scheduling nothing during that time. But for now, I am in catch-up mode. Catching up with Joel and with friends, catching up with medical exams, catching up with home repairs.

And houseguests. I have houseguests scheduled twice this month and next month my Sonoma friends will spend their annual 3-day stay here. I love to provide this to them as their mini-vacation, spent by the pool during the day and playing our favorite game in the evening. In March of 2020, just before the lockdown, we met in Carmel so that we could share a vacation without anyone having to be the host. Hosting guests, in spite of the fun, can be exhausting. Still, I look forward to this year's summer visit and hopefully to more mini-vacations in the future, meeting them somewhere away from both our homes.

Lastly, I took up the challenge of organizing a neighborhood party here on our street. I reached out to three neighbors, women whom I barely knew, inviting them to my home to pitch my plan. We talked over champagne, and they were all enthusiastic. We picked a date, assigned tasks and a few of us began the work. It could have been a wonderful celebration, but late in the planning process, it became a disaster. One of the things I had pondered during the year was that I wanted to reach out to people, and this briefly felt like a realization of that desire. Unfortunately, the plan went south, and with it came the pain of realization that the women I had reached out to in hopes of becoming better friends and neighbors, seemed to believe that doing the wrong thing is perfectly excusable, as long as you say the right thing to cover. I hadn't seen this coming, and it was hurtful. But, in the spirit of attempting to walk a mile in others' shoes, I have tried to stay mindful that this is a difficult and confusing time for all. Was it handled well? No. But you never know what is going on in other peoples' lives. Still, despite that attempt at compassionate understanding, I ultimately decided to chalk it up to this life lesson: When life hands you lemons; take a good look at who the lemon growers are.

So, moving on, life is returning in an irregular way which is for better, and perhaps a bit for worse. But that is life, right? And the striving for balance is, or should be, always with us. Hopefully the pandemic response is something we will eventually be able to leave behind us as we return to some new normal. I do hope this will include the embraces of loved ones, those big hugs between us and our friends, as these are at the core of what makes life worth living.

Oh, and about that aborted party... Salseros are coming to my house for dancing that evening. So maybe a little lemonade might get made out of those lemons. Or maybe what I should write here is: When life hands you lemons; fuck it. Just dance salsa! Vivir la vida! And, thank you for reading my blog.