Happy Anniversary, Darling!

I remember.

Sixty years!

That’s pretty good.

Some people say, “Wow! You got me beat!”

It’s not a competition. It’s just what tallies up when you get it right early.

It’s like real math. The symbols in the equation represent something. Sometimes that something doesn’t add up. But when you find the way to interpret the essence of the symbols, the equation is a perfect balance.

It’s sifting the gold from the dross.

The Truth from the facts.

Curating the disparate, good/bad, high/low/ profit/loss, success/failure, happy/sad, yes/no.

By curated choice, an act of conscious will, reinforced by the result, good high profit success happy yes.

I found early in life the happily ever after.

I realize I have been blessed with joy.

Not a day goes by that I realize how lucky I was, and still am.

I had those deliriously happy sixty years of marriage, and you can’t take that away from me.

But wait! There’s more!

I posted on the day, September 9, 9/9. a poem about fashion. It’s an early effort. I was trying to find words to approach a realization of Shirley’s fashion sense.

That’s just one of the things about her. She knew fashion in all its forms and iterations. She felt it in her bones. She knew what worked, what didn’t.

She liked reading the fashion magazines, subscribed to some. She was always way past up to date with the latest. But she could judge, sagaciously, and was constantly refining her judgment. She was ahead of the curve.

In her teens, she worked at a clothing store for children, and she outsold everyone. She found the perfect match for the happy customers who trusted her judgment because she was right. The owners wanted to keep her when her family moved. They were not picky about the minimum employment age. She was under sixteen.

So many years later, when she worked at the Folk Tree and The Folk Tree Collection, she sold everything to everybody because she had internalized the essence of the fashions of folk art from everywhere in the world.

That’s why customers asked for her. She knew what they wanted and needed, often before they knew it themselves.

“You’re so right! I do look better in this!”

The Great and the Near Great sought her out, sometimes would not deal with anybody else. She was the one who knew.

The Wealthy Woman who owned a whole island off the Canadian West Coast, would drive down thousands of miles in her custom limousine, the chauffeur holding the door for her, then loading the piles of packages into the car to capacity. She bought thousands of dollars’ worth at a time, and drove all that way just to talk to and buy from Shirley.

Movie Stars patronized the store. Helena Bonham Carter was almost a regular. Elmer Bernstein, his Oscar for the music for To Kill a Mockingbird, would talk at length and follow her around the store. I think he’s the one who came looking for gifts for his illustrious guests at a dinner party he was hosting. Shirley was a genius at finding just the thing to fill a need, at the same time clearing inventory of an item that wasn’t selling. She brought him ivory chopsticks, beautiful, expensive. He bought two dozen. He had money. He and his guests were very happy.

Bob Mackie (we’re talking fashion) was our local Hollywood fashion icon. We all remember, when he designed all the costumes for the Carol Burnett Show, that famous scene from the antebellum south which had gone with the wind, how Carol as the Mistress of the Plantation struggling with no money to dress up for a fete, looked at the curtains hanging in the window, mused, then…cut to her descending down the stairs, lavishly dressed in full curtain, extending a yard beyond each shoulder as the curtain rod held the draping drapes, she paused by the naked window to be sure we got the picture, then descended, saying with offhand modesty, “It’s just something I saw in the window.”

Big laugh.

Reminds one of Maria making play clothes for the Von Trapp children from the windows in her bedroom.

The Great Bob Mackie. Turns out, Shirley and he went to high school at the same time, cross town rivals. Lots to talk about, compare notes. They might have even encountered each other back then.

And Shirley also was a buyer for the store. She went to the Fabric District in L. A. where imports and the latest world fashions were unloaded directly from the L. A. docks to display for the authorized buyers for Department Stores, independents, Beverly Hills, Rodeo Drive. Shirley knew her stuff, could read the signs and see the fashion future.

She bought in bulk because she knew. The store was nervous, “Too many!” but they sold like hotcakes on a hungry morning, sold out, needed re-orders.

It was her deep awareness that underpinned and infused her life, in everything, especially creative art.

That’s why, as she advanced in Dance, Ballet, climbed the Royal Ballet ladder, she immediately attracted attention. She understood and embodied from the very start the essence of creative art.

Dance, ballet, is a full body and out of body experience. Her beautiful body was music. The teachers recognized it, gave scholarships, tried to lure her into their companies.

And she did it all, knew the latest trends and dance fashions, globally. At UCLA, in World Arts and Cultures, her major, when the Department brought over the icon of African Dance to perform, demonstrate, lead classes to broaden the students, the students dropped like flies, one by one, and Shirley was the only one left standing, still dancing.

The teacher said, “Damn, girl, you got it!”

Shirley said, “Royal Ballet.”

I could go on and on, and I have, and will. But I started with fashion, and our anniversary.


A sudden offhand squib:

I am ready
to go steady
with the memory of you.


I was a poor fashion companion. I didn’t care how I looked, was unaware.

She dressed me up respectably,
so she could then be seen with me.
I still don’t know
the way I show
my outer inner
self at dinner
parties. I would heart ease,
dress as I please.
Now I’m no longer needed
to accompany her receded
presence, though we dance
in memory, the only chance
now, when in life
I never learned to dance my wife.


But, moving on, the day, our anniversary.

“What would you like to do today, Dad, to celebrate? You can just stay home if you want. Hurry up and get dressed, we’re ready to leave!”

I wanted Rasputin Records and Amoeba Music. I’m collecting DVDs of old or classic movies otherwise unavailable, and performances of opera and ballet.

Closed on Tuesday, both of them. I should have remembered that.

So, on to the Berkeley Library Used Book Store. I wondered if they remember me.

Yes, they do.

And not just because of that time when I was looking for literary magazines and journals to see which ones I’m in. “They’re slow sellers, not much call for that stuff, here’s what we have, this shelf.”

I bought almost the whole shelf, which gave them room for other more saleable things. They were overjoyably grateful, so of course they remember me.

And because I gave them my card which leads to my blog. I’m exaggeratedly obvious about that as I prattle with intellectual insight, which should not only help them remember me by impact, but also lead to the blog, which, I suspect, they’re not reading. I have to remind them.

I looked at the tray of DVDs, set four aside for consideration, and headed straight to the back corner where the music is.

They have shelves of music scores, instrumental, vocal. Last time I bought Verdi arias for baritone, and Schubert, Volume III, for low voicer. That’s me, low voice, pretty low, but not as low as you can get. This time it was Brahms songs, two volumes, low voice. And a promising collection of selected songs by Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Strauss, probably Wolf, middle to low voice.

Many of the songs I know and love. Some I have sung, even in public, even on the radio.

I really should learn to read music.

Then, “Where do you wanna go next, Dad? Pegasus Books?”

“Not right now. Isn’t it approximately time to eat? All I had for breakfast and lunch was one cup of coffee, in anticipation of the feast, because I know where we’re going.”

“Me too,” said Chaz, “Same here, breakfast and lunch, same reason, coffee, but two cups.”

So we drove around Berkeley to Angeline’s and parked right in front.

Last year at this time, we went to Miceli’s in Hollywood. Shirley and I had gone there as often as we could. Her Greek father introduced us to the place and we went there with family, then more often on our own. As often as we could. It’s the real deal. Home cooked Italian food, wine bottles hanging from the ceiling, waiters and waitresses singing at the piano, hoping to be discovered. And the owner talked with us at length as we shared memories. He gave us lapel pins celebrating their anniversary, 75 years. They beat me by ten.

This year we’re in the Bay Area, so it was Angeline’s.

Angeline’s Louisiana Kitchen. Cajun style. (See how I brought style and fashion back into the conversation?).

Shirley loved the place, so, in her honor and memory.

The waiter was exceptional, as all their waiters are. Intelligent, insightful, sorry for my loss, knows the menu, responded when I lightened the mood.

As usual I ordered water. It’s free. Allows me to afford to pay for the meal. I insisted. Let me do something.

We were three at a table of four. I put my phone on the place setting next to me, with the empty chair on my right.

This was a celebration. I was curating my life. (I decided I like the word curate, and use it (too) often.)

For me, of course, the BBQ ribs. That’s what Shirley ate. You can’t get better.

For Kristina, catfish with salubrious potato salad and I don’t know whatever, hush puppies, round and brown and tempting.

Chaz had the magic chicken which also has a preparation name which I forget. I was not surprised by his order. Last time it was jambalaya, but I know how he likes his chicken.

I myself juggled the possibilities of jambalaya and gumbo. I stuck with the ribs. They stick to your ribs. But I want to come back, soon, and eat everything on the menu.

Our waiter, Mateo, was so kind to let me be funny, and he refilled my water without me even having to ask.

We shared a dessert with three spoons, and boxed up my last two ribs, with a bit of Kristina’s catfish and a hush puppy. Tomorrow I’ll share my ribs, one to Chaz, one to Kristina. Unless I wake up before them hungry. Then all bets are off.

Then we got home, and I had us watch Beasts of the Southern Wild. I was recommending it for years, and they finally gave in. The girl in the movie is called Hushpuppy.

I’m so happy we have holidays.

It gives me a chance and excuse to celebrate.

As I curate my life, I celebrate a lot.