The Food was Great but…………

I haven’t been going to the monthly luncheons at the senior hall since my Gathering Girls group got organized and is giving me the kind of interaction with others that I was craving. In fact I haven’t been to one since last Thanksgiving but I found myself signing up for this year’s turkey dinner again. I figured if I don’t get any invitations for the holiday at least I’d have this one turkey dinner under my belt. I love turkey and it’s not like I can bake a whole bird all for myself. Well, I could but how depressing would that be? As many widows have no doubt experienced, in the first few years I got the ‘pity invitations’ for Thanksgiving Day which are well intended and do---in hindsight---help us more than we’d like to admit. In the beginning of widowhood that feeling of being alone in a celebrating group of people is not fun and what better way to walk through that fire for the first time than to be with people who would understand if our tears appear? So we find ourselves seated at a decked out table and it all looks so normal while the newly minted widows are anything but normal on the inside.

That was me six Thanksgivings ago and the pity invitations no longer come. Life go on after a spouse dies and I know a few widows who resent that those pity invitations don’t continue coming but, in my mind, that’s to be expected. Family sizes change---yadda, yadda, yadda---and new widows or widowers come along that need the pity invitations more than seasoned widows. Widows at a holiday table are like outfits in the fashion industry, you’re either in or you’re out. Very few become classics that return year after year. As Waylon Jennings used to sing, “Lawdy Lawd woe is me. Ain't a body would care I got a slow rollin' low…” coming into my head. 

Actually, any slow rollin’ low I might feel coming on is more seasonal related than holiday or widow related. We got our first snow over the weekend, a prelude to 3-4 months of never knowing from one day to the next if I’ll get sidelined at home by bad roads and cancellations. I know, I know, it’s time to get out the knitting needles or paint brushes or otherwise keep myself so busy being Suzie Homemaker that I don’t have time for the winter blues to settle in, not to mention that it’s way too early to let thoughts of pity parties dance around in my head like sugarplum fairies. 

By Monday the snow we got was nearly gone---just patches left in the shade and a sweet little snowman smiling at me from across the street---and I had things to do. One of those things was getting a haircut, $38 including tip and not for the first time I wish I could get my haircut at the dog’s foo-foo beauty spa. He gets a bath, haircut, pedicure and lots of loving hugs and kisses for $50. Such a bargain. Levi goes to a shop that has a 50-ish year old guy groomer who specializes in schnauzers and he tells me that Levi is the best natured and best mannered schnauzer he’s ever met. Put a feather in my dog mothering cap. Back in the day when we'd go "over the meadow and through the woods" to my mom's house for holiday dinners our dog was always as welcome as her grandkids.

Yesterday at the luncheon a guy about my age asked if he could sit next to me and the two of us started a free-wheeling and friendly conversation. As it turned out he was the after lunch entertainment and by the end of his act, he was crying like a baby and he wasn’t the only one in the room doing so. He’s a chalk artist who drew a mural of the bronze statue that memorializes the six Marines raising the U.S. flag during the Battle of Iwo Jima in 1945 while the artist’s wife---ya, I was disappointed that he had one---read Veterans Day stories including one about those six particular Marines. Only two of them survived the battle and one---Ira Hayes, a full-blooded Pima Native American---was memorialized in a song that both Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan recorded. “When Ira started drinkin' hard, jail was often his home. They'd let him raise the flag and lower it like you'd throw a dog a bone! He died drunk early one mornin' alone in the land he fought to save, two inches of water in a lonely ditch was a grave for Ira Hayes.” 

The artist had been working in 'invisible' chalk that looks white until illuminated by a black light, all very boring to watch until the end when a panel of lights came on and made the statue and flag mural appear as if by magic while a burst of patriotic songs cane over the loud speakers. One by one the audience stood up until everyone was on their feet in a silence tribute, broken when the crying artist finally spoke a few words of apology for breaking up then everyone started clapping. I left the senior hall wishing I’d stayed home and ate a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. The food was great but that hour of patriotism-on-speed was emotionally draining.  ©

Wright, Van Gogh, Beethoven and my Plans for Immortality

This week I took part in a Frank Lloyd Wright marathon down at the senior hall starting with a book discussion of Loving Frank and ending with a viewing of a PBS documentary by Ken Burns. Over five hours between the two. It would have been even longer if I’d signed up for the bus trip portion the next day to tour a classic Prairie house that Wright designed. I’ve been inside that house several times in the past and had no desire to see it again. I’m not a fan of its rigid, tightly controlled interiors but since my secret desire from age twelve to forty-five was to be an architect, I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to learn more about a man that many call a genius, thus the time I invested in the marathon was worth it. 

PBS describes the films we us saw this way: This two-part documentary explores the life of one of America's greatest architects -- hated by some, worshiped by others and ignored by many. Using archival photographs, live cinematography, interviews, newsreel footage and home movies, the film tells the story of Wright's turbulent life and his extraordinary professional career.” 

Built over 800 buildings including the Guggenheim Museum, known for his huge overruns, a hustler and a salesman/showman as well as a genius engineer and designer, Wright was unique. His personal life was riddled with scandal---left is first wife with a ton of unpaid bills and six kids to raise while he ran off to Europe with a married woman and never looked back. Got married two more times, had two more kids, Wright lived way above his means but he didn’t seem to care. His personal motto was, “Live in the now.” And just to keep his beloved Taliesin house in Wisconsin, his friends had to bail him out of bankruptcy on several occasions.

After leaving the movie marathon, I got to thinking about other people who put their mark on the creative world who were troubled or outrageous in their personal lives. Vincent Van Gogh of Starry Night fame, for example, a post-impressionist painter who suffered with what people now guess was bi-polar issues. He killed himself at age 37 and was said to have cut off his ear in a fit of madness. (Although not all historians agree on whether he or his friend Paul Gauguin lopped off the ear with a sword during a fight.) Then there’s Georgia O’Keeffe, considered to be pioneer of American modernism. I hate, HATE her canvases of enlarged flowers and I have no clue why one of them sold for 44.4 million 3-4 years ago. She was legendary for her “independent spirit” but her personal life was filled with anxiety, depression and hostility. And who could leave out Beethoven in a discussion of famous works created by people with a messed up personal life? Alcoholic, extreme highs, suicidal lows. Ken Burns compared him to Wright because near the end of his life when he could no longer hear the music Beethoven wrote the notes on paper to create masterpieces that have passed the test of time and Wright, well into his 80s, did the same with innovative and pioneering engineering concepts. 

What does it take to be so creative that your work is your immortality---to be a genius in your genre like Beethoven and Wright? Do you have to be a self-absorbed ass-breath? Someday will, say, Harvey Weinstein’s cutting-edge achievements in film production, his 194 credits, be a large enough legacy to transcend his personal failings and flaws? Will students of film study his movies like architect students study Wright, overlooking the people Weinstein hurt like the people Wright hurt fell by the wayside? Does art---The Work---rise above its creator? Or do the scandals, the whispers of wrong-doing, the self-promotions and the self-adsorptions actually help to elevate their greatness---calling attention to the mystique of the misunderstood artist that translates into upping their commercial value after death?

I really want answers because when I turn 80 and check myself into a nursing home I want to be the next Grandma Moses. I want to get “discovered” by a newly minted arts and activities director for building fanciful structures out of Popsicle sticks and paper clips and or for painting noses and lips, eyeballs and ears swapped out of their proper places on portraits of my fellow inmates. I want my work to make me immortal but I don’t want to be considered crazy or misunderstood until I’ve got someone else lined up to do my laundry and fix my meals. ©

Cool Guys and Uppity Women

Poor planning on my part left me with an hour and a half to kill in between getting a haircut and The Gathering (for people looking for friends) at the senior hall. It was a beautiful, sunny day and I found myself sitting outside at Starbucks drinking a pumpkin spice latte, eating a bacon, Gouda and egg sandwich and doing my best imitation of a wanna-be writer. My notebook and pen were almost salivating at the prospect of describing a gentleman in his late forties sitting near-by. He was wearing sandals, the palest pink shorts I’ve ever seen---probably once white that had clandestine affair in the washing machine with a red sock---and he paired the shorts with a lavender and blue plaid shirt. His long blonde hair was tucked behind his ears, his sunglasses were perched on the top of his head as he read a hardcover book and sipped on his blended drink. Two girls next to me were talking office politics and I listened for awhile but not so intently that I missed it when lean and lanky Mr. Cool Guy finally closed his book and walked by me. He smiled. I smiled back. It was like being served dessert. As he walked toward his car, in my mind I could hear Travis Tritt singing: 

And it's a great day to be alive

I know the sun's still shining

When I close my eyes

There's some hard times in the neighborhood

But why can't every day be just this good

While I was still basking in the aftermath of Mr. Cool Guy’s smile, my nephew’s mother-in-law stopped her Ford next to the railing of Starbucks’ patio and yelled out, “Hi, Jean!” I felt like I’d been caught with my hand in the proverbial cookie jar. Darn it! I wanted to keep thinking about the guy who was self-confident enough to wear pink shorts and carry a hardcover book around in public. I go to Starbucks all the time but that was the first time I’ve ever sat outside and I’d do it more often if I thought “dessert” came with it every time. Was he one of those guys who smiles at everyone or did he instinctively know I was writing about him? If only we had been from the same generation, we could have been a good match. He likes to read. I like to write and I sure could use a proofreader in my life plus I wear enough red clothing that I always have a full load of reds for the washer. No colors and whites have ever accidentally done the hokey-pokey in a batch of my laundry. I’ll put that in my profile should I ever decide to join one of those online dating sites for seniors.

Saturday was another perfect weather day and I had the pleasure of going to an Art in the Park show and having lunch with two of my Gathering Girls friends. It was a juried event with 35 artists showing their pottery, jewelry and visual arts along the river in my adopted hometown. As we looked around a booth with ceramics I picked up a fancy gadget and asked the artist, “Okay, what is it?” and he replied, “A wine bottle stopper.” “Ah, no wonder I didn’t recognize it,” I said, "I don’t drink.” A stranger standing near-by put her hand on my arm and in a tone usually reserved for comforting newly minted widows she said, “I’m so sorry to hear that.” I started laughing and she started apologizing for her sense of humor. I love art shows. They draw some interesting people like the guy who excitedly announced, "Siri is talking in my pocket!" Apparently, she/his phone was answering questions he'd been asking his companion.

At another booth I accidentally insulted an artist...or maybe it was the other way around? I'm not sure. She had a half dozen 3' x 5' canvases (minus their stretchers) hanging on a clothesline. They reminded me of some canvas floor cloths I used to make and that I’ve seen before at art shows. (Canvas floor cloths have been around since colony days, they're the forerunner to linoleum and they come back around from time to time in the decorative arts world.) After the artist in the park told us that her canvases were ready for framing---not!---I asked her if she’s ever turned them into floor cloths. “My dear, these canvases sell for $600! You wouldn’t want to walk on them.”

Her uppity tone made me want to be snippy back at her, but I said, “Floor cloths are protected with layers and layers of varnish.” And I bit my tongue to keep from saying any more. How did she know I wasn't a rich bitch who wouldn't think twice about walking on a $600 throw rug? First rule of sales: don't judge what's in a customer's bank account. I also wanted to point out that I've seen canvas floor cloths go for higher than $600 and that her impressionistic swans were overpriced. But I’m basically a nice person who would no more say that out loud than I would have told Mr. Cool Guy that his smile made me want to shout out, “It’s a great day to be alive!” But I do worry about the day when the filter in my brain wears out and my all thoughts come rolling down my tongue, randomly flattering or insulting strangers in my wake. ©

 

Link to Kathy Cooper's site: Modern Floor Cloth Artist