Tag Archives: childhood memories

THE HEAVENS DECLARE THEMSELVES

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Life, actually…
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THE HEAVENS DECLARE THEMSELVES
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When young, I used to lie nights on the roof of my parents’ home and listen to the stars.
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You can hear stars, you know. It just takes some patience.
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All you need in order to listen to the stars late at night on a roof is a ladder, a quilt or blanket, a notepad, a pencil, maybe some binoculars or a small telescope, perhaps a penlight, possibly some long sleeves and pants to deter the biting and stinging critters.
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If you can’t find all these objects, you will discover that you don’t need them at all.
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All you have to do is find a way to the roof and hope against hope that ambient human-made lights won’t occlude your view.
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Just lie flat on your back face-up, cradle your head in your hands, and spread yourself open to the immediately viewable universe.
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Don’t expect to be overwhelmed at first. It takes a couple of dozen minutes for your eyes to adjust to the night.
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Then, hold on to the sky and traverse the heavens with ears and eyes and all operating senses.
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There will be color. You will see every fine shade of color you can imagine, colors you never knew were there all along.
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If you lie still long enough, you’ll see meteors—tiny instant streaks of literal stardust that etch the view. Now and then a lone and steady aircraft will arc from horizon to horizon. On really lucky nights, you may glimpse an earthling-crafted satellite scurrying above to the nearest available rabbit hole.
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During special times, you can spot a comet floating solid against the turning sky.
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Sometimes the Moon grins at you, its mystic reflection of the Sun often so bright you can’t see the surrounding sister suns. Once the Moon has gone away, on another night, the points of light will reappear, even though they never went away at all.
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If you’re fortunate, an hour or two of this ancient practice of staring up will set everything in life in proportion, make daily annoyances seem petty and time-consuming, make you humble and grateful all at once—humbled by the incredible expansiveness of it all, grateful that you bothered to stare somewhere besides at the consistently pervasive abuse of the spirit caused by activities of daily living on the small planet.
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Once your eyes begin accepting the handiwork of the heavens, you’ll begin to hear the stars. They will speak to you, tell you stories, impart their philosophies and ideas, cause you to grin ear to ear, make you shed a tear in wonder…and maybe, if you are among the fortunate few who are not afraid of words, you will want to start taking dictation, becoming the scribe of the night, passing forward your wonder and wizened knowledge.
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Maybe you will write down something so ancient and perfect that some reader somewhere will be inspired to sneak outside on a clear evening and play hooky to life…
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On a roof under the dome
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© Jim Reed 2023 A.D.
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Once Upon a Time, Long Before You and Me

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http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/onceuponatimelongbeforeyouandme.mp3

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Saturday, October 12, 2013 A.D.

Once upon a time, long before you and me, my mother was born.

Yesterday would have been her 100th birthday.

“WOULD have been her 100th birthday” doesn’t sound exactly right. Actually, it WAS her 100th birthday, she just couldn’t be here to celebrate in person. Or rather, I couldn’t be where she is to celebrate. There are cosmic barriers to such things, you know.

Tomorrow, I will travel to Cuba, Alabama, to visit my mother’s baby sister, Aunt Margaret McGee Hardin. The occasion, husband Uncle Lamar’s 90th birthday, is as good an excuse as any…an excuse to enter the heart of the heart of the Alabama countryside and check up on the Theory of Relativity—that theory being, “In the long run, after all is lived and almost done, it’s Family that matters most, in both memory and reality.” No use trying to escape this theory, because olde times from childhood will not be forgotten, will continue to make themselves  known, will persistently rise up and remind you of your evolution from child of the womb to child of the universe to child of the unknown After Here.

On the way to Aunt Margaret’s home, Liz and I will pick up sister Barbara Reed Partrich at our mother’s home on Old Eastwood Avenue in Tuscaloosa. Barbara has traveled from Columbia, South Carolina, to attend Uncle Lamar’s party.

On the way back from Cuba, maybe the three of us will visit Mom’s burial site to wish her a happy birthday, and stand at the nearby graves of our father and sister Rosi.

We will chat and laugh and reminisce and wipe away an occasional tear, and the lively conversation will include all six of us, since we know in our hearts exactly what Rosi and Mom and Dad would say if we could only hear them.

It will be a nice visit.

And maybe—just maybe—once upon a time in the near future, someone Liz and Barbara and I have left behind will do the same with us, be we coffin-bound or ash-scattered. We’ll be Somewhere Else, but the reunion will be fun anyhow.

At least, maybe the remaining celebrants will get a chuckle out of my epitaph, which will read, NOT EXACTLY WHAT I HAD IN MIND

 

© 2013 A.D. by Jim Reed

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Under the dome of Birmingham: Stalking the elusive mom and pop breakfast places

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http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/underthebirminghamdome.mp3

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The man of a certain age sits alone in the diner, his girth mastering most of the booth space.

He eats his breakfast as if he’s never eaten before, smacking and stuffing and sopping and glugging, like he’s not had a meal for days, though it’s evident that he’s been frequently well-fed and well-groomed. He leans into the food and stuffs away, his blow-dried sprayed whitening hair and monogrammed track pullover shirt quivering in the morning fluorescent light.

He is his own world for a few minutes in the crowded eatery.

Across the room, a mustachioed baseball-capped good ol’ boy with hand in napkinned lap eats mannerly and methodically, gazing all the while into the indiscernable space before him, ignoring the blaring TV set hanging from the ceiling.

Worldly waitresses, ears slanted from cached pencils, skillfully walk the tightrope assigned to their lot—the tightrope walk between appearing simultaneously aloof and chummy, careful to balance the roles of Mom and Flirt and Nurturer and Businesswoman while keeping all these morning shovelers of food happy and distant.

Four elderly men at Table 4 grunt and chat and laugh and tease as they relate oft-repeated stories about how the world is going to hell and how the young people these days…

They are having the best time they’ll have all day, for a smattering of minutes avoiding all responsibility and duty and honey-do tasks which will face them down later in the morning, no matter what.

One four-year-old sits with his grandmother and diligently stabs into waffles and syrup and butter with zeal usually assigned to a nervous dog digging for its favorite bone. In just a few years, he, too, will be trying to find the perfect breakfast place that replicates this perfect childhood experience he’s having right now.

He, like all of us in the diner, is imprinted with the combination of taste, texture, fragrance, feel of what it’s like to be in a safe, familiar, non-threatening place, being cared for by kindly strangers whose only goal is to feed you well and stay out of your way while you soak up all that nurturing atmosphere, the nurturing atmosphere you take with you to start the day right, even if later on, some grumbly non-breakfasted bastard wonders why you’re in a better mood than he is, and tries to take it all away from you

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Singing in the bathtub with Billy Eckstine and John Lee Hooker

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The Wanna-Be Billy Eckstine Bass-Baritone Life Plan Caper

I’m a barely-teenage superstar belting out my acapella rendition of “That Old Black Magic” in the privacy of the family bathtub, and my audience of none thinks it’s the best thing ever heard on planet earth.

That old black magic has me in its spell.

That old black magic that you weave so well.

Those icy fingers up and down my spine.

The same old witch-craft when your eyes meet mine.

The same old tingle that I feel inside

And then that elevator starts its ride *

The bathtub is private tonight because I have the house to myself for a while—a rarity because two parents and five kids usually live here.

This is back in the early 1950′s in Tuscaloosa, when pre-rock ‘n’ roll singers who make it to the top of their profession know how to enunciate and carry a tune and actually SELL lyrics to the listener. Once you hear the most dynamic of these performers, you are hooked for life.

Anyhow, I’m singing away in the bathtub, hoping against all hope that someday I’ll have a great voice that can belt out “That Old Black Magic” to beat the band, a voice that will make me the most popular kid on the block.

Among the best of the best of all pop singers is Billy Eckstine, whose powerful bass-baritone voice and sense of jazz-disciplined improvisation make him an icon alongside the great male vocalists of the day—Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, Nat “King” Cole, Mel Torme, Bobby Troup, Tony Bennett, Cab Calloway, Bing Crosby, Big Joe Williams, Harry Belafonte, Louis Armstrong, Sammy Davis Jr., Steve Lawrence, John Lee Hooker, Fred Astaire. These guys are wonderful storytellers and back in these times they all get to be heard on local radio stations. This is long before music appreciation becomes segmented and self-limiting, long before a true Sinatra fan isn’t allowed to appreciate Hooker, long before it is unfashionable to pair Lawrence with Williams, or Satchmo with Mario Lanza.

In my family household, a great singer is a great singer, regardless of genre or age or race or style…so we listen to Hank Williams and George Beverly Shea and Dean Martin and Leonard Warren and Homer and Jethro equally, because we know each has a talent that must be embraced and appreciated.

That’s why I’m anxious to be home alone now and then so I can bellow out songs that bounce off the tiles and echo my temporarily enriched tones. Today, I’m emulating Billy Eckstine, whose incredible range and clarity make me feel I could make any woman within the sound of my voice swoon.

Funny thing about my particular generation is that we not only love our own music, but we love our parents’ and grandparents’ music as well. Our recordings span half a century—waltzes and bebop and scat and honky tonk and opera and polka and Cajun and country and gospel and schmaltz and jazz and blues and satire all combine according to the mood of the moment.

Later, when I become a disc jockey, I get to play all these forms of music, perhaps the last time any disc jockey is accorded this honor. As soon as the mid-1960′s approach, radio stations begin segmenting, specializing, becoming frozen in playlists. But for a while, I get to ply my trade in several worlds:

At a public radio station, I play classical and opera and ballet, along with show tunes, jazz, folk and international sounds from various exotic cultures. At commercial radio stations, I play “mood” music, rock ‘n’ roll, pop, comedy tunes, country gospel, ol’ time religion, barber shop quartets, upper-crust sacred works—you name it, I am exposed to it. Plus, I get to expose my audience to this wondrous variety of talent.

Nowadays, in the nervous present, I find it difficult to explain my taste in music. Hip hop fans know nothing about bluegrass, punk rockers don’t know who Howlin’ Wolf is, opera enthusiasts look at me funny when I mention that John Denver made recordings with Pavarotti. And heaven forfend if I suggest that Dennis Day also sang with Spike Jones.

So, the evergreen memory I hold close is one of pretending that I, like Billy Eckstine and his generation, might actually, for a coupla seconds at a time, sound great.

This love of understandable lyrics carries me into the future and influences what I later do for pleasure. After all that practice emulating male superstar singers and male superstar actors (Richard Burton, Orson Welles, Laurence Olivier, Dick Martin), I grow up knowing how to make clear what I am saying, how to express the meaning behind the words. It serves me in good stead when, now and again, I get to perform in public, teach, act, communicate the love of great books. I have Billy Eckstine and all his buddies to blame.

So, many moons after the Tuscaloosa bathtub performance days, I still sing at the top of my lungs in the shower—but only when no-one is around. After all, the worst thing anyone could tell me is that I may sound more like Don Knotts than Eckstine.

Darling down and down I go,

‘Round and ’round I go,

In a spin, loving the spin I’m in

Under that old black magic called love! *

Denial of unpleasant truths is something I’ve honed to a fine art. It keeps me going forward, keeps me from facing unwanted realities, keeps me performing for my admiring shower stall audience of none

© 2013 A.D. by Jim Reed

( Listen to the man himself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SATmftj-Qbc )

(The above lyrics are verbatim from the original sheet music by Johnny Mercer and Harold Arlen. Lyrics found elsewhere on the internet are inaccurate–and mostly transcribed phonetically.)

jim@jimreedbooks.com

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Backtiming Your Life

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I’m in the middle of preparing breakfast, juggling the eggs, tomatoes, cheese, onions, potatoes, butter, jam, biscuits, so that they are all ready to eat at the exact same moment—what we old broadcasters used to call backtiming everything.

Backtiming? Here comes a memory:

Let’s go way back to the days before computers: as a radio announcer, I need to end my music show at exactly 8:59:50 pm, so that a nine-second station identification and “time check” can be performed precisely one second prior to ”hitting the network,” meaning that my sentence has to stop one beat before the network newsperson begins reporting news. It has to seem effortless to the listener, but as any professional performer knows, you have to work hard to look effortless. So, how do I make that musical piece end at exactly 8:59:50 pm? Well, I check the length of the final song on the program. Hmmm, it’s three minutes and 21 seconds long. So, in order to end perfectly, the record must begin at 8:56:29 pm. That means that what I am ad-libbing right before the record starts has to end at exactly 8:56.28pm, but sound easy and natural to the listener. The entire hour is pre-determined this way, working backwards and then proceeding forward. Thus the term backtiming. Everything has to be backtimed. 

Do this backtiming thing a few thousand times and you never again have trouble making things end at exactly the right instant. It’s all done with computers these days, so announcers no longer need to know this stuff.

Back to the kitchen and making breakfast.

I’m not a good cook, but I do know how to make everything happen at about the same moment. The oven has to be preheated, biscuits laid out and ready to insert on signal, the onions and potatoes are sauteeing nicely, starting just early enough to time out with the eggs and sausage, the tea must be made and ready to go, the utensils and plates and napkins appear just in time…everything has to be hot and presented together, or my little show will be ruined.

I do pull it off, and you’ll have to ask Liz whether the whole thing is worth it.

I am now father and grandfather to several good cooks, but I recall how they, too, had to learn to backtime, even though they never heard the term. Margaret, for instance, used to cook for the family one night per week when she was a pre-teen. Having never heard that magic word, she at first took several hours to get everything ready. She merrily prepared one course from beginning to end, then began the second course to completion, then the third. After a while, she caught on to the fact that if the courses existed in parallel universes, they could be put together simultaneously and dinner ready in less than an hour. This is something you teach yourself, and to this day, she’s an efficient and wonderful cook.

So why did this whole subject pop into my head? Well, like much of my writing, it started out as an essay on the memories that inanimate objects contain, but my fingers wrote something else. Maybe I’ll get around to the inanimate-object thingy next week.

Stay tuned for station identification

(c) 2012 A.D. by Jim Reed

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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