Memories

My memories are not the misty, watercolour memories Barbra Striesand sings about-well, maybe a few-that magical evening on a terrace high above Laguna Beach at twighlight could only be rendered in Watercolours-thats the pink, blue, lavender, orange, green world created by the ethos of that moment in time.

I have many memories like slightly overexposed polaroid pictures-the bright colours are too bright-there is subtlety lacking and the faces are a little blurred.

A beautiful sparkly girl bathed by washes of magenta and midnight blue with white ostrich plumes as the curtain comes down and the music swells---a dark swarthy man with a blazing white smile full of promises and danger on a street in Tunisia where everything is pools of light and swimming shadows.

The first times of our lives are usually captured in this way-it's amazing how many people's first memory of the Grand Canyon is that Disneyesque vista of incomprehensible majesty usually at some hour near sundown when the surfaces are washed with colours that only the setting sun can paint.

As a city boy I was used to a dark sky with a few bright stars or that medium range sky of a nebulous colour as the city lights reflect upward and obscure and subtly of tones and shades-the moon is the best feature of a city sky.

I once found myself on a dark road not too far from Jackson, California in the Gold Country of the Sierra Nevada foothills at midnight and stepping out of the car I forced myself not to look up until, I took a deep breath and then almost fell to my knees at the view of a sky white with stars, clouds of gas-the slash of the milky way-overwhelming.

I was probably in my 30s.

You see pictures but pictures are someone elses vision-have you ever noticed how many photographs people take they label as disappointing?

Doesn't do it justice...you have to see it in person.

The Eiffel tower, the view from Sacre Coeur, the Colosseo de Roma in the light of a full moon, the colour of the water in the sea near Corfu, Old Faithful, the first view of the Yosemite Valley-the great plains seen as you descend on Highway 70 (?) from the Ricky Mountains,,,so many more.

One late afternoon we wander in some ruins near the North Rim of the Grand Canyon and the setting sun made them glow red light they were hot embers.

Driving along the eastern side of the Rockies toward Denver, Colorado I noticed amongst the cattle deer and antelope....playing...against a cerulean blue sky going dark and the moon rose behind the scene.

Venice at Sunset,

Mesa Verde at twilight.

Niagara at dawn or just pre-dawn when the mist from the falls becomes pink, peach and apricot-if there is snow so much the better.

People I remember differently-maybe because they are so animated-hard to make a flash memory.

I remember being awed by how beautiful the people on Ipanema Beach in Brazil were-almost ethereal with their cocoa skin, white teeth and green eyes- unflawed and perfect bodies.

Men in Rome-swarthy breathing imitations of the David statue-their dark curls fall like Botticelli or Leonardo ran a hair salon they have just emerged from.

The rich fashionistas of Paris and Milan-oblivious of their surroundings unless something in a window catches their eye- Hermes, Boucheron, Cartier---perfectly dressed creatures with all the accessories...stratospherically high needle heels on their impossibly expensive shoes.

Opening night at Covent Garden watch the gowns and jewels on parade and try to do a flash calculation of what it all cost-better to just enjoy the show and avoid depression.

I remember standing an a chilly evening watching a European movie star wearing a strapless gown and my friend whispering the 6 digit cost of the diamonds she was wearing and added "Hers, not hired".

I remember the first time I was in the house when one of my stage productions opened and the audience applauded the set when the curtain rose...

I have so many memories...

Petting a Tiger, cuddling a litter of kittens, having a python around my neck. riding a camel (and an elephant) seeing a panda in a zoo and seeing a snow leopard in the wilds of Tibet...

It's hard to think that all those pictures will go with me when I move on to whatever is next-if the universe really is all a programmed computer someone did a pretty wonderful job for me...

The visual memories are easy the more esoteric memories escape quickly-I don't remember the first time I drank coffee or the first time I kissed someone I loved or thought I loved or my first orgasm-all those things have escaped from my data banks.

I think that's why so many of us like art, films, food and photography there are bits of our visceral memories in those things-a sunset can have some of the quiet awe of being quietly in love and the rush of the first drop of a roller coaster is not unlike that little death, breathless moment of sex.

Strawberries and Figs, Musky melons, honey...all things people connect to love and love-making.

I have those kinds of feelings when I smell clean towels, fresh from the dryer or the salt spray of a warm ocean...

Gardenias, Freesias, Tuberose all remind me of Paris-Baking bread and garlic are Rome but Lemon blossoms are Tuscany...Linden Flowers and evergreens: Germany...

My memories are also more abstract-the night Barak Obama was elected president and I was so afraid someone would shoot at him-my first night working at Disneyland walking across the park in my new Orleans Square costume and greeting the guests, my firs tour on my own at Universal studios and the tour where I had Price Feisal and Jane Fonda on the same tram...My curtain call the first time I sang Sharpless in Madam Butterfly and my curtain call after my solo spot in the Lido Show on the Champs Elysees...selling a drawing at a street show for a price that would pay my rent for 2 months
and being recognized and asked for an autograph at a painting convention.

My bad memories I try my best to process and file away-unless they had a lesson in them the serve only to give me or someone else pain but I will never forget the feeling of anger and betrayal when I woke to find Donald Trump was president.

Odd isn't it how someone's joy can be someone else's worst nightmare?

I watched a great show today on Netflix -the first episode of a new interview show that David Letterman is hosting-his guest was Barrack Obama-so many people hate President Obama I don't understand why especially when we have a maniac running the country now.

I found it so touching to see how the usually sarcastic, acidic David Letterman was genuinely touched by spending an hour interviewing the ex-president and I realized how much I missed him and Michele-I was always sorry that he came into the White House at a time that was so full of traps and anger and also sorry that he wasn't warmer, his wife certainly tried to shower warmth upon America.

But my memories of him are good-I didn't (and don't) hold the resentments of so many people...

In the library of memories he isn't sunrise at Big Sur or a shooting star over Castle Rock he is a quiet memory of a time when I felt safe in my country and had hope that things were getting better.

Most memories come with attachments and addendums-did you ever notice?

So few are just how much sundown in Connecticut can look like a Maxfield Parrish Painting or how well the music from Wagner's Ring Cycle goes with a cruise down the Rhine River.

Even with those simple, uncluttered memories there is someone waiting to remind yo that Parrish is a sentimental painter of Calendar art and Wagner, the Rhine and Germany all equate to the NAZIS and Hitler.

We live in a time when it is wrong to like what others hate, fear or distrust...

I am not a great lover of organized religion or the right wing but I made sure I sad MERRY CHRISTMAS a lot and loudly this year-it has nothing to do with some political stance it's about my happy memories of Christmas past and how we celebrated.

I'm tired of people raining on my parade or anyone else's-the confederate Flag may have horrible memories for people but it is a part of our history-suppressing Nazi memorabilia will not change the outcome of the holocaust those things are etched in our memories.

I remember back in the 60s there were many "underground" newspapers that held alternate views and often showed REALITY instead of whitewashed middle of the road news.

One sticks in my mind as a vivid memory-the front page had a photo pf a dead soldier's head with a large hole in his forehead and his brains spilling out.

Even in black and white it made a memory.

Hearing a number of how many men died in Vietnam was so abstract and often people compared it to the 2nd world war- The war casualties are somewhere between 55 and 100 THOUSAND soldiers-often MIAs and others are forgotten or overlooked-two hundred thousand Japanese civilians died just in Hiroshima and another 130+thousand in Nagasaki-over 30 thousand American soldiers died in the gulf war...

The Japanese died on the own soil our men died fighting in foreign lands...

I'm not sure what the message is but the memory is there...

I buried at least 26 of my closest friends in the AIDS Plague I know many more people who died-being in the arts it decimated so many people I knew and worked with but also just people from life.

Despite what our personal feelings are we must honor the dead-people who died for what they believed in or just because they were victims of wars and conflicts.
We must NEVER forget lest we be doomed to repeat the tragedies.

I feel like we are all in jeopardy and peril today what will our memories be like in the future and moreover what will the memories be of our children and grandchildren?

I had hoped that future generations would have memories of the American Flag flying against a sunset standing for all good things, peace, justice, equality...

I don't think that will be the case.