My economic history cont. To satisfy the gods of SEO, I must write “not write.” Having done so, back to my résumé. In January of 1992, I sent a proposal for an article to Jim Roberts, the editor of Bass Player. He accepted it, and it was published as “The Bass Gods of Japan” in…
Things I never considered, part 80 trillion
April 24, 2014
I just got an e-mail that prompts me to post about something I never considered. It was a long message full of instructions on how I should change the way I write and live. I’ll address just one point because in our current culture, the classes are pitted against each other, and I don’t want…
A squall
April 24, 2014
I had a very strange experience last night: a squall of uncontrollable emotion. It shows that things are always in flux. I guess I’ve buried some aspects of my life instead of accepting and incorporating them. The work must continue. After I take my nightly meds, I watch YouTube videos for a while, until I’m…
Goodbye is Forever
April 9, 2014
On page 267 of Ghosts and Ballyhoo, I describe how the Cardinal Ghost Carmen explained why the Arcadia song “Goodbye is Forever” choked me up. She said it was just a matter of the harmonies eliciting an emotional response. To her it was only a song. Many women—including my mother—have told me that it’s much…
Confession
April 5, 2014
I have a confession to make. Here’s my brother Tim and his friend Winston, our next-door neighbor in Campo Verde, Tia Juana, Venezuela. The two redheads were so similar that they even broke their left arms in April of 1968. Tim was pretending to be Tarzan. He tried to swing from one branch to another…
The postal service missed one
April 3, 2014
Well, the US Postal Service theft ring missed one. The reason is because it was sent domestically instead of from Europe. The funny thing is, this is the most valuable purchase I’ve ever made. It’s an original watercolor by Friedrich Ludwig Scharf (1884-1965), an artist who served in the Imperial German Army during World War…
The man in the hardware store
March 27, 2014
I saw a man in the hardware store. He was unremarkable from behind, but when he turned around, I initially couldn’t identify what I was seeing. It simply did not compute. Then I almost screamed. He was only a few years older than me and didn’t have an ounce of fat anywhere else on his…
Not your problem
March 16, 2014
I’m mentally ill. But it’s not your problem. Some of my mental illness is genetic. I have clinical depression on both sides of the family. One relative lived by herself for decades, filling each room of her house with junk until there were piles that reached the ceilings. She used a chamberpot and emptied it…
Put the pie back
March 11, 2014
When we’ve settled Mom and Dad’s estates and sold the three houses and their contents, Tim and I plan on moving to Austin, Texas. We’re a bit nervous about it. From 1972 to 1975, we lived in Tyler, Texas. It wasn’t very fun. We were aliens from Venezuela, and this was a different era. But…