(Cafe) La Mama

I wasn't sure how/if this was ever going to be a topic of Lemons. But I managed to find a way to massage it into the mix. Today is Mother's Day. That is the segue. And hey. It's my story to tell, so no rules. I am an Aquarius after all.

The film in my mind scrolls backward. A fast spin to those salad days. frames whiz by. Several months into the autumn of my freshman year at Briarcliff. 1969. A'blaze with color. Dazzling. Leafy, technicolor brilliance showcasing our blooming ingenuity. Fuchsia petals of our burgeoning sensuality fringed in shades of hot pink. Innocent. Expectant.

The evening sky turned purple as the cranberry colored Rolls Royce pulled into the circular drive outside Dow Hall. No heads turned. This was Briarcliff where long haired, nubile ingenues accessorized their Landlubber jeans with Capezio ballet flats, Pucci undies and Gucci belts circling slim hips.

Jorie and I walked gracefully onto the cockle shell driveway. Our Dior overnight bags carefully placed in the boot next to her uncle's Louis Vuitton luggage. We slid primly onto the back seat. Behind the glass partition. Sipping sparkling water from crystal flutes.

A sterling cigarette case slipped through the hinged pass-through. We smiled. Ten perfectly rolled joints sat neatly side by side. Carefully we lifted one and lit it with the silver lighter on the drop down mahogany tray. The sweet pungent blue grey smoke twined gracefully as we drew it deep into our lungs. Paused. Then exhaled. Our minds floated gently above the fray. Away from mid-terms and roommates and house mothers guarding our flowers with strictly enforced parietals. And rules upon rules defining staid and proper loco in parentis guidance.

The village beckoned. Greenwich Village. Where her uncle, Michael Butler, a tall tanned obscenely handsome polo playing producer from Oak Brook, Illinois awaited our arrival from our Westchester County college. His elegant, lanky girlfriend, the Vogue model Minnie Beard, prepared to introduce the young sophisticates to avant-garde, Studio 54, Andy Warhol New York.

We arrived excitedly (and stoned) at the stage entrance of the Biltmore Theater on West 47th. A bearded hippie waist length dreadlocks led us dizzily through the maze of halls past dressing rooms, racks of costumes, last minute makeup and hair. The buzz of actors in various stages of pre-show dress smiled and mimed the scattering of pixie dust in our direction. We ambled through the glittery haze of blue smoke toward the wings of the theatre. I gasped. This was exhilarating in an over-stimulating, over-the-top way. And, I loved it. Alot.

Red velvet seats occupied slowly with patrons of all ages eager to witness the happening. Strains of instruments tuning wafted from the pit in front of the curtainless stage. My heart raced. Flashes of intense colors filled my head. We took our seats fifth row center. Sunk back cocooned by love.

The tribal love rock musical, the first of its genre, live on Broadway. A racially-integrated, counter-culture thumb to the nose aimed at ultra conservative industrial-military politicos wreaking havoc on our innocent, sybaritic selves. A societal revolution. My generation's multi-hued, irreverently staged hippie culture extravaganza replete with full frontal nudity, drug induced, anti-war, pot smoking, acid dropping not-trusting anyone over 30 effete intellectual snobs (to quote our illustrious Veep, Spiro). A psychedelic, theatrical be-in. No pigs allowed.

After the final curtain we headed with the cast and crew to chic, down and dirty Greenwich Village. The Rolls, pungent with sweet marijuana, floated on rain slicked roadways through deep into the bowels of Manhattan. Destination Bowery. Eased onto 4th Street. And glided to a halt in front of Cafe La Mama. Sophisticated, theatre of the absurd. It was well after midnight.

Long limbed Jorie gracefully emerged onto the rain glistened sidewalk. I slid out of the limo. The hems of my black velvet bellbottoms skimming the puddles. We were hurried behind the gold braided ropes into yet another blue hazed room. Flutes of champagne were passed by topless waiters as barely clothed patrons slunk into the pillowed banquettes. A shimmery silver lame curtain slipped erotically to the side of the teeny stage. Tweedledee-dees and dums (or so I thought) sang Chinese opera-style as erhus and ancient instruments kept tempo. My eyelids dropped heavy with the evening.

The sky tinged pink with the new day as we headed north up the Saw Mill River Parkway two days later to leafy Westchester. My mind, and life, inextricably enhanced. Never would I see it the same way. My unconventional journey was in full swing.

Gimme a head with hair, long beautiful hair. Shining, gleaming, steaming, flaxen, waxen. Give me down to there, hair! Shoulder length, longer. Here baby, there mama. Everywhere daddy daddy. Hair!

Around the World in Eighty Days

Lemons is global!

As of today Lemons, propelled by wanderlust, insatiable curiosity and off-the-cuff insights, has landed this Steel Magnolia on five continents! Welcome! Willkommen! Bienvenue! Recepción! Welkom! Vinda!

Even transported to South American where this trepid soul has not yet adventured. The Aussie wallabies downunder have yet to amble by to share some cheer and ramblings from this fork in the road. But are most welcome.

Interestingly, nearly every traveler outside the U. S. lives near the sea. Lusty breezes luring you to my coastal home.

And daily I open my arms to my new American friends visiting from the heartland, the northeast, the deep south and New England.

It is a pleasure most profound to be interconnected at home and abroad with you. Joined in outbursts of zany irreverence, sublime wit, brilliant observations, kindred spirits.

Cheers, fellow travelers! To the toasts of my town: Y'all comeback now. Ya hear?

Earth Day 1970

It seems like I was everywhere during the heady, waning days of the late sixties and early seventies. I was. And, I wasn't.

But this time I was.

Forty years ago today.

Philadelphia. Dogwood and magnolia blossoms in full bloom. Us, too.

The first Earth Day. April 22, 1970. An environmental teach-in.

Propelled by a sense of urgency. Threats to the environment. The burning Cuyahoga River. Acid rain. Napalm deforestations. We were killing our earth. The penultimate wasting asset. Our home. Our neighborhood. Decaying before our eyes.

Our idealistic ... and ironically quite logical ... Woodstock Nation sensibilities threatened. Mocked by multinational corporations, crop dusters, aging coal-fueled factories and a brand spanking new interstate highway system luring Detroit's automakers to quintuple output. Trains, buses, monorails ... public transportation infrastructure be damned.

In short, the globe's natural resources were depleting rapidly before our eyes. Acid rain poured into our rivers, our streams, our fishing habitats. Life sustaining water contaminated. Shrouds of heavy yellow smog and gritty coal particles from factories raging uncontrolled polluted the skies. We were killing the planet. One neighborhood at a time. Single-handed. Headed for hell in a handbasket.

Unconscionable trade-offs. Corporate interests v the health of our unborn children's children's children. We’re simply not going to all wake up, sing Kumbaya around a cackling camp fire and tackle these problems.

Altogether some 20 million people – 10% of the U.S. population – participated in 1970 Earth Day teach-ins, marches, and rallies across the country. Nearly half were students. I was one of them. On the Earth Day organizing committee. Lured by the promise of saving our habitat. Our planet. Hand-in-hand, but of course, with brilliant, motivated, mostly good looking (if you could imagine their fresh faces sans beards) college boys from all over the east coast. My Briarcliff suite mate, Jill Gardner, dating Larry Rockefeller got us the gig. Weekly treks to either The City (New York, of course), Philadelphia or D.C.

A happening. Inspired by the Apollo 11 moon landing the prior summer. We were energized. Propelled by the Moody Blues in their lyrical, psychedelic ode to our children's children's children born from Native American wisdom.

[© 1969 Deram/Polydor. All rights reserved.]

So where are we now? These 40 years later? Same place. Same destruction. Greying hair and apathy. Good God. The more we changed, the more we stayed the same.

Treat the earth well.

It was not given to you by your parents,

it was loaned to you by your children.

We do not inherit the Earth from our Ancestors,

we borrow it from our Children.

~ Ancient Indian Saying

Our radical, forward thinking uprising morphed four decades later into an innocuous Hallmark greeting card.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

Hey, ya fergot La Yogurt

It's all in a name. Smoke, ash and lava spewing forth from the "vowel-and-liquid-consonant-lubricated slopes" of Eyjafjallajökull, the volcano's 16-letter, six-and-a-half-syllable eruption that is shaking our modern boundaryless world by the balls. Reeking havoc on international flights. Delaying shipments of fresh flowers, techno gadgets and human organs. Not since Pompeii has there been more of a threat to civilization.

[Arnar Thorsson/Associated Press]

Global interruption. Movement halted dead in its tracks. Schedules emphatically delayed. Nonnegotiable. Irrevocable. No ability to engage in a dance of options and alternatives with a rogue nation. Mother Nature's very own atomic bomb spilling silica from a red-hot pimple. Oozing fire and sediment into the atmosphere. Iran and Al-Qaida silently taking claim.

Charlie and I were perplexed when we visited the magical, progressive Reykjavík in late November 2004 on our way to Scotland and a university tour. Land of the noontime moon. Sunrise at 1:30 in the afternoon. Dusk a few hours later. The Northern Lights shot psychedelic across the dark winter sky. Humored by the fact that Icelanders don’t have last names! They go by their first name followed by the name of their father. Gutrid Hansdóttir. Katrín Jakobsdóttir. And my always-in-the-swing-of-things fatherless son, Charles Alicesson, scarfed down his midday Yule smörgåsbord with gusto.

The Icelanders giggle at our confusion and momentary lapse in being know it alls. Mocking us gently. Perhaps it is their not-so-subtle attempt to fissure their financial obligations. An email is circulating cyberspace: “Put 30 billion euros in unmarked bills in a bag by the gate of the Icelandic embassy in London, and we’ll turn off the volcano.”

“Eyja” is the Icelandic word for island. “Fjalla” means mountain. “Jokull” is glacier. Simple really if we Americans knew the etymology of those Norse words.

We are stymied. English speakers don't even know where to start. How to break the name apart. Which syllables are for emphasis. Which silent. Do the consonants sound like the letter represented. Or another altogether. How do the double Ls come out sounding like a T? Jibberish. Jabberwocky. But hey, we cannot read, much less pronounce, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Mandarin, Greek, Russian or Latvian either. Icelandish. Outlandish, really.

With the NFL draft just a week away, maybe we better get cracking on teaching folks to pronounce “Ndamukong”.

I raise my icy glass of Aquavit. Cheers!

[Special thanks to New York Times for the pronunciation and translation. Note: Blog title is how the glacier is pronounced!]

Feed Your Head

It was 1969. One of those days I will never forget. Ever.

We emerged one toke over the line from the shabby Astor Place subway station. The bowels of the East Village. Seedy New York. The skies buzzed purple. The bare trees of Tompkins Square Park ominous in winter sleek. We moved as a unit. Swaying up the concrete steps pushed forward by gentle swarms of long haired, tie-dyed, bell bottomed kids into a brisk November evening. The air pungent. Sweet, smokey scents drifting from brass pipes with primo pellets. Burning Moroccan resin. Loosely wrapped Zig Zag papers burning unevenly with Kentucky Blue passed freely among the throngs of ebullient hippies, students. Anyone under thirty really. Reefer madness. Nixon was cringing in la maison blanche. We were floating.

It was a happening. My first. 1969. A few months into the Woodstock Nation. I had just arrived from the innocence of a southern childhood. Delivered expectantly into a city a buzz with change. I happily traded color-coordinated Pappagallo skimmer flats paired with matching Lady Bug heather skirt and sweater ensembles for the new costume of the day. Fringed tan suede vest beaded the colors of the rainbow cropped mid-thigh swaying gracefully over slim Landlubber very low cut jeans, the sleeves of my silk blouse billowing as they slipped unfettered from the Indian poncho I had borrowed earlier from Christine Palmer. Hints of my gold hoop earrings peeked tantalizingly through stray locks that framed my fresh, eager face, my thick chestnut hair grazing my nubile waist. Nothing matched. I was ecstatic.

Here we were. In the thick of the burgeoning Woodstock revolution. My heart raced. My eyes blurred with this sea of young humanity flowing along the sidewalks toward Bill Graham's rock palace. The Fillmore East.

The Jefferson Airplane silhouetted by an enormous silver cinema screen stretching floor-to-the-tippy-top of the proscenium. Reflecting a liquid light show. Flowing psychedelic art. The kaleidoscope of intense color swirling blobs, pooling, morphing from indefinable shape to another whether my eyes were shut or not. My very own Elvis painting on the black velvet screen of my inner eyelids. Cool. I made my way up the stairs leading to the balcony. First row center.

White Rabbit on You Tube

Gracie Slick sang of Alice's Adventures into Wonderland. I hung on her every word. The nimble white rabbit luring me further into a trance. Lyrical comparisons to the hallucinatory effects of psychedelic drugs such as magic mushrooms and unknown liquids commingled and interspersed with the imagery found in the fantasy works of Lewis Carroll's stream of consciousness tales penned a century before. References in this fabled song so obvious to my very stoned self: the seductive hookah-smoking caterpillar, gallant White Knight, bitchy premenstrual Red Queen, wise Dormouse ... and experimenting Alice herself. My favorite childhood stories woven into my newly adult sensibilities. Or so I imagined.

What does this euphoric memory of my younger college age self have to do with anything? Caught up in the moment. High on life. The intensity. The promise. Oh yes. I do remember. So I still have a few active brain cells in my much-needed-to-be defragged hard drive. File drawers rusted sticky must be lubricated. Loosened up so the sparks can ignite cogent thought.

Yesterday morning's Health section in the New York Times featured an article touting the use of hallucinogens, the magic mushroom, psilocybin to be exact, in the treatment of despair. Doctors, not Timothy Leary of course, at Johns Hopkins medical school are conducting clinical trials for depression in cancer patients, end of life anxiety, post traumatic stress disorder ... and get this: addiction to drugs and alcohol. Now that's what I am talking about! Everything seems to have come full circle. Maybe that is what has kept me buoyed up all these years. Unburdened by substance abuse. No reaction to the mild terror I experienced in that marriage a decade and a half ago.

Cheers ... to acid flashbacks and psychedelic induced pyrotechnic light shows ... and to bona fide medical studies that might bring it all back again. This time funded by Medicare!

Ocracoke

Oh well. I was in the process of musing about slices of lemons. Those bittersweet vignettes that randomly overtake the day-to-day-workaday world to bring a bit of saccharine, sunshine or a sour taste into our lives. But the writing gods had other plans for my 'pen'.

B. Miller, the renowned author of dark fiction, mentioned in her blog this morning where she'd rather be spending her time today instead of where she is going to be (B's Blog) and transported me silkily back to the early spring of 1971 on a windy beach in the sparsely populated Outer Banks of North Carolina.

The Cape Hatteras National Seashore to be exact. Our sought-after, secret destination after nearly 20 hours of driving through the night in sleet and winter mess along the eastern seaboard from colleges in the rarefied northeast. Sallie, Bob, Bruce, Mickey, David and I had set up camp deep in the wind-whipped sea grass covered dunes. Out of the line of sight from muscular, red-necked North Carolina troopers on patrol just hankering to put an abrupt end to the shenanigans of six upper middle class, weekend hippies from north of the Mason-Dixon line, the intelligentsia (the boys in their final year at Dartmouth) ... effete intellectual snobs as just described by Spiro Agnew our illustrious veep on the White House lawn. Gheesh.

We set up our mini-tent city, one brand new canopied LL Bean canvas yurt-like home for each couple. A fourth for our kitchen/mess hall. I sat quietly over on a far away dune contemplating nearly a week without a place for my toilette which I now realized would most likely be behind the sand mound I was leaning against. This rustic experience sounded like a fine idea before we left. Romantic evenings under the stars. Psychedelic-fueled survivor games that had more to do with us being the last humans on earth than who was getting voted off the island. All now totally foreign to this never-get-dirt-under-my-fingernails, much less sand in the hoo-hoo, girl who avoided Dad's fishing/camping jaunts to Bernheim Forest at all costs.

But here I was. Camping on a deserted national treasure. A felony for the trespassing. Death by shooting squad for the sex and drugs and rock 'n' roll. Deep swallow. Transform my squeamish nature. Voila. I could get into this. Five days of roughing it in the treasure filled sands with my 6 foot, blond, incredibly smart and talented boyfriend. No cell phones (hey this was 1971 for god sakes). No cameras. No nothing. No links to home. Or civilization. Pirates! My gold hoops and lime green bandanna perfectly in style a major tip off that I was more costume driven than most campers. It was all in the outfit.

Several days into our Hatteras adventure we piled into the back of the orange VW bus with the brown and yellow gingham curtains fluttering at the windows made lovingly for Bob by Sallie (they are still together after four decades ... wow ... I should have glommed on to her techniques as David is nowhere to be found ... but that is another story) for our first official outing. We carefully camouflaged our humble abodes. Put out the fire and buried it under the deep sand. Packed our gear into the tents. Swallowed synthetic mushrooms. And pointed our van south. To the island of Ocracoke floating off the tip of the cape. Separated from the land mass by hurricanes past. Attracting real pirates in the nearly unnavigable waters. Reportedly Blackbeard met his death here in the early 1700s. A storied, fabled, magical place. Twinkling in the spring sunshine. Sparkles dancing off the waters.

By the time we boarded the ferry our minds were abuzz with lightshows as preMTV videos scanned across our minds' eyes. Bob was playing his mouth harp while Bruce accompanied him on an old Martin acoustic. Sallie swirled. Her Indian print skirt floating gaily around her slender legs. We were blissed. In more ways than one. Swaying to the familiar rock and roll beat of folkadelic songsters.

Our island sojourn was amazing. Spanish moss drooped from the trees in the historic village of colonial homes and gas lamps. The wide sandy white beach flat and pristine. Too early in the season, there were few residents and no other tourists. We had the island mostly to ourselves and played merrily. Catching the last ferry back to the mainland, we stopped along the way to shower and freshen up and grab a bite to eat at the diner along the way.

We arrived back at our camp site sated, relaxed ... and WOW totally surprised. Our site was surrounded by what looked like an entire squadron of military personnel. Going through our things were a dozen of the meanest looking state troopers this side of Fort Bragg. They had spotted us from the air. A routine fly-over. Get the hell outta here. And we did. Tore down the tents and scurried as fast as our heart-thumping, psychedelic deflating minds would allow. Thank the lord we had taken the 'contraband' and left no trace behind.

Driving up the highway we had our very own motorcycle escort. Four uniformed troopers. Plus a NC Highway Patrol car leading the way. Headlights on. Blue lights flashing. Bubbas on parade along Route 12. Past Nags Head. Past Kitty Hawk where the first airplane took flight. Turn north at US Route 158 and head within the speed limit of course straight toward Virginia and the state line. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200. With the strictest of orders never, and they meant do not ever, come back to the illustrious state of North Carolina.

I have visited the state often in the years since. It is one of my favorites. The ocean, the mountains, good southern cooking and gracious hospitality. Invested in an emerging tech venture. Financed two UHF television stations. Had a financial services consulting client in Morehead City. Visit Raleigh and my cousins every few years. But I always look over my shoulder ... just in case.

Cheers to getting out of good ol' boy North Carolina with nary a warning ... and not needing a passport or to meet stringent homeland security officers on re-entry!

Club Izzy

What a night! What an event! Party planning extraordinaire. My sister amazingly recreated the bright lights big city scene at Limelight in 1980s Manhattan (sans the Bolivian marching powder!) for her daughter's birthday bash on the other coast some twenty five years later. Planned lovingly for nearly three years. No detail overlooked. My god. She did it. Gracefully. Club Izzy rocks!

Strobing flashes of brilliant multi-colored hues transforms the chocolate brown room into a riot of benign pyrotechnics. Streaming video of the evening's guests laced with snapshots from what seems like another lifetime blasts onto the silver screens. White hot pulsating notes permeate our bodies hopping up our heart rates as we half walk-half dance through the darkened tunnel papered with all things Izzy into the pink cloud.

On the dance floor the music was almost visible. Neon bracelets sparkle chartreuse, azure and tangerine around the slender arms of newly minted teenage girls and their tween friends teetering on metallic strappy high heels. Their mini-dresses adorably short short reveal scrapes from their childhood afternoons on the soccer field. Giggling like children they morph sophisticated into young ingénues right before our eyes tossing their shiny tresses like Miley or Taylor. Excitement oozes from every movement as they balance on the brink. Life unfolds before them like the tunnel from which they had just emerged. The young boys slicked their blond locks into spikes trying to conceal the innocence their faces betrayed.

Lightening pulses of colored lights pop around the room. The DJ warms up the crowd. Whipping us all into a frenzy. Even the fifty-something crowd whose not as taut arms are held high in the air clapping to the hip-hop beat. While our post-menopausal hips sway wildly our muscle memory from frat parties in the sixties and early 70s not missing a trick. The men, the daddies, watch bemusedly from the sidelines, swilling scotch.

Plumes of the hottest cherry blossom pink ostrich feathers festively adorn the tables. A life-size boa circling Club Izzy's dance floor. Disco tempo. Adrenalin rush. The excitement palpable as we await the entrance of my precious niece, Isabel, who earlier in the day rocked Temple Bat Yahm with her poise, dedication and glorious voice.

Isabel, our precious, precocious Izzy, the star of this evening's festivities, swirled in brilliant pink satin and emerges rocking a pop tune into her hand held mic, twirling a boa and pointing to her screaming 'fans' clapping to the hyper beat and cheering her on. It was only yesterday when this innocent twinkly eyed girl bopped around her pale pink carousel decorated bedroom gyrating wildly to the radio, a shampoo bottle in her hand, a tiara tangled in her curly hair. A glimpse fast forwarded to this long awaited moment in time when she would wow her friends, family and DJ dancers with her incredible talent and confidence.

Izzy, our darling, is poised confidently at the threshold of young womanhood a steel magnolia. Graceful. Self-assured. Resilient. Enthusiastic. Embracing life's potentials. Imagining the possibilities. Her mother has taught her well. She celebrates this joyous occasion in a festive blur of cotton candy confections, adoring BFFs and swirling dancers young and not so. Mamma Mia!

Cheers to Mary, my darling sister! I lift my glass in awe. Your beloved Isabel Rose rocked the house.

To Snow ... Or Not To Snow

A blizzard is brewing. And, for once it is not headed straight up the Eastern seaboard to the Gulf of Maine to blanket us in feet of the white stuff. A respite. By this time of the year, we are storm weary. The days are lengthening. The sun is higher. Spring is in the air. Kind of. The temps have been moderating. Up into the high 30s. A few months ago that spelled winter. Not now. Warmer days herald spring. Warmer, a relative term.

It is everything I can do to refrain from storing the two snow shovels disgracing my screened in porch (my summer al fresco dining room) back on their empty hooks in the garage, pull the reflective glass topped aluminum driveway markers and sow some seed on my browned out lawn. Winters for the past few years defy global warming. Nowhere has it been more frigid and snowy than northern New England.

Not this year. Yes we have had a snow. Lots of it. But we have had several January thaws melting the piles. February has been downright sunny. Freezing, but ample sunshine. Snowbanks are virtually gone. Further south weather is singing a different tune.

Yes, from our nation's capital and the rolling hills of Virginia horse country up to and beyond the emerald city of Oz. Southern Maine and coastal New Hampshire on the cusp. The snow line. Blizzard to our south. Nothing to our north. Wouldn't you know it? Tonight, weather maps and forecasters are predicting precipitation of the white variety. How much? Unknown. Clear skies for weeks now. Goes to figure.

This evening my darling mother is treating me to a belated birthday celebration. The Monterrey Jazz Festival on tour. A much heralded performance at the chic music hall in Portsmouth. On the snow line. A dusting here. Six inches or more there. Our collective breaths are held. Eyes glued to the weather map. Frequent phone calls to the box office forty miles from home. Snow? No snow? Hmmmm. Will we go? Or not go? That is the question of the hour.

Cheers ... and all that jazz!