bad kitty files

The stories are out there. Everywhere. The world is full of fall-out from the follow-your-bliss train. Exhausted, baffled people everywhere, devotees of the church of good faith, broad-sided by the painful truth that devotion and good faith are no guarantee of anything. I say, let yourself off the hook for the whole damned thing, let everyone else go too, and just say ‘oh well.’ These are wise words offered to me once by an over-achiever. This is what you say when you fuck up or lose; an antidote for the moments when you get whacked by life and all mundane human failings are revealed. It's not intuitive and sounds "soft" to many but it's well worth a whirl. So your whole damned life plan didn’t pan out. Oh well. So you devoted yourself completely, as wholly as your awareness allowed along the way, and it doesn’t seem like the world reached back at ya’. Oh well. So you did some great work and some got out there into the world, or maybe none did, but you’ve got ...

The orchard next to our house was a wild, citrus-scented tangle of ancient tangelo, pomegranate, orange, and lemon trees that persevered each year despite total neglect. The sharp edges of brittle, broken branches would catch on our sleeves as we chased each other through a shadowy canopy, the bristly underbrush poking at our shins. The hillside orchard was on the far side of our big backyard above the San Fernando Valley . Between the orchard and the house was a badminton court, a terraced hillside with more fruit trees, and finally a large patio just outside the living room, which housed an outdoor dining set and barbecue. Cut into the patio tiles next to the dining table was a wooden door painted red and splintering, leading to the underground cellar, just like the one at Dorothy’s house in Kansas - a rarity in the hills of Sherman Oaks. Or you could describe the backyard as: The place where I’d disappear alone for hours to make salads out of leaves, fruits and nuts and...

In the end, it was always a slow groove that would move me most, body and soul. I was a rushed person, a rushed child, no time for me, no place for me, no time to feel. A slow song or a slow groove was like a friend who would wait for me; a guardian three steps ahead who would turn around, reach out their arm and wait for me to catch up… A friend who had time for me.     Maybe that is why ballads have been some of my strongest tunes. They slow me down, enough to hear the vibration of the vocal chord ushering out the words; enough to let the music carry me away. Lushlife, Something Cool, Strange Fruit, Maiden Voyage, Goodbye Porkpie Hat. These songs called for me to slow down and listen. Down to You, The Weakness in Me, Vision in My Mind, and Sly Stone’s version of Que Sera, Sera - the slowest song in the world. These songs would take me over completely, undo me, rearrange me; then lay me down and tuck me in with the softest whisper when they were finished.

It was the middle of an intense, pre-theatre rush at the restaurant. My busser Daniel was so ‘on,’ that if I even glanced his way from across the room, he immediately turned his head to meet my eyes and interpret my nod or my lifting of an eye-brow. Without hesitation he’d be offering more bread, giving hot towels, replacing a fallen knife.  I loved this feeling of being in the middle of complete insanity, with runners careening through the dining room, unconcerned diners clogging the service bar or aisle, one table ready for cheese and Banyuls, another hoping to do three courses in a hour to make the shuttle to the Mark Taper Forum; while the crew moved smoothly, seamlessly like a ten-headed, undulating organism, creating pathways in the crossfire, counterpoint in the conversation and improvising over the primitive rhythm of humans feeding. But why did I like this? Hmm... I was a child in a good liberal California household in the 70’s. Picture women with long, stringy blo...