On owning people

I am thinking this morning that owning people is a bad habit humans can hardly resist trying to do. I do not know what happened to the man trying to kill himself but I just ran into the alcoholic he was drinking with on the elevator and he had since fallen and broken his arm looked like, mashed his nose and teeth and had a black eye, hazards of the preoccupation of drinking. But the other man came through the wall last night which assured me he was still alive. I introduced the idea to this man of traveling to see me, invisibly, so we would not be subjected to the abuse I encountered with the last man in here I publically connected to. Other women felt they owned him and I was barraged throughout the relationship with threatening phone calls, evil looks, etc. Even after he died, a rather scary man paid me a visit saying he had come to collect my prisoner to take him back to his rightful owner in California, his ex wife. I had never seen a woman more determined not to give up ownership of a man. It was literally almost to the point of if I can't have you, nobody else will, when he up and died, no doubt helped along by her change of heart over the divorce and his ownership.
So the next time I ran into an attractive man I really liked I was a lot more wary. I thought up the idea of just meeting in thought rather than in the actual flesh. Since he was psychic, he liked the idea of traveling out of his body it seemed, but I never discussed it with him again, for fear that he might mention this to someone else and thus alert the media. I just simply noted whether he still seemed to be thinking of me from time to time.
In the interests of Doc I did tell him that I had this psychic relationship which would undoubtedly continue if he was impaired by his alcoholism to the point he could not think about any woman, or do anything with her should he like her. There was no question of a physical relationship. This was fine with Doc. He was prepared to pay the price of his alcoholism. I made as good of use of him as I could with his wide interests in the arts, film, acting, comedy, etc. He was still able to do most of those things better than many sober men which gave him the illusion that alchol was being kind to him.
But he has gradually become possessive and likes to give the impression of owning me whether he actually does or not. If I fight this he gets angry, so the alcoholic takes his toll. I can only fight so much then I have to stop and rest.
In the meantime a pleasant relationship with the other man was suddenly lost by his deciding to drink again. I did not see that this was going to help anything, but he was only human I suppose and thought to return to his former ways of indulging himself. Wherever he is right now, I am sure he is in bad shape, but he still comes through the wall occasionally. I asked him if he was all right last night and he said yes, as well as he could be. He is not sure if he can survive this fall fron grace but he is apparently still on the earth and trying.
I haven't seen him around here for a few days, so it is possible someone was able to persuade him to stay in treatment longer, so he had a chance of sobering up here. If he is still here, he will turn up in worse shape outside on his his beer runs to Circle K. Alcohol eventually runs out.
In the interest of helping him I have now revealed our psychic connection. So he will know that I have fought over the right to be free from ownership, especially by an alcoholic, up to this present date. I thought he was agreeable to the plan because he did not like to be owned either and was very wary of a public commitment. He did indeed finally connect to a woman in here who I thought suited him quite well, and I figured that our psychic connection would grow thinner and thinner until it perhaps disappeared, which I thought it was doing for a while. Then suddenly he did the worst possible thing to this relationship he could have done, he began to drink in a most disgraceful fashion as though he intended to drive every woman away for a thousand miles around.
Since I had never tried to own him in the least possible way this did not affect me too much as far as public humiliation went. However, since he was my only connection to a sober man, I started to suffer quite badly when the binge went on and on and it began to look as though he might die.
I asked him in a psychic conversation if he was angry at me for all the stuff I was doing with Doc. He responded that he knew drunks and Doc trying to act like he owned me did not impress him much. I told him outside one day last week if he knew that I had been in love with him for 5 years. He said of course I did. So I carried on this conversation telepathically.
I said I told him this in the interest of trying to help him, this time, no matter what anybody said. Or to help him on his way if he were to die. I wanted to tell him how much his sobriety had meant to me. It cheered me up every morning when I woke up. I was pretty sure I would encounter him bright eyed and sober that day so I was happy.
I said I was afraid that you lost faith in the power of your sobriety. But I thought I was doing what you wanted by not trying to own you. Had you wanted more of a connection to me I thought you would have made that known.
He said that he remained wary of any connection to a woman because of this ownership thing. He feared what freedom he had would be taken away without enough joy to take its place. And this fear became self fulfilling and was the trigger to ending 5 years of sobriety.
He said if he was to recover he would have to go back to having less and expecting less, as he knew he had ruined trust. He doubted if the other woman could still love him through all this. He said either way he intended to set her free. She would surely be free if he died and she would want to be free if he lived. He thought it could all be worked out amicably either way.
He said that his relationship to me was much less binding, ending each time he thought about me or I thought about him without knowing whether it would resume again. I said that was fine.
He said he had a tough time accepting Doc in my life but realized he had expected me to accept his relationships. I did accept them, including the last one.
Doc cannot claim me without sobriety to start with. He is scornful of that. So he has to try to act the part. Real life is not acting. It does not work. It only works in plays, but drinking men don't think that well.
I hope the other man is sobering up before death really does pay a call.

A great day and a half to my daughter Ronda's

I went out to be there when my grandson Ethan went to school and to be there when he got home as Ronda had to work a 12 hour shift and Chad, my SIL, was out of town. My grandson Jamal, 17, also popped in from school early, but could not be there for his brother because he had to play in a state tennis tournament,(they won) so he will be playing next weekend, too. He dropped out playing singles when he came down with strep throat and couldn't play, but likes doubles even better he says.
Jamal and I chatted about his upcoming plans. He got a Presidential scholarship for ASU where he intends to major in business, starting this coming year. I will soon be getting his high school commencement announcement. I met his girlfriend who will be living in an ASU dorm down town! She is going to major in health and nutrition he says.
Ethan asked me if I wanted him to read aloud his 30 minutes of required reading in the evening (by his parents). I said yes, so he read out of a book about Mars which I enjoyed very much.
I got better acquainted with their little dog Bailey. I asked my daughter if she had a leash, so if I took him for a walk I could control him. Was I glad I took that precaution as when he heard a sound out in the desert, he made a serious attempt to get away from me and get out there and chase it down. My daughter said yes, he would probably chase whatever it was until he was exhausted as he was bred to do. I love this little dog (I think he is a border terrier) and I sure did not want to be the one to lose him. Ronda lives right on the edge of a great pristine part of the desert, and it was so beautiful.
I apologize for being too lazy to take my camera and the charger, as the desert was just starting to bloom in all its spring glory as were the palo verde. Their back yard was in full bloom and so beautiful.
To tell the truth, it took me a while to get up from down. I really needed this break. Ronda and I visited. She brought home a lovely lunch today from an Arabic cafe, featuring hummus and falafel bean croquettes, the best I have tasted. The hummus was divine, too.
We watched American Idol and Dancing with the Stars on her big wide movie screen TV which was like going to the movies. We chatted about her job in nursing. And I came home with $25 of Tide because she and Chad just bought a washer and dryer that takes a certain kind of soap, and she was over supplied.

Blue shines healing light on Colfrey and promised they will meet again (End of Blue Reading)

In my new spring outfit, as dangerous as I am probably going to get

I got on the elevator this morning in this outfit and a man got on and stared at me. I told him it was my new spring outfit and he said he liked it. Doc was pleasantly startled when I got to his apartment and agreed to take this photo. I first posted it on the family site urging all the other ladies to have photos taken of them in their new spring outfits.
It is my theory that a new outfit is good for whatever ails us. I contemplated how men get some bad idea fixed in their heads and it cannot be dispelled. I remembered that my ex took a long walk into the desert three years ago in as spectacular disappearance as we had had in Utah for some time. I don't know what women can do when men begin to act out their dark and dangerous fantasies but go to the thrift store and buy new outfits. Which is surely a good deal less upsetting, reassuring the world that all is well.
My friend sent me a letter that President Obama sent blessing the national scrabble tournament. She is an enthusiastic player, and I know she plays scrabble when she is down in the dumps. I thoroughly approve. I would play scrabble, too, if I had the time, but Doc is like a big kid who might get in serious trouble with his fantasy life if I did not keep him occupied. We are working on another play reading where he gets to play a 22 year old schizophrenic retarded man and a 14 year old smart eleck 'basset playing' son and a high school Jock. This is going to stretch his imagination in healthy ways I am hoping.

My friend likes to shop for new outfits, too. I thoroughly approve of this one.
I haven't had time to work on the play I am going to send Raymond he says he will do a year from now. He is plannng two more play dates in Utah soon of his one man show, so he is getting ready for those. He has to build a mobile set which he tells us in his last post in Cowboys and Bohemians, "Finally in Boulder." If you want to read what he is doing check out my blog list.
I am preparing for my trip to Boulder in a year by resurrecting an old friendship with a woman up there. She is retired now from the profession of hair dresser so has more time for friendship now. I had trouble last time I went up there with an old girlfriend who had gotten mad at me years ago. She practically ruined my trip. So I decided I needed an ally who would help prevent this from happening when I go to see my play.

I took this photo of her when I was to the Boulder festival last time. Her hair is always lovely. She was always fun to stop and have coffee with, she is such a good hostess.
My sister Linda still has her numb hands if you can believe that which causes her difficulty in typing. But she finally went to urgent care this past week in San Francisco and they agreed to schedule her for an MRI. I was so relieved that they thought they needed to check out the cause more thoroughly. She is now waiting for that appointment, long over due, but she just had so much trouble getting into the system in both states after she could no longer work and ran out of money for co-payments. She had to get on medi-Cal in California or medicaid here and that takes time, especially now days when many have lost their jobs, health insurance and ability to pay.
I will be gone tomorrow out to my daughter's looking after my grandson, Ethan, so I will not be posting. I hope to be able to take in my older grandson Jamal's tennis tournament at his high school. His Uncle Dan will have to come and take us there. I hope I will be able to bypass the swine flu. We will surely be getting it here as people travel back and forth to Mexico constantly. Jamal got strep throat twice this winter, so I am hoping he can make it until school is out without another health risk, as this swine flu is pretty bad. Wish him luck with his tennis!

Talking to the afflicted

It is time for everyone to make sure they talk to this man because he is sorely afflicted. I will be surprised if he lives out the month. He looks ten years older than he did 6 weeks ago, and when I talked to him yesterday he told me he had a long razor slash down his arm where he got into a fight with a homeless guy over to Circle K. He said the manager had told him she was drawing up eviction papers because he was drinking out in front of the building, ignoring the rules. I would not lend him money or go to the store to get beer for him. He said he almost got run over by the fast transit, but after borrowing money from someone he set off for the store, barely able to stay on his feet. He could not find his ATM card even thugh he still has money in the bank, and that could take some process for him to be able to access his account any other way.
For five years people were used to seeing him as he appears in the above photo, immaculate. In control.
I reminded him that a coma helped him to quit drinking last time, so was that what he was waiting for. He then disclosed that he had only slept a couple of hours a night all the time he was sober. I said you are sleeping now? He said yes, right through. High price to pay for a good night's sleep, but I saw him many times yawning and saying he had not slept. So I believe him. I have read several times that some alcoholics find it extremely difficult to sleep a long time after, when they sober up.
I only said positive things to him as I figure he is getting scolded enough. He talked vaguely about going to Lark, and I said, "But you come back home as soon as you get there." He admitted that was so, so did not know how he was going to get to sobriety, the possibility of which seemed to be receding more each day. We will continue to stand watch.

Rude insane young Jake is forced to listen to Jessie's play or he can't have his turn

Spirit walking adaptation after near death experiences

The man who is dying had a near death experience five years ago. When he was recovering I was working in the computer room as a monitor where he worked and took the time to talk to him almost every day. I feared that he would hit the same kind of frustrations he had before and would drink again and nothing would save him. I found out from our conversations that he was extremely psychic, probably from the near death experiences he had been having all his drinking life from the way he drank. I saw that he interacted with so many people while he was drinking that he existed in kind of a battle field with all these people vying for his attention, sometimes in most unpleasant ways. He was a very popular guy, but I figured it was his very popularity that was apt to kill him. There is little purpose in having people fight over you. But he was not thinking well enough to be cautious when he was drinking.
I suggested to him that he become a spirit walker. That is that he should communicate by telepathic means so some of what he did would be invisible. He complained constantly that he could not talk to women where people knew him. Well, no, not if he was going to flirt with every woman in sight while he was drinking. When he sobered up he would have ten times more girlfriends than he knew what to do with. If he learned a different means of communication, he would not have to fight somebody who loved him over every encounter.
I found him to be one of the most startling spirit walkers I have ever met. All those poems I wrote were to him. But I tired of the limitation of this means of communication after about a year, as I could see from his behavior that he and I were not destined to be together in 'real' time, but I thought that spirit walking helped save his life, since it was almost impossible for me to talk to him the normal way, and I thought he desperately needed more and better communication than he was getting. Or he could not distance himself from his all too frequent drinking binges. This was my theory and it worked. He did not have one of these mad suicidal binges for 5 years. And I never begrudged the time and effort I put in to help him because he is a man of great appeal.
But I have gradually realized that his near death experiences left him impaired and that it was going to be very difficult for him to form a committed relationship with anybody. The last two years he finally did so, and now suddenly he has thrown it to the winds and is once again trying to kill himself. I shied away from him and this possibility and took up with Doc.
Doc has complete erectile dysfunction but he understands and practices commitment to a woman. In fact, he has outdone every other man I have ever known in that department. When you are with him, he concentrates his attention completely on you. He enjoys you, and he makes you undertand how much fun a couple can have if they give each other the time and attention a relationship requires.
I don't know that he has the ability anymore to quit drinking. He does not seem to, so I have had to be content with his great gifts that still manifest despite his drinking. But he knew that because of his drinking this other man, while sober, could keep his telepathic connection to me alive. In fact, it was never broken because of Doc's drinking. So Doc accepted this as the price for his continuing to drink, but now the other man has started to drink again and way surpassed Doc in self destruction in a matter of a few weeks. He gulps, he does not sip like Doc!
Last night for the first time I got the message from his eyes, everything about him, that he is dying. So now maybe you will understand a little better why his self destruction has shaken me. He had power over me because we were both spirit walkers and we still met out of body from time to time.
Strange I should be posting this play "Blue" or "The Spirit Walkers Convention" at this time. I have known two other spirit walkers of his kind of ability. They were both more powerful out of body and invisible because they were in prison in their bodies because of all the lovers surrounding and fighting over them. I have used this invisible means of traveling out of body to save my own life because of my disabilities, and they have used it to save theirs. But if the body cannot not work well for whatever reason, spirit walking can only give a limited amount of help before impairment of the more profound sort takes its toll, and the dying begins.

Closer and closer to death

The man who has been trying to kill himself for over a month is still at it. I saw him a little while ago, and he looked a good deal more haggard, dark circles starting to form under his eyes, his face bruised where he has fallen. He was begging money from everyone to buy more beer. This is a man who cannot stop once he starts. He has been taken away inumerable times by paramedics but as soon as he gets where he is going to a hospital, or somewhere, he leaves and comes home again, and they say they cannot hold an alcoholic against his will.
Yesterday in a brief conversation he remembered that he had been sober for some time (5 years) since he tried to kill himself like this before, ended up in a coma from bleeding into the stomach He looks to me like he is not far from being able to die now. Don't know if anyone will realize it this time. They were barely able to save him last time.
It's pretty painful to be watching all this happening, it seems to have disturbed all the other alcoholics. Maybe they will see what is in store for them as their appetite for alcohol inevitably grows larger, while their body's tolerence for it grows less. This is like watching a man with a terminal disease wasting away. His will to drink is stronger than anybody else's power to stop him. Alcoholism is a terrible disease. This is very close to a death watch.

I hope the lion sleeps tonight referring to Doc and "The Prince from Saturn"

Day before yesterday I made the mistake of mentioning to Doc I had another play, "Prince from Saturn" I might want us to read after "Blue" was all uploaded (it will be done after two more videos) so nothing but do I had to find two copies of it somewhere and we had to start reading it. He filmed it, too, but I didn't like it because he set the camera too far away and my thunder thighs were too prominent. I also didn't like how he interpreted some of these younger characters. I insisted on stopping part way and going home over his protests.
At 3 am that night or early morning I could not sleep for some reason and got up to check my computer. As I was sitting there, to my shock the phone rang. I saw by the caller ID it was Doc! He is strictly forbidden to call me in the middle of the night, so I let it ring and ring. Finally after he had called a number of times I decided I better answer as he might be sick or something. I answered and he told me to get down there right now as he wanted to finish that play! He said he had watched what we filmed twice. Can you imagine? I said no, and he argued and argued with me, so I hung up on him, but finally when he called back about 5 am, I answered and when he said get down there, I agreed. I was not going to get any more sleep, it was clear. Besides this is somewhat how Doc works, only he has never acted quite so goofy before.
So we read the rest of the play this time close up, and I liked that part better. He wanted me to stay and make up a trailer as he was going to, but I refused. He called me later and said his trailer was done and now he was burning copies (in a white hot pace) Mind you, he made it plain he was not doing this because he regarded this play as a masterpiece, it's just the way he gets things done.
Today I did not mention this play to him, as I decided I was going to do something with it I have not done before. I am going to force him to do it over if he wants me to put it up on Youtube. He is going to have to improve the reading which in his infinite alcoholic superiority he hates to do. We are coming close to 8,000 hits on this video blog which is certainly not the discovery numbers that Scottish singer hit, but these numbers are encouraging enough for me to keep doing videos. I will probably never get another production of "Prince from Saturn" in my life time, so I need to get a reading of it up there. Besides the subject matter is very pertient to hard times in Arizona. Both the Prince of Saturn and I are trying for disability at the time because our limitations keep us from holding down a job and taking care of our families. The Prince has a wife and baby now, and I still have two kids in school. We are in a bad fix.
In the meantime I am happy to report that the lion slept last night and I hope he sleeps tonight. I am not going to mention what he is going to have to do for a while, so he won't get hyper again. What an acting partner, but at this age, he is about as good as I am apt to get. You have no idea how hard actors are to find that will do what I have managed to get Doc to do.

21 polo horses owned by a Venzuela Polo Team died upon arrival

I posted the above photo because of the magnitude of these deaths of beautiful highly trained horses of unknown causes at the moment, although the reasons will soon be known to the mourners of great horses dying everywhere. I have never heard of that many horses suddenly dying. When I think of how my dad would have reacted to just one death of one of his trained cow horses, I can just imagine how this hit the players and trainers alike. In polo as in cowboying, the horse and rider become one. It is so magnificent to watch. I will update you when the reasons for these deaths have been tracked down.
One story on the Internet is that they think the deaths were caused by each horse getting a shot of a steroid to enhance performance which had somehow been mixed with cleaning solution! No followup is available, so it still might take a while to confirm the reasons for the deaths.

Connie sent me the beautiful touching graphic of the horse and girl overhead which I thought showed the deep love of horses some humans develop. Connie says that she is not going to post anymore in her blog Windswept Whispers, but I am unable to get to her other blogs as Blogspot has put a warning on them as having material in them they might not approve of. I never could get a blog to appear, so Connie will have to track the reason down. Another blogger from AOL had to get that lifted off her blog after she migrated. I put a message on Windswept Whispers, but Connie might not read that for some time, so I will also put one here and then if I still can't get to it, I will send her an e-mail.

I thought I would enter the Photo Challenge this week

I thought I would enter the Photo Challenge this week which "The Great Outdoors". Here is my entry which is a photo of the winning art entry for our new Civic Space Park just down from the street from our complex. The park cost over 2 million to develop and the art project $600,000. Since it is designed to be a desert cactus blossom the artist said she calls it "Nature is patient."

Kelli, here is a country woman making soap

I found this photo in an old Country magazine and I decided to post it for Kelli, who writes Thoughts of a Sober White Women, because she has been talking about making soap as an ecco friendly thing to do. This reminded me so much of our days of makng soap in the country out of animal fat and lye, water, etc. We used beef suet quite a bit because we did not make lard out of it as we did with pig fat. We would be tending the fire and stirring now and then until it set up, and then we would leave it over night and the next day we would cut it up in chunks leaving this caustic jelly we would have to find some place to pour out, as it would burn a place in the grass, but did not really do a lot of harm.
This was just one more big old task I would help with. My dad would not buy laundry soap out of the store ever. The only thing he agreed to buy willingly was pork and beans for camping out. Maybe a little can of vienna sausage once in a while. He had been raised to be very frugal like his Mom. He would have highly approved of you, Kelli, with your quilt making. My mom wanted to leave behind country ways which is why they never got along I suppose. She thought that if she went to all the trouble of building a country store and stocking it, she should be able to live out of it. She refused to make bread any more, so our dad recruited us girls to make his home made bread. He loved nothing more than warm bread, butter we churned ourselves, and home made jam we bottled in the summer out of a number of different fruits. He was ecco friendly like Kelli and didn't even know it!

Blue tells son Cal, the playwright, his future (Blue reading Scene 5a)

Son Dan and I go see "State of Play" at the movies

I thought this movie starring Russell Crowe, Ben Afleck, Rachael McAdams, Robin Penn Wright, and Helen Mirren was well done and quite relevant to the times. It was based on a series developed in England and changed to an American setting. Russell Crowe plays a newspaper reporter and Helen Mirren his boss and Ben Afleck his friend from college who is now a congressman and subject to corruption in office. The story also makes the case of the newspaper as a the best source of all the pertinent details of the story. And what would we do without it?
I don't think it will become obsolete just because we need newspapers on a local level to give us the indepth story. That can't be done nearly so well on the Internet. And I think we might end up with better newspapers if the publishers pay attention to local issues. I think for a long time the trend was away from local coverage, which did not make sense since the Internet could do a better job of just reporting the facts of national newstories, cheaper and faster. Newspapers trying to compete soon lost ground.
So now we are back to the basic reason newspapers were invented in the first place, to cover stories nobody else could in each city. I am just as interested in the newspaper now as I ever was, because I am reading about so many issues that are related to Arizona economy, schools, employment, everything in fact!
Just recently the Arizona Theater Company announced it would do four new plays that have never been produced before this coming season. The success of this exciting development will depend on how well the newspaper covers these plays. I have a huge invested interest in this, because I would like to see one of my plays produced here before I die. I would like to see Raymond's grant winning play "Blue Baby" produced here. It should have been well on its way to a big production when it received a $5,000 grant from the Arizona Commission on the Arts with the famous Tony Kunstler, the playwright who wrote "Angels in America" about the AIDs epidemic, as a judge. Raymond's play dealt with homoxexual rape in a city jail where such stuff should never be allowed to happen. The victim has merely been picked up on a drunk drivng charge and supposedly incarcerated over night. Instead he is tortured for five hours and nearly murdered, and his life will never be the same again.
A local playwright writes a play that deals with issues of this magnitude and the leading newspaper critic in Phoenix and indeed all of Arizona manages to avoid seeing two of his own productions of this play?
When did a newspaper man become great by avoiding tough issues? This is what I mean by the newspapers becoming and staying relevant at all times.
My own plays deal with some very tough issues, and I can never get a production here if theater critics continue to tiptoe around issues. My play, "Daughters of the Shadow Men" a Youtube improv version of which I embedded in this blog some months back, deals with the outing of a gay father by his family, long after he is dead, when the mother writes her history of their marriage and reveals information that coincides with what one of the daughters has observed. Do you think this play will ever get produced if the newspaper critics shy away from such subjects?
My latest play "Blue" also deals with gay men who have married and have children, and I put a reading from the script up on Youtube to try to persuade not only Arizona but America to produce plays like this, simply because these problems are part of our lives. Sooner or later I figure these videos will attract someone who will want to produce them.
Look at that Scottish singer whose Youtube audience brought her to the attention of the world.
The local newspapers need to demonstrate that they can handle tough issues and they will survive!

Son Gary meets me at the Civic Place Park for lighting of the sculpture

We met around 7:30 at the park where quite a lot of people had gathered to hear the artist Janet Aukerman from Boston talk about her work. She suggested we think of it as kind of a blossom, and it does look like one when lighted. Colored lights on poles reflect into the lighting of the netting and make it look as though it is glowing from within. He said that every night different lights will go on that will make subtle changes in the colors of the 'blossom.' One story they told was how a swarm of bees flew up into the center of it, so they thought it looked like a blossom, too. That got a laugh from the crowd, as we have been plagued with swarming bees here who have taken up residence in vacant houses in foreclosure.
I took my camera but it is too primitive to take good night pictures. I was glad others were there with more expensive cameras to show those who didn't see it lit what they were missing. Engineers and lighting experts talked. They said they wanted a sculpture piece that was up in the air since this is a small park and they needed all the space for people to mix and mingle, and boy, were we looking up, most of the day. They also featured a fountain of many colors, too, under the sculpture in the air. I went over there three different times today to take in what was going on. I was happy to see my son Gary walk up this last visit. We listened to everybody talk about how they did it, and then he walked me home. I am glad I went!

Visit to new Civic Park Plaza and winning art object!

That's it, the winner, that round circle up in the sky with some kind of netting hanging from it, and tonight it is going to be lit, but I can't guarantee my camera will take a good photo of that. I am going back tonight, so if I get a good picture I will post it.
Otherwise it is just your ordinary little park which they feel will enhance the center of the city. I agree. I like it! I think it is a big improvement on the last one which nobody liked so they tore it down. This one is only a hop and skip and jump from where I live. Aren't I lucky?

When husbands are gay, wives hardly notice (Blue reading Scene 4b)

In this video Luis talks about his wife regarding his male lover as their best friend. The kids love him, too, because that is how he has been introduced to them and best friend is the role he plays in their life. This scenario probably plays out in a lot of households where one or both parents are gay. And wives, especially, are desperate to keep the breadwinner father of their children around, no matter what he might do.
There is also the possibility as with my father, that along with a gay gene, he also had a strong paternal side that made him want children. I think there are many gays like him, too. So they will do whatever is necessary to acquire them.
I am quite fascinated with the book, "Straight Acting" pictured above, whose gay author, Angelo Pezzote, claims that most gay men are in the process of 'coming out' their whole lives. (This book is available in our public library) Gay men may be out among their friends but not at work, or their parents may still think they are straight, an so on, and when Pezzote describes all the hazards of coming out in our society, it is no wonder that it is so difficult to do.
Having had a gay dad, I have been studying and thinking about the problems of gay parents since I was five years old. My dad was in deep denial to everyone I suppose but the 'friends' he interacted with sexually. He probably thought that was risky enough. I have come to think he was predominately gay, which means if there is a gay gene he may have been born with one. My second husband, however, was raped by a man when he was seven, which seemed to affect him to the point of pursuing gay relationships, but I thought he did this partly to take revenge. As he got older, I thought that he began to pursue younger guys as a kind of father figure who would betray them the same way his 'friendly' neighbor did, as children often do who have been victimized by pedofiles.
Some of these themes about gays acting straight figure in a lot of my novels and plays. This play "Blue" is no exception. Blue is the all seeing savior figure who takes in everything and is able to handle all the complexities with a healing approach. So for Colfrey he is the only kind of a savior she can lean on during her dying process, since she has a conflict with organized religion.
In this book "Straight Acting" a couple of times parents are mentioned who tell their sons hiding their gay orientation that they would rather have a dead son than a gay son. You can't get much more explicit than that which is probably the reason there is such a high incidence of gay suicides. And our sexual orientation may be genetic! What a world we live in when the complexities of our genetic makeup may invite death if we should happen to possess the genuine thing, a gay gene. We sure have not advanced far if that is the case.
But there is no getting around the fact that this subject matter is tough to talk about, tough for people to take in if they don't think they have it in their families. They just might have prejudice so thick in their families, nobody will risk coming out as gay.

I feel I am doing the world a favor to post scenes about the thoughts bisexuals I have known have expressed, exposing the way they have to live, and the burdens of secrets and lies many will carry to their graves. Are there any heavier burdens than the secrets and lies society requires in the event of gay orientation? I don't think so.

I dreamed I was dancing with the stars and--

I suddenly realized that the temperature in the room was too high, so I stopped dancing and told them I had to have the temperature at exactly 78 degrees or I would get overheated, so they turned it down and we were waiting for the room to get to the right temperature so I could dance when I woke up.
I then realized that this was also probably a dream about my daughter who belongs to a west coast swing dance club. (the trophies in the photo are hers) I usually talk to her on the phone every Sunday night when she is on her way to dance, but since she started her nursing job which is in 12 hour shifts she says she can't always go because she is too tired. I have been concerned about her feeling too much stress in her job on a unit that is not ICU but the next one to it. She says it was very stressful at first, but she is getting used to it.
She was also perturbed this last Sunday night about some bad feelings the residing board of officers have caused among members. She was going to another dance place further away this Sunday night where upset members were meeting, but she said she did not want to stop going to her club altogether so she was going to go back. The board had kicked out some of the members. It is not as if there is a bunch of west coast swing dancers waiting in the wings to take their place. Many of the members did not think the board should be kicking people out of the club for just any infraction. I agreed that if members did not agree with the reasons, it did not seem logical for the board to proceed. She said there had never been such a problem with a board's actions before, but this one seemed to be taking their authority too seriously.
I am always concerned that Ronda will get too stressed out with all she takes on. She adores her dance club and has made a lot of friends among the members. It is her favorite way of kicking back and enjoying some wonderful exercise.
I love to see her dance. She is very graceful like her father who impressed me the first time I ever saw him roller skating. He was doing these dance moves around the floor and he was the most graceful skater there. He was whirling and doing splits. I was quite shocked. He looked almost professional compared to the rest of us, and he said that he had an older half sister he did not know too well who was a professional skater. His own father loved to dance and never missed a week going dancing until he was up in his 80's. This was a daughter he had before marrying his second wife and having Ron.
Ronda was dancing in her cradle to any music she heard. Her favorite thing to do at 5 years old was to go anywhere there was a live band and dance. Men would ask her to dance just like she was grown up which made her father so nervous that he once threatened to beat up on one persistent dancer. I remember her going to a dance up in Utah when she was just five in a long red dress she had worn to her brother's wedding. She was surely the belle of the ball that night, so I was not really surprised when she developed her passion for west coast swing dancing. In fact Lacey Schwimmer is a west coast swing dancer she knows along with her brother Benjy who won So You Think You Can Dance one years. Lacey is now one of the professional dancers on Dancing with the Stars who teaches the stars. She had her work cut out for her tonight with the guy from Jackass, but I think she is making a dancer out of him in spite of himself.
My sisters and I all loved to dance, and our favorite thing to do was to find a dance somewhere even if we had to travel miles to get to it. I could dance well with some people but started having a stamina problem, so could not dance fast very long. My sister Linda on the other hand could dance fast for hours. She never tired. She loved dancing all her life
But now poor thing, she has fallen down hard again. I just pray it did not do any serious damage, but she did hurt her arm. She is not as agile as she was now that she is struggling with numb hands and a back problem. A very good chiropracter is helping her though. So that is my story of Dancing with the Stars. I am going back to bed and maybe I will dream how I wowed them with my dance once I got the room to the right temperature which is exactly what I keep it at night. Otherwise I throw off the quilts and get sore legs from the cold. But there is probably a good reason why I woke up before I could do that strenuous dance number in my sleep!

Royce explains why he cannot leave his wife (Blue reading scene 4a)

Twenty two years ago I was interacting with men who were gay but married, studying them, and also because they were often very brilliant, talented, and attractive. If they turned outlaw they had the capacity to do considerable damage to their society, to their wives, kids, whoever might be affected by their deceptions. The man on whom the character Royce was based is one of the most brilliant and charming men I ever met, but with definite criminal tendencies. I was surprised to find him as personable as he was. My own father was considered one of the smartest men in the country. Well, it is very painful when for whatever reasons, this person begins to become very troubled because of all the conflicting feelings they and society have about their gay activities.
Which leads me to believe that a good many of these activities are initiated with the young and underaged who are vulnerable, boys who take high risks, drink, or who have already been victimized as innocent children.
We like to think that this happens through natural inclination, and in some cases it seems to, but I think that at the present we have not observed what happens to these troubled men from childhood on. I made it my business to study them over several generations, starting with my grandfather. I saw so much unhappiness among these men that I could not help but try to study them more to see what could be done to change things. The women married to them are quite as unhappy as they are, for how can a woman be happy with a man who is not. If she is not being treated well? The reasons for studying these troubled people are endless.

Easter Sunday

I would have to say that I think the angels are still crying when anyone dies on this earth because of devaluing life. It is very hard sometimes to value life as it should be valued because it is a great gift from the creator. But on sacred holidays like this we can rededicate ourselves to the cause. "In so much ye have done it unto the least of them, you have done it unto me." As long as the innocent die, we never stop hanging people on the cross.
Thank you, Sugar, for this picture.

Visiting Ronda and Ethan and Dan

I surely enjoyed visiting with Ethan a couple of hours while Ronda, my daughter, was taking care of business at the hospital where she works, which is not far from the Westward Ho. Ethan surprised me by asking questions and wanting stories about my past, growing up in cattle country. I had plenty of hair raising tales to tell him. He is the first grand child I have had who has taken such an interest in the past. Ethan says he likes history and social studies is his favorite class. I believe it after he asked question after question.
His mom picked us for lunch at the Thai Hut where my youngest son, Dan, joined us. Dan works to the new Sheraton Hotel in downtown Phoenix which has cut his hours due to slow business, as you might imagine. He has not yet been laid off, but is working on other options for work while he has time to write screen plays and create web sites, etc. I used to love having my hours cut so I could write, as it is hard to get the energy and time to do much while working a full shift. I always tell anyone trying to be an artist, buy time if you can, because you have to practice in order to get good at art. Dan said he is doing research on the drug cartels which are getting alot of publicity in Phoenix right now.


Ronda said she is working very hard on her job in nursing which is in the wards where people go out of ICU. She says there is plenty to do that must be done right for the safety and recovery of the patient, but once she got used to her responsibilties she is finding it easier to do.
Altogether it was a very enjoyable get together. And lifted my spirits considerably.

free spirit

you are free to create

the life you want

and I will listen

to what you say

as long as you

dont curb my freedom

to be what I want to be

if thats all right with you

then we can continue to get along

resuming where we left off

before you became angry

over what someone else did

how they acted

that is not me

I can only control myself

I cant control anyone else

they dont speak for me

I dont speak for them

we dont walk through this world alone

you dont

I dont

but I am not in chains

I can do what I want to do

all you have to do is ask politely

I dont get angry at you

I dont tell you what you should

or should not do

if I like what you say

I will respond

that is what I call

being a free spirit

I love who I want to love

because I like what they say

they are nice

I always withhold my love

from those who try to use force

I give my love in freedom

I accept your apology

for getting angry

we all get angry

but nothing good can happen

when people are too angry

thats all I am trying to say

gerry

My new spring skirt black and white

After I tried on every skirt in the store practically I picked this black and white tiered one with silver threads running through it, thinking I can change it with white blouses and white hats as well as sleeveless black blouses. So I am well satisfied and thought to have Doc take a photo.

Colfrey takes off wig baring her bald alien head (Blue play reading Scene 3c)

I must explain that Blue, the alien, is the sober man in our society who is able to communicate telepathically, fly to the stars, triumph over aging and death, and all sorts of wonderful things, and he is helping the dying sister to find the life in her death.
The drunks represent the addicted members of our society who have lost their vision of what they can be in substance abuse. They cannot get off the ground. They cannot keep up with Blue. Of course these superior beings in our society have to practically remain invisible, their powers unleashed, because ordinary mortals are too jealous to stand them. Thus we see the lure of substance abuse in order to be accepted. The woman playwright is a threat also, as she is too all seeing to be loved. The more insight she develops the less apt she is to get a 'showing' on earth. People will not 'see' her just as they don't see the alien. She will find herself growing more and more invisible while still alive.
This is the way people have always greeted writers. They are suspicious and distrusting of them, so they try to get control of them by rewarding them with riches and fame if they will just stop laying quite so much truth on the protesting public. A good woman writer will very likely not be recognized in her time. And will generally be regarded as a failure if considered at all.
Lesser writers on the other hand will have no trouble finding fame and fortune. It will be a snap.
The alcoholic has tried to sabotage this play, but he has not altogether succeeded. The writer's stamp on it remains despite everything he can do to claim the credit for himself. Women playwrights must make do with addicted actors who are better than no actors at all. They do not fear them. They know the public will eventually get the play sorted out, and will recognize the power of sober Blue who looks with shrewd insight on the antics of the drunks. The drunk is the freak, not the extra terrestrial.

Farmers Market and more healthful outings

I decided that I needed to counteract the effect of many deaths in two weeks time by getting out into the world more. (Another woman died who had shared her story with me this year of going downhill after hip replacement surgery) Also the man we all have been worrying about who seems to be suffering a major meltdown is still very troubled and unable to get back control.
The Farmers Market which features flowers for sale like the one above is a great place to go. I get the best tomatoes there I have found anywhere in Arizona, vine ripened, also wonderful tasting onions. Yesterday I got tabouli salad which is so green I feel like a cow eating it which takes me back to good country eatin'. Tabouli salad and sliced tomatoes, a divine supper. I added some vegetarian tamales made with spinach.
Tomorrow I plan a walk over to the Arizona Center to check out summer skirts. If I find one I like I intend to buy one brand new. I rarely buy new clothes, but colorful skirts are such a big part of dressing for the heat, I would like to get just one I did not buy in the thrift store. That usually satisfies me, but I did not buy myself anything for Xmas even though I was given money specifically to do so. I was saving for my trip to California which did not end up costing a whole lot so I feel that I can afford to buy one now.
The next day I am having my grandson Ethan over for a little while and then we will go to lunch with his mother and Uncle Dan. It is always fun to see my grandchildren. They make me feel good with their youthful exuberance. Ethan is my youngest one. I am looking forward to catching up on what has been happening with my daughter with her new nursing job. She has to go to the hospital for something, but won't be working which is why we have time to go to lunch. She works 12 hour shifts so all she can think of is getting home otherwise.
So already I am startng to feel better as I shake off the effects of so many deaths in such a short time. You might say it has been a hard winter here. If any ailing people got the kind of flu I did, that would be enough to cause a hazard right there. I am still recovering from that.
Anyway these plans should keep me on the up and up. Plus I will keep posting videos of my play reading, just because they are funny and make me laugh. Doc has a great sense of humor which is one reason he is valuable to me, but I have been avoiding him more when his drinking depresses me. Can't help it. Got to cheer myself up!
A dream caused me to wake up and go to my computer, a warning dream, so I must write to my sister to tell her about it. Maybe she can use it to head off some trouble that might rise up in her life. Takes a lot of alertness to stay alive. Can't get too down, that is for sure. So I am working on that up feeling!

Coffee with the legislater

I went down at 8am for coffee in the ballroom in an event sponsored by the WRAI, a non profit tenatns organization which does not elect resident officers as the other one does, but is dedicated to bringing other benefits to the residents. I quite enjoyed this session with a member of the Arizona legislature who was willing to discuss the draconian cuts Arizona has had to make to balance the budget this year. Quite a number of residents ended up attending as the state has recently cut copays on drug prescriptions which has affected SSI recipients quite a bit. Anytime you are going to initiate a cut that will affect that group of people you will get some alarm. A number of other programs have been cut back, too, which legislater State Senator Debbie McCune Davis addressed.
Nola and Victor, pictured above, are two long time members and original founders of the WRAI. I enjoyed getting out and about and listening to a group of people address what is going on in our state. Sounds like this state senator is also engaged in trying to educate new legislaters on what is involved in programs they might cut. Ouch! It hurts to balance the budget!

Royce and Thor insist on a ride in the space ship (Scene 3b of Blue)

I don't know why Doc is able to play drunks so well, or why I was surrounded 22 years ago by drunks, too. I called them my patients I was trying to save. They came for miles for my therapy. They traveled in the spirit when they were too imprisoned and addicted to come in the flesh. I calculate I kept quite a few of them alive a few years longer. Oddly some of the most creative and funniest men I ever met were the worst off. You would think the world would love a wit but that is not so. Or else their creativity causes them to be too sensitive and therefore too prone to medicating themselves from pain. So I tried to enjoy the laughs they provided even though they were so hard to cure.

A cheerer upper from the thrift store

Above is one of the spring blouses I bought to the thrift store. I took a photo of it to cheer you up, too. it was senior citizen day.
It was sad to think of Bob's parents coming to take the last vestiges of his presence away from the Westward Ho. He had died. And this will be among the last of their many trips here over the years coming to support Bob. They used to attend all the parties until they got ailments that kept them from driving, and they were also tending their 2 little great grandchildren while their granddaughter worked, for free of course. I know a lot of grandmothers who step in to volunteer their baby sitting services and there are probably going to be more. Greater love hath no grandmother. I know my own sister has tended four of hers regularly and always goes to visit the other ones. My sister Linda is now busy in San Francisco tending her two grandchildren before and after school. She hopes to get into see a specialist this week some time as she is still having alot of problems with her numb hands, which she now thinks is connected to her upper back.
I was reading where Obama was addressing other countries saying that they could not keep looking to the US to consume all their products, that we had gone overboard with our consuming habit as urged on by our presidents and so on, and an adjustment was going to have to be made to turn us back into savers. For spending has brought us to a sad end, and all the businesses that opened on the strength of our consumer habits will drag along or go bankrupt. That's a whole lot of adjustment there.

An angel to watch over you, Lisa and Nelishia and Missy

I just read in Lisa's blog that she is in the hospital with pneumonia in both lungs, one worse than the other one. Her blog is on my blog list Please Dont Take Life for Granted. This was posted since I last checked as I usually check her blog every day or so. I am sending her this beautiful angel that Sugar made to watch over her, as I sent it to Nelishia who has had a very rough winter with frequent virus attacks. I just hope she is doing all right. I wait for her to get better and post.
I just went to Missy's blog Upside Down World and was dismayed to read that she is suffering more complications in her leg, more pain, and just really a scarey difficult experience, and she needs more concentration of our prayers. I am so sorry this knee surgery has turned into such a harrowing experience for her. She needs angels to be with her, too. Her blog is on my blog list.

Going to tackle addiction harder

I have no choice. Either that or be overwhelmed! I listened to three hours of great country music last night on the CMA awards, and you don't get that good without a lot of hard work. Alchoholism and drug addiction used to be tolerated more it seems back in the 'old' days, but now you would soon 'fall off the charts' if you indulged yourself very much in that malarkey. I thoroughly enjoyed this show which was so well done. I thought the tribute to the soldiers was so touching by Trace Adkins. His tall dramatic figure and the choir singing behind him just knocked me out, especially when they were singing we won't come home. I thought it was great that they thought to give Lee Ann Rimes a humanitarian award for her work with the children of soldiers gone to war.
However, how does this all translate to the common people? I won't stop talking to alcoholics or trying to work with them as much as I can, as long as I think it is productive. Some alcoholics knew more about a good work ethic than some sober people do ONCE. That is the point. They have given up and fallen into some down thinking that is for sure, and this is where I want to stop short before they suck me into depression. I could not help but be depressed all this week with some huge meltdowns around here, topped off by another death that was clearly caused by excessive alcohol and tobacco use.
So off I go this morning to the grocery store and I will stop by for moment of cheer at the thrift store across the street. Haven't been there since I got the flu.
I got an e-mail from Krissy whose blog Sometimes I Think is now listed on my blog list. She reported on the last few months when John suffered from both viral and fungal pneumonia as a result of the weakness in his immune system after his marrow transplant. He first got shingles and chickenpox at the same time, and experienced maximum pain, but I can't believe how those two cooperate and fight for life. Krissy says she is back to blogging again after some harrowing months. There is a lot of courage demonstrated in her blog, so check it out. It will renew your faith in the determination of some people to find life precious enough to fight for it.
Dont you love the joy in Connies Creations three kids and horse? Try Windswept Whispers on my blog list if you want to snag something.

Lord have mercy on all the addicted

There is an alcoholic couple on the 9th floor where I live who are starting to call constant attention to themselves with brawls. The police were called when the man threatened to kill the woman yesterday. She left last year for some time after beng accused of seriously trying to kill him, but after several months returned because she is too old and broken down to work and it would be impossible for her to get disability right now based on her alcoholism, so she just came on back to him as the place of last resort. Another younger alcoholic who lives near them is trying to get them evicted since now a trail leads to their door of spills, dog accidents, etc. They call everyone names who criticizes them. So it is a lovely area of our home to venture into.
When I find myself living among the dramas of the addicted I think well, alcoholism is not so much different than my own food addiction, which just has quieter results. When I wrote my play Blue I put the most troubled, creative and probably most briliant characters in my play I had had a long time associations with, which started with my father. I found almost every one of the alcoholics in this play to have been broken down as children, all what we call bisexuals, with therefore the most difficult sexual problems to handle in our society. I have Doc reading this play with me, another brilliant alcoholic who is the only one who is not a bisexual of the older men. My son Cal is a character in this play. Doc keeps reading hostility in his attitude toward me, which I kept telling him was not there. My son who ran the playwrights workshop was far too civilized to talk like that to anyone. I got so mad at Doc for misinterpreting my lines that I almost quit the reading, but I decided to let his reading be an example of working with an alcoholic who is gleeflully portraying alcoholics. I got mad at him for adding lines that suggest even my father and Uncle Deke are still drinking, after having died and gone to hell presumably. I tried to explain how he does not add to the play when he improvises too much, he just makes it seem more chaotic.
But since alcoholics are all I have to work with in this place, I will let this reading stand. And we can all see why no plays get produced if we have to depend on alcoholics. But we are a very addicted society in so many different ways, so to my mind, it behooves us all to try to be understanding of the others addictions.
My scolding did result in Doc being alittle more restrained as the play went along. I will be embedding Scene 3a in this entry as soon as it uploads.

ET Blue asks ailing sister Colfrey to have his child (scene 2c)

Blue, the alien, proposes to Colfrey that she have his child. She points to the hole in her abdomen where the chemo is zapped to fight the cancer, but Blue does not seem to think that will be any problem. She also says she is too old for him but he says he is a billion years old in our time. Colfrey is raised from her gloom finding out about extra terrestrials. She is so tired of thinking about cancer that she welcomes this new 'Blue' diversion. She seems to opt for the old fashioned way of dying and being greeted by relatives who have passed on rather than leaving with an alien stranger in his space ship. Her dad will come to get her on a horse. An angel choir will no doubt be singing!

Westward Ho's biggest baseball fan on life support

I found out yesterday afternoon that this notable resident had a massive heart attack and stroke, and his parents reported him on life support. Bob has been a long time resident in here who was known for his devotion to the Diamondbacks. He called himself their number one fan and would wheel himself down to the home games at least once a week, as well as watching all the games on TV. You could count on him to remind you the game was on. Traits like this endeared this stroke victim to me in spite of his temper. He had a tough time at first of adjusting to life in a wheel chair and got into a fight a day it seemed sometimes. I remember one notable one he had with an older resident who was wielding a cane while Bob parried with a cane of sorts he carried on his wheel chair for protection. The hot tempered older resident was furious to think a younger one would attack him, but then Bob was more handicapped!
I remember he and I having long conversations about his recliner falling apart, as he could not sleep on a bed his limbs on one side were so frozen, so he was going to have to buy another lazy-boy which he said was the only kind he could sleep in comfortably. Then I had to contemplate how it might feel to never be able to stretch out on a bed again.
Bob suffered his stroke while he was a long distance truck driver and said he drove too many hours one time too many and paid for it. He would always take the blame for whatever he thought he was responsible for, and that was that, so let's get on with life and stuff like baseball you can still enjoy.
Bob loved to go out to eat to a cafeteria and he had just discovered the new cafeteria in the student dorm close by and said he went there as often as possible. It sure beat his home cooking.
I will miss Bob. I remember him always greeting Dante when he came to visit, from the time he was a little boy. Once when Dante was around six he greeted him after having not seen him for a while. He told me he said, "Haven't you got a hug for me? I thought you liked me." Dante quickly responded, "Not that way." Dante of course had been well schooled about hugging any men he could technically call stranger. In fact we had to quit swimming in the pool for a while, because an unstable resident just would not leave him alone and was so hot tempered I did not dare discpline him. Some people will act like kids have no rights. It is most disconcerting.
Anyway, Bob had a rare sense of humor and he laughed so hard at Dante's quick retort. Dante remained a favorite of his.
I had to go to bed the rest of the day when my actress friend Joyce who lived next door told me about Bob. He had learned she was kind hearted and when he fell down trying to go to the bathroom and could not get up he would pound her wall with something and she would call 911. She said that is what she thought was occurring this last time, but the paramedics took Bob away, never to return I am sure. She and I both knew Bob drank way too much. But he seemed to have cut back quite a bit because he wasn't having nearly as many fights. Goodbye, Bob. You were a tough fighter.

Walking on a spring morning...

I mailed some books this morning and took a walk around the block on a nice spring morning. I took my camera to photograph the new civic park next to the post office but the fence was too thck, so I will have to wait until it is gone. I paid a call to Circle K for some juice, etc, and when I came in the door why was I not surprised to see the invididual we have all been worrying about sitting there, still quite drunk. It looks like he has sprung out of Lark as fast as he went in, so I sat down to talk to him a little bit since he was a little less drunk than in past days. He then told me that he had a large round spot on his hip that had caused all the trouble in the first place by stinging and burning non stop. After 7 sleepless nights he started to drink. (some days ago) He said after all this drinking, it still stings and hurts. He said that he has been in 3 hospitals trying to get a diagnosis and treatment. Now they think it was brought in from abroad and is something they don't recognize, so he was waiting for a taxi to go have a culture of it taken, so someone else can try to tell what it is and how it must be treated! This is the first I have heard of this trouble. Sometimes there are simple physical causes to the beginning of a spiral downward you donot expect. I wished him luck.
Since I did not get any photos and the gorgous palo verde is just starting to blossom I decided to post the photo above of a tree my sister Ann sent me from Utah. I call that some flowering tree.
I talked to Raymond twice in Utah and he sprung this news on me. He wants to do my play, "Happy Hello, Sad Goodbye," in Boulder, probably not this summer, but next summer when he hopes to have helped build out a theater there. This was the first full length production he did in a theater in Phoenix, produced by his friend Bryan John. That was a wonderful experience for me. Happy Hello was written in Boulder with a mountain setting. (You can see an improv version of it on my Youtube Channel gerryking40 Doc and I made)
So I found out I had a pretty clean recently revised vesion of it which I intend to send to him as soon as possible. Bryan John had a lot of fun helping build the set of this play, a mountain cabin surrounded by firs. He rented about 20 fir trees from a nursery. He also wrote and sang an original song for it. I wrote the play for my little sisters then, Ann, 16, and Linda, 14. I wrote the spirit aunt character for myself, and the drifter for Raymond's father. When the play was done in Phoenix, my daughter who was around 17, played the part of my sister Ann. The character playing the drifter, a friend of Bryan's, forgot his cue to come on stage, and left her ad libbing for she said so long she gave up the theater then and there!


I thought of the log cabin in the play as one my Grandfather King built in Kings Pasture on Boulder Mountain when he homesteaded it's 400 acres, but it fell down, so I am posting the other log cabin he built on his homestead in Salt Gulch, as painted by his daughter Neta.

Luis the Mexican explains Jessie the playwright to Blue the extraterrestrial (scene 2b)

Luis, who was drawn from life from a man I hung out with for about seven years, was one of the most remarkable intelligences I met on the west side. He intuitively understood people like no other. He had a rare sense of humor. He could keep a crowd of his followers laughing with his boldness and impertinence. He did not bother to tell lies about his most shocking traits. The only people he spared the truth were his children who were not ready for it.
He was a born spirit walker, but there was tragedy in his past that kept him a prisoner in that bar and his alcoholism. Pretty soon, no matter how gifted, he could only shuffle along as a prisoner does, bound by his chains, but he recognized that I had become an alien in my own country as he would always be. I was not accepted. I pushed people too far, said too much, spoke about the unspeakable, and the powerful had marked me as a non entity, 'crazy' therefore an untouchable, a woman who did not know her place.

Then comes the calm...

April brought welcome relief to the Westward Ho. Our anguished resident at last agreed to go off to a facility for help with his alcoholic meltdown that has kept us on the edge for over a week I never felt such relief as when I talked to one of his good friends who I could see had been working tirelessly to try to save his life. I thought she was behaving in an admirable manner and he certainly needed this kind of friend. I was afraid she would have fled the premises, but she was made of stronger mettle than that.
I have long had all I could handle with Doc and could not take the kind of measures she did. Perhaps in time she will have some ideas about Doc as she said she used to be a counselor Doc flirts with the idea of rehab now and then, so he made me repeat the whole story.
I am sure our friend is still not out of the woods, and might resist treatment as he has been known to do. He and Doc both are of this old fashioned breed of men who think they can handle their lives with no help, but then they just don't do it.
It's very important to trust someone or something to get the monster in control. Doc is certainly not safe. He's just a sipper not a gulper. My dad could hit a crisis in a few hours of drinking by pouring copious amounts of poisonous brew down himself. I had never gotten acquainted with anyone before with the sipping approach to death by alcohol. I still maintain this method may be slow but it will get you in the ground eventually.