Cloister Commentary, Day 121: 63 – 54 – 5 – 44 – H

I am spending a week with my mom and yesterday hit the ol’ 63 – 54 – 5 – 44 – H trail that I could drive in my sleep. Broke in the new car stereo with mid-’70s Miles, Beatles, VU (’68 stuff–damn), Gary Stewart (yelled all the songs: I wish I could sing like him), and PE.

Road observations:

Had to stop at the Wal-Mart in Camdenton because I drank a cup of tea before I left. Plusses: all employees were masked, plus IF you are a dude, need to take a leak, and don’t mind sanitizing back in the jalopy, you can enter, do the biz, and exit without touching anything foreign. Minuses: maybe 2 in 10 customers were masked, and the rejiggering of the entrances and exits just seemed to create massive bottlenecks.

On I-44, I once again mourned the impending sale of “The Den of Metal Arts.” I’d always hoped that, one, some former students of mine would form a metal band and use a photo of it as an album cover, and, two, it would someday be converted into a metal recording studio or venue. It’ll probably end up an evangelical church.

As I passed 65, a maroon van merged onto 44 beside me, into a crowd of vehicles we traveled with for several miles. Spray-painted crudely and legibly on its driver side was “Honk if you love Trump!” No one honked.

We had a nice afternoon and evening. Mom and I got caught up, we chatted with my brother Brian on the blower, I Zoomed with my Sunday regz and my sweetie Nicole (who’s minding the feline farm), and we had BLs with fresh Ts. Closed down the day by watching the terse but somewhat trance-inducing Apple + series Defending Jacob.

I read a few pages of Michael Corcoran’s great book on Ghost Notes: Pioneering Spirits in Texas Music. I’m supposed to know a ton about American music, but how come I never knew the great pianists and singers Charles Brown and Amos Milburn were not only likely gay but also a couple? Amazing, cool–and damn difficult for their glory years.

Streaming for Strivers:

Speaking of Texas music…

Cloister Commentary, Day 119.5: Splash, So Long

I have had a decent portion on my plate lately, so I was happy to hand a very healthy certified check over to good ol’ Sharon Dothage at Hickman for deposit into our account for remembering our departed friend George Frissell. My first experience managing a GoFundMe campaign was pretty positive, but also nerve-wracking. Would I do it again? Depends.

Thanks be to McKnight Tire for bringing my ’93 Ford Ranger (formerly known as a Splash until I had the evidence removed–didn’t quite go with my image) up to long-distance travel-speed. They have treated that vehicle lovingly for almost 30 years, and after the new owner has them put a set of tires on it, they shall see it no more, and will eventually meet my Chevy. I hope they get along.

How many hours in a day can you read? Providing my damn phone is buried somewhere, I can get seriously lost in a book, but I happened to have my nose in an in-demand book I’d checked out from the DBRL that was, um, five days overdue, so I had additional motivation. Finished it with time to spare, which I used to…read another book.

The dark side of the day was learning that 30 fellow Stephens employees lost their jobs. I’m pretty convinced the leadership did everything they could to prevent taking that measure, but COVID-19 gives no quarter. Had we done a much better job refusing any ourselves–say, starting in January–we’d be in a better place now. But more and more it is appearing we are in a hell we had a hand in making.

Random shout-out: I was delighted to see one of my favorite administrators and edumacational wizards, Dr. Andrew McCarthy, yesterday. Andy’s smart, dedicated, hard-working, funny, positive, patient, and nice. What else could one require in an educator?

Streaming for Strivers:

How ’bout some snap, crackle, and pop?

Cloister Commentary, Day 119: Candles

Yesterday was a trying day, but I managed to vanquish the stress and arrest a darkening mood by focusing on the blessings I was fortunate to be provided by the cosmos, luck, proximity, curiosity, whatever:

A fresh and local cucumber, onion, and tomato salad. Nicole augmented it from an old favorite recipe of Jane’s.

A terrific essay on Halsey’s new album by my oldest freshman (24), who has grown so much as a writer in so little time.

A compilation of the diverse, lively, and clarion-calling songs of Texas singer and picker Blind Lemon Jefferson (I’m listening to it all over again as I thumb this out; also, see below).

A pair of books that made me forget everything but their worlds, one by the underrated Texas music writer Michael Corcoran, entitled Ghost Notes, which explores the work of such Lone Star masters as Arizona Dranes, Joyce Harris, Kenny Dorham, and The D.O.C., the other by multiple-award winner James McBride, Deacon King Kong, which traces the repercussions of a single hazily-conceived violent action on a Brooklyn day in ’69.

A candle. Yes, a candle. I like candles, what of it? This one emitted a ginger scent and it relaxed me while I graded papers. I’m thankful for the chandler who had the idea.

A trip to pick up pet food, groceries, and fresh produce–and drop of three of my mom’s homemade masks, two of her patterns, and three jars of Blue Plate mayonnaise to our friends named Ruffin.

A terrific meal from my former student Sonny Singh’s always-reliable restaurant India’s House. Their cuisine has been a weekly pleasure for us lately.

A simple change in routine: morning in the front room, with the sun coming up through the windows, evening in the “living room,” with a splendid nature video mirrored to the TV and neighborhood fools out of earshot.

A soul mate who kept calm when I was about to go volcanic.

I encourage you to stop today and count the ways you’re lucky if you’re hitting a snag. I concede that some readers may find it more difficult than I did yesterday, but I’m confident some crack in your life is letting light in.

Streaming for survivors:

This music is best appreciated leaning forward just a bit (speaking mentally, at least).

Cloister Commentary, Day 118: Up in this Mess

Things Nicole and I do up in this mess:

1) Finally spread the ashes of two fond ol’ cats (Carlos the Buddha Cat and Little Lola) out in the backyard.

2) Perseverate about the form of our future in education and the form of education in the future.

3) Drive aimlessly through town with the windows down and the stereo up (it was Tropicalia: A Brazilian Revolution in Sound) and feel like we’re on vacation.

4) Hang out in the backyard stringing solar lights from the swing and hiding cat food from the raccoons.

5) Move our pleasant evening reading into the TV room to distance ourselves from the screaming of our neighbors at each other and their loose dogs (“What is a leash?”), then turn up Bud Powell and once again revel in his genius.

Streaming for Shut-Ins:

Also, our dog Louis discovered he can sleep soundly to this marvelous singer, who I think Missy Elliott knows about.

Cloister Commentary, Day 117: I Can’t Live Without My Stereo

I would love to have left completely intact the 2003 Chevy Silverado I inherited from my father, but I cannot survive vehicularly with an AM/FM radio only. I just can’t. Thus, I had Tom at Auto Radio here in Columbia install a much more enhanced stereo in it and replace the factory speakers, which were about to turn to dust (Tom showed me). I selected the following discs to test the new system, adjust my EQ, and just cruise: Sonny Rollins’ Saxophone Colossus, Clipse’s Hell Hath No Fury, Al Green’s Call Me, Nighthawk Records’ Send I A Lion, and Johnny Thunders’ So Alone. By the way, big thumbs up to Auto Radio.

We had Louis in the dog hotel for our recent excursion to see my mom, and left him in an extra day to facilitate pure feline party pleasure. Our youngster Junior is really learning to enjoy being a lap cat, and now seems to like having his head, ears, and chin scratched. Now, if he’ll just rein back his tongue when he meows! He extends it fully in the process, which creates an incredibly grating whine.

Nicole and I finished Hulu’s The Great. If anything, it was too short. Bosch brought into the Streaming Age; also, many, many other parallels are evident.

Streaming for Strivers:

Do it for Johnny, man.

Cloister Commentary, Day 116: Just Being Still

A kind of quiet day in Mask Ordinance USA.

Riding back up to Columbia, we listened to the audiobook of Marjorie Spruill’s Divided We Stand. You’ve heard me mention it while enthusing about the Hulu series Mrs. America, for which it served as somewhat of a guidebook for the series’ writers. In it, Spruill makes a great case for the seeds of today’s paralyzing, aggravating, and flat-out miserable division having been planted by the ’70s struggle over the Equal Rights Amendment. While the book is enlightening, it does not serve to lift much pre-existing dread with which one might be grappling.

In other highlights, when we got home, I lay next to Nicole on our bed in the dark while she napped, just being still, conscious, and calm. It was very nice. Also, there was a cat on my chest.

Later, I had a peach popsicle and again fell asleep exactly for the key moment of Episode 8 of The Great. As always, I awakened right after the key moment.

I did not listen to any music, but I heard much of the following in my head.

Streaming for Strivers:

Thank you for the nudge, Michael Corcoran. It’d been awhile since I’d been down to Marlin, Texas.

Cloister Commentary, Day 115: Ronnie

Ronnie Williams was the first dude I met when I moved to Monett for the summer in 1980. He was very welcoming, introduced me to some “key players” on the just-graduated late-adolescent scene, and was just a great friend to illicitly drink beer and jam tunes with.

Ronnie and I hung out yesterday on my mom’s back porch and strolled down memory lane, reflecting on our many trips across the state line to Galena and Columbus, Kansas, to dance, party, and fail with girls; Ronnie’s high-board acrobatics (cutaways, gainers…I saw him do a front 3 1/2 while I was guarding one day) off the Monett pool high board–ahhh, the city pool high board: a relic from another age!; and, especially, our sports clashes when I was a Carthage Tiger and he was a Monett Cub. I once hooped against Cub legends Brad Grant and David Wallace; he once upset the legendary and volatile Norris brothers in doubles tennis.

Ronnie and his wife Missy are keeping an eye on Mom, and Nicole and I really appreciate it. They are good folks, simple as that.

Streaming for Survivors:

That’s Fernest Arceneaux. Fire up that squeezebox.

Cloister Commentary, Day 114: Cases

Would have been my dad’s 85^th birthday. Woulda coulda shoulda…

726 total COVID-19 cases in Boone County as of yesterday. I haven’t really been reporting stats on this journey, but that snapped up my eyelids like roller blinds, Hardin*.

Nicole and I have been visiting my mom. Whenever we’re in Monett, we like to walk around, and in the morning we jaunted down to the main drag and back. A very old house in pretty decent shape stopped us in our tracks and had us imagining living there, but it’s a domicile for those with ancient fix-it know-how.

Mom is a seamstress, and she’s made many masks over these months. I now have several very stylish ones for the coming days, weeks, months….

In the afternoon, we listened to an amazing clarinet recital streamed on Facebook live by a young lady named Lydia Krikke, who just happened to be the daughter of Janis Neher, the pianist who shone during by father’s service. In the very best sense, clearly the apple doesn’t fall far at all from the tree.

For dinner, we dined on delicious shrimp, cream cheese-stuffed bread, fresh sliced cucumber salad with onions. For a second, I thought we were in New Orleans!

Started a new graphic novel, Superman Smashes the Klan, by Gene Luen Yang (art by Gurihiru). It sounds corny, perhaps, but it’s quite the opposite. As my friend Rex had suspected when he learned I was reading it, the book’s based on a 1946 radio serial, but it’s masterfully brought into the present.

Also, we started a new cable series that all three of instantly loved: The Great, on Hulu. It’s about Catherine, and it is.

Streaming for Strivers:

I hope one day the lawyers get what’s tangled about the Joe Tex Dial / Atlantic discography straightened out, but, ’til then?

*Hardin’s a good friend for whom I specifically included that allusion.

Cloister Commentary, Day 113: Advice from the Unwise

When writing to inmates, take special care in comparing COVID-19 realities. Some similarities exist, but far more differences provide dramatic contrast. That paragraph will be a booger.

When dealing with the paperwork after a loved one passes, never say aloud, “Well, that was the last!” When we arrived at my mom’s, the entire surface area of my brother’s old bed was covered with more. I knew better.

When wearing your dad’s old jeans, for chrissakes use a belt or suspenders. I’ve put on 10 pounds of rona/grief weight, which tends to push jeans down my non-existent butt. They fit great three weeks ago, but when I found myself with both hands occupied at the grocery store, I had to use my lower back muscles to keep from exposing myself, and they are screaming today.

When preparing to watch the brilliant Disney + version of Hamilton, it’s best not to add a shot of tequila to one’s second glass of Salvador’s Top Shelf Pre-Mixed Margarita. I feel asleep precisely before and woke up precisely after the climactic duel. I had seen it live at The Fabulous Fox a few years ago, but in some ways this version is more moving.

When trying to massage your injured pride after falling asleep on a masterpiece, try asking your fellow viewers if they want to watch an episode of Kath & Kim. It works!

Streaming for Survivors:

“When life looks like Easy Street / There is danger at your door.”

Cloister Commentary, Day 112: Good Fortune and Bright Light

Good fortune and bright light shone on me yesterday. As far as fortune went, Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty found inmates for both Nicole and me to correspond with through their program. Neither of us believe in capital punishment, both of us recognize mass incarceration as one of our country’s biggest issues, and we applied to MADP to try to assist in a personal way. The response to the program had been so robust that they initially had no one to pair us with.

Bright light came in two forms. We successfully released “Scrappy,” a stray cat who found his way to Columbia’s Cat Capitol and got trapped and SNPed. To our surprise, he stayed put on the deck for a tuna treat. But…why were we even surprised? Also, our great friends Kenny and Gwen Wright chose us for their first Zoom double-date and we laughed into the night. Their youngun Ethan will soon be driving the most conspicuous and be-bumper-stickered teacher vehicle in town, only he’ll be doing so in Birmingham. We’ll meet in Memphis for the transaction, so that will be bright light for the future. I wish they were our next-door neighbors.

Oh yeah: I finished grading those papers. Beer. And dropped off a mega-load of recycling. Beer. And finished Jennings & Duffy’s mind-blowing graphic adaptation of Octavia Butler’s Kindred. Beer. Apologies, but I had been needing some release, and was stubborn in coming.

Streaming for Strivers:

Comin’ round the mountain…