Johnny Carson began hosting the Tonight Show the same year as I was born, so in my life there has never been a time without him. The news of his death on Sunday marked the end of an era. For those of us lucky enough to grow up with him, watching Johnny nightly was a requirement, as much as brushing your teeth before bed. As children, our entire family would watch at least his opening monologue every night and then my parents would go take their baths while my brother and I tried to sneak a bit more TV to see who the guests were. Of course, everyone loved Joan Embry from the San Diego Zoo (and the Wild Kingdom folks), Don Rickles, Charlie Callas, Bob Newhart and even such oddities as Charo and Tiny Tim.
Johnny made all of his guests shine, which is the mark of a truly great interviewer and host. He was open minded and curious, kind and honest, much too modest, very private, and he took the good and the bad as it came in stride. He always reminded me a lot of my own father, who just turned 76, and also unfortunately has emphysema. One of my big regrets was during the one trip our family took to California in the summer of 1980, Johnny was on vacation that week. We toured the NBC studios, no photos were allowed inside the building so the only photo I got that was Tonight Show related was a photo from a moving tram of Doc Severinson's parking space.
My husband and I watched his last Tonight Show together in 1992 and both cried like babies. We sat and watched Jay Leno's tribute this evening, which is literally the first time we've watched the Tonight Show all the way through since Johnny's sign off. Nothing against Jay, but it just wasn't the same. It never will be, I've been dry eyed the last two days, but as I write this now I'm finally beginning to tear up.
And so ends what has aptly been proclaimed the most depressing day of the year, I'm glad January has officially been called for what it is, a month of illness, death, debt and depression. (I was born this month so I feel qualified to agree with the good doctor's findings). We've still got a few days to go, but here's hoping February brings health, prosperity and happiness. And laughter.
Childhood memories...
My dad watering down the roof "just in case"
Standing in the back yard holding sparklers hoping they wouldn't burn me
Best of all... sitting on the ground watching the seemingly endless display at Westbury Square each year, being so close the dead ones sometimes would land at our feet. Laying back and letting the spectacle completely fill my vision.
Then laying in bed in the dark later watching it all replay behind my eyelids...
I've been kind of in a funk today, then I clicked on an email a friend sent and my iTunes automatically popped open to play the snippet that was attached. And, because of poor alphabetization, some of my Yeah Yeah Yeahs songs popped up to the top. I've only seen the video to Maps, which is mesmerizing, so out of boredom I listened to some of their other songs that were, um, in my files. Now I've got to get the album. They remind me of a lot of the early girl punk - New Wave groups, just totally doing their own thing. The lead is kind of Siouxsie-esque.
Then I scrolled down a bit and the tracks from my two Altered Images albums that I painstakingly transferred from vinyl to CD, and were in correct alphabetical order, appeared, so I listened to them for an hour or so and felt like I was 19 again. Altered Images were another very weird UK New Wave group that most people haven't heard of, you sort of had to frequent clubs and alternative record stores in the early 80's to know who they are. Amazon has the two albums I bought new way back, Happy Birthday and Pinky Blue, just recently released on CD for like $21 each, yikes, imports... ooh, extra tracks! They also have a good little best of CD (with song samples online) for $11.
It may sound silly now, when there are so many easily available choices when it comes to music, but New Wave and punk rock music changed my life in college. Growing up in the 70's with some of the scariest pop music ever, not to mention non-stop disco would numb most people's ears to just about anything playing on the radio. Nothing against classic rock, I still love it, but after hearing the same songs for almost a decade a breath of fresh air was nothing short of exhilirating.
I actually do have other things I've been meaning to write about lately, namely Italian charm bracelets and fibromyalgia, but I need to get the rest of this out of my head. I was going to write yesterday, but I'm glad I didn't because I was surfing last night and found out some things I didn't know before and now I'm even more confused...
First to finish the post office story where I left off, one of my favorite clerks (we know all of them by name and vice versa) called me to come on up and be waited on next. So I walk behind the ex (who I'm going to just refer to as K. from now on), luckily I only had about half a dozen packages instead of my normal three shopping bags full, and the clerk starts talking to me as I walk up and we banter back and forth for a minute. Then the lightbulb goes off in K's head and he turns and stares at me and then saunters over and says hello. He said he thought it was me, but when I spoke he knew. Now, while he looks pretty much the same, he's filled out a bit (he was always really lanky), I, on the other hand, don't look exactly the same anymore. My hair is darker than it was, I'm having to wear glasses to read again (the RK is wearing off and my MS is messing with my vision), and I've gained about 30+ pounds since 1990. And at 5'1" every bloody pound shows. I like to blame it on the MS and other various health problems I've been suffering from, it's hard to work out in Houston when you're not supposed to get overheated, but as my dad would say, that's probably just a "cop out" on my part.
So there I am, no makeup, baggy tee shirt, my long hair pulled back in a ponytail (none of which is unusual, just a bit embarrassing) and he's talking at me while his poor wife is finishing paying for her postage. Face to face, I can see he really has not changed much at all, he's still wearing his pseudo law enforcement stuff, a shirt with a badge of some sort, several little pins, an American flag pin (I hope he hasn't gone Republican), and the assortment of phones and pagers. Which may not sound unusual today, but in 1983 he was the only one I knew who carried a pager everywhere he went 24/7. So I start reading his symbols on his shirt and asking "so what are you up to now?" and he quickly says he's "retired" and hanging out with the Fort Bend county folks, etc. We both really wanted to be cops in the 80's and neither one of us successeded. I came really close several times, but being a SWF (short white female) I was told by several departments that no matter how well I tested, they really didn't need me. Years ago my brother (who would see him occasionally and used to help him do odd jobs) had told me he'd gotten married and they were living in a house in a neighborhood near my old junior high school. Now it seems, he's living in a house oh... let's see... about 3 or 4 miles south of where we live! Like the next major intersection west of us. There's proof right there that I don't get out of the house much that we've never run into each other until now. He asks about my brother, I ask him if they're doing eBay (yes), mention I'm a powerseller and have been doing it for ages now. His wife is selling things for someone who lives just up the street from my house.
As the clerk is finishing up my packages, his wife comes over and he introduces her and then me as his "could have been wife". I honestly don't even remember hearing her voice, I don't think she actually said anything. But the three of us all walked out to the parking lot together, where ironically we were parked next to each other, and said our goodbyes as his wife hastily jumped in the car and drove them off. She was short, had short brown hair, was dressed in a tank top and shorts, and seemed to be older than us (we're the same age). In retrospect, she reminded me of what I remember his mom looked like last time I saw her, which makes sense because he was very much a mama's boy. (For good reason, though, his father died very young and he was I believe the next to oldest son in a family of about 5 kids) When we were walking outside, I thought "man, I have a crappy old car" but their car was in worse shape than mine.
So to really try and make a long story short, being a detective by nature (and former profession) also, and an internet freak, I came home and spent two nights looking things up out of curiousity. I had really mixed feelings at first, I felt sorry for his wife, both for having to put up with the legal problems I know he'd gone through in the 90's (it was on the local news, another story for another time...), and the fact that they obviously weren't very well off financially, that her Ebay packages looked like they were wrapped in empty Kleenex boxes... I still had a million questions and a strange desire to help. Not that I'm wealthy or anything, but at least we're comfortable, and I'm really good at eBay, it's sort of been my life for about for many years now. (Sad, huh?)
But I jump on all the search engines, he had mentioned they had an email account with Juno but he doesn't seem to be real active on the net, I only found a few traces of him, an article I'd already read about his legal problems, a note he's left on someone's guestbook (with his full name and email) bragging about how he was a retired police officer, etc. He's in the phone book, so his address and all three phone numbers came up. (Following my parents example, I've always had an unpublished number and been very careful with what personal info I allow onto the internet) His sister seems to be very prominent in the local churches, good for her, she came up a lot. His wife was a ghost, though, which perplexed me. I thought maybe she's going by her maiden name, I still do in some situations, so I actually managed to find the vital records for Texas and Harris county online. I found them backwards, though, through their FTP site, so it was slow going. I found their date of marriage in 1993, and a woman's name that didn't match the name he'd introduced her by... maybe she's going by her middle name, half the people I know seem to, including my husband and my father. I do find this new name (with his surname) on one of the major people search boards, but I'm not willing to shell out any money to find out anything else about her.
Weird thing also, the woman he married in 1993 was 13 years older than him. So I don't feel so sorry for her anymore, she's old enough to know what she was getting herself into when she married him. But something still doesn't seem right, so last night I looked again and actually found the front entrance to the vital records site (it's searchable, duh!), so I stick in his last name, which is unusual like my own, and I get a couple of apges of results. Births, marriages, deaths... and divorces. Including one for him from 1999 from the 1993 wife. But no remarriages. Unfortunately, their database seems to stop at 2001. So is this the same woman (who would be in her mid fifties by now), or has he remarried... I dunno, I'm still curious.
I know it sounds dumb, but K. is one of the few ties I have left to my past, he was a big part of it, though often a very painful part. He went out with another (much younger) girl while he was living with me (which I found out later), he's a very self-centered person who likes to have the spotlight focused on him. He pretends to be things he's not, he lied to me numerous times, even borrowed my Corvette to take the other girl out. He's not actually a bad person, though, just rather misguided and irresponsible in his own weird way. He used to brag that all the girls he'd dated had remained friends with him afterwards, which I never believed but it's a nice thought.
Hi all, I've begun a new category that wasn't supposed to exactly be about this type of thing, I meant it more to be a way to record the snapshot memories of my past before they fade away (occasionally to be accompanied by actual snapshots). It's after 5am and my brain is starting to make that humming noise and I've yet to shower, but I had to at least start on this little story to get part of it out of my brain...
Long story short (for now), a week ago I went to our local post office, where Sparky and I have been going for over 10 years, we know everyone by name, they're used to us dragging in three and four shopping bags full of stuff to mail 3 to 4 times a week. Usually Sparky is nice enough to bring them in for me, but both of our businesses have been slow lately, so I've been going in more often. He goes around lunch time, I go right before they close normally, at like 4:30. Why? Because I work nights and sleep all day. And sometimes when I get up some eBay payments have arrived in the mail or by Paypal and I try and get them out the same day.
But anyway, I walk in to the post office and there are only a few people in line and several at the counter. As opposed to the often scenario of having the line to the back of the building that I often encounter, this was great, I waltzed up to take my place in line. The person in front of me was called and I'm head of the line, yippee. I glance around and notice a couple at the window in front of me delivering what are obvious eBay packages, complete with a bin to carry them in. Short woman, very tall man. Something starts to click in my brain as I'm looking at him from behind... hmmm.. cellphone and what looks like a pager, the ever present shorts, right height (about 6'4")... And then he opens his mouth to say something witty to one of the other clerks and I know. Before he even turns his head a bit to look at his wife, broken nose, strong profile...
It's my ex boyfriend, whom I haven't seen in over 10 years. I broke up with him the day after I met Sparky. He was not only my last boyfriend, but also my first REAL boyfriend whom I met on the eve of my 21st birthday as I was about to move out of my parents home into my first apartment, the first person who lived with me. This all began back in the early 80's. I was working security graveyards at a hospital and he brought a patient in to be transferred (he was an EMT) and we talked some, he flirted, but I balked. So he came to visit me at my day job at Foley's and basically was so persistant I eventually agreed to go out with him. We dated on and off for years, he'd stay with me and then sort of panic and drift back to his mom's house for awhile. He's promise to do things and then just not show up, very frustrating yet highly charged relationship because we had a hell of a spark between us that never really went away, even after I'd given up on him after he'd promised to move to Austin so we could be together and then called me in the middle of the night at work to decline. That was one of my moments of clarity.
Now in between our on and offness I didn't sit around and pine. I dated several people, mostly people I worked security with, even married one because he had the balls to ask me. Of course, it turned out I was his fourth wife and he basically just needed someone to run the house and clean up after him. That one lasted less than two years, but it alienated me from most of my friends, resulted in five different moves around Texas in said time frame, and left me in Austin all alone after it was done with two big dogs. While there I dated a few other guys I worked with, all disasters.
The ex actually tracked me down in Austn and showed up at my work (at a time when someone was trying to serve lawsuit papers on me so when I heard there was a guy with a walkie talkie at the security station I was more than a little shook up). But it was him, in full faux police regalia (more on that in the next entry), tall and handsome and full of blarney. (We're both Irish so I'm immune)
The weirdest part was a week or two before I had a dream about him so vivid I actually wrote it in my diary. I was working nights (even then) and during the day I dreamed that he was there, in town, looking for me, and he was really upset that he couldn't fine me. Turns out that on the day of the dream, he actually had driven up from Houston and went to my last address, a few miles down the street from where I'd moved to. He'd run and address check on me and came up with the old address.
By this point I was officially divorced, and sort of dating/living with a guy I met at work (in my house, as always), and my brother, who had followed me and the ex husband to New Braunfels and then Austin to help with our failed business. It was a way wrong relationship, but I hadn't figured out how to get out of it without him getting all suicidal and depressed so he and his dog remained for a little while longer.
I was also feeling rather suicidal and depressed living away from my family, with few friends, and a boyfriend who would come and visit when he felt like it (or I'd drive into Houston to visit for a day). So in January of 1990 with my parents help, I moved back to Houston and settled into a nice little rental house with my two dogs. And here comes ex boyfriend drifting back. I had mentally blown him off when he backed out of coming to Austin, so it was easier to resist his charms this time, though we did go out a few times, etc., etc.
Then a few months after I'd moved back to Houston, I got an invitation to a Dark Shadows fan club party that I'd joined when I was in Austin and I thought, what the heck. Fan people usually sort of scare me, and there were several scary ones at the party, but there was also this tall good looking young man who I instantly felt at ease with. I think we were probably the only two "normal" people there (no offense guys and gals). And he was funny, and engaging, and asked me to go to a midnight movie after the party, which turned out to be near my house. This was all odd for me, because I rarely date anyone I haven't known in some capacity for awhile, but something clicked.
So I get to the theater (late as usual) and he's waiting on the steps out front for me and I run through the parking lot and we joke and go in and watch a terrible movie (The Guardian), which, I'm told, I babbled nonstop throughout. (I do that when I'm nervous). He was working the next day, on which I had a date scheduled with the ex, and asked to see me the day after and we've literally been together since. We give the day we met as our anniversary, and seven years later we got "officially" married on the same date.
So I called the ex, left a message on his machine ala Tim Burton, and basically told him I didn't think it was working between us, and I wasn't happy. And I didn't see him again till a few years later when he showed up on my porch one day looking for my brother in a big shiny truck. Sparky saw him though the window, but I don't think they ever officially met. Soon after I heard from my brother that he had met and married a nurse. So much for an inability to make a commitment.
Yikes, almost six, off to bed, more tomorrow...