LIFEMOVES-YELLOWROSES

On a damp and chilled evening in the early 1980s in Chicago, I joined my friend, Tim Glisson, to discover a newly opened Sushi Bar. It was off of the beaten track of places to eat in Andersonville and it was on a side street in a store front. It no longer exists. We arrived, found seats at the bar, and placed our jackets on the backs of the chairs. When the Sushi master (Komada San) saw us he took a long gaze through which we felt his focus. He was the only one in the establishment other than his two guests – US.

We were served steaming green tea in large mugs and our verbal orders were taken as he started preparing our orders. However he kept glancing at us as he meticulously prepared our food. About mid meal, Komada San started a fractured conversation about his leaving Japan a few years prior and moving to Chicago where his wife had relatives. He stated that he wanted to have a small and elegant Sushi Bar – it only seated 8 – 10 at the bar and only one narrow table for 4 past the entrance. The appointments were refined as were all of the pottery and ceramics made by Japanese artisans and cultural treasures. Our oblong napkins were cotton cloth of hand dyed deep indigo with subtle grey details. He was very gentle in his dialogue and eventually asked if we had ever traveled to or in Japan. I replied Yes.
Then he asked, “in what years?” I sensed he was directing the conversation for information as he took another long stare particularly at me.

Next he stated you must have been a student. “Correct” I responded. Next was, “What did you study?” When I replied that at Waseda I had focused on Nihon Bunka (Japanese Culture) he again focused tight with his eyes squinting, took a deep breath and continued with what other places had I studied. I responded with a long list of the Umewaka Noh Theatre, Nishikawa School of Classical Dance (Nihon Buyo), the National Museum, and the Imperial School of Music and Dance. At the end, after a pause I mentioned the Grand Kabuki Theatre.

Next he inquired as to the names of my teachers. I responded with the names and he replied that they were national treasures and it would be rare and unusual for Japanese students or artists to have the opportunity to study with any of them. I informed him of my support with fellowships from the Fulbright Association and the Japan Foundation, etc. He seemed to be satisfied with my answers and then he asked, “Is your name Ronny or Lonny?” With my affirmative response he clasped his hands and moved around the counter and seated himself beside me and took my hand in his and told a loving story of recognition. All of this being witnessed by my friend Tim.

He had owned and been the sushi chief of a very intimate place exactly 2 blocks behind the Kabuki Za where I had my lessons and many studies with Kanzaburo Nakamura XVII. The story that unfolded was how he had been contacted by Kanzaburo personally in order to arrange the place where I could be picked up after my lessons, but no statement of who would pick me up was made by my venerable teacher. This was an outcome of my confiding in Kanzaburo about meeting Yukio on the street at the end of a prior week after my lessons as I was walking to Wako department store. This meeting story was published in Impressions Magazine in 2017, edited by Julia Meech.

Shortly some days after this talk, I went backstage to be greeted by Yukio in the dressing with Kanzaburo. A discussion evolved about discretion and privacy and no public or press/media scandal in order to protect all involved. Also allowing me to learn in depth about scrutiny and having a private life while learning in depth about the inner workings of a society steeped in tradition.

What was arranged: After my lessons on prior planned dates, I would walk to this Sushi location and take a seat by the window. I would order a small meal with green tea and await for a car to slow in front and then move down the block while I paid my tab. Then I would exit to my right and walk to the middle of the block to the waiting car, and off we would go to a great adventure of looking at handmade silks, selecting the most exquisite fans, a drive to the ocean, an evening of private dining, soaking in spring fed hot baths, etc.

On one occasion, I was late as I had gone to the restroom and when I returned to the Window where I always was seated, the car had stopped in front and the back right window was partly opened and there was Yukio gesturing for me to come along. In this instant Komada San recognized the face inside of the car window, and he came to understand the reasoning of Kanzaburo for a place for me to come after specific lessons. He confided that this secret was ours, but that he had always wondered when the car slowed outside as to who, what, why and in that moment he comprehended the delicacy and weight of the gesture and contact by Kanzaburo.

Many deep abiding lessons were learned from and with a truly great teacher – a master of his art and of living a life in the public eye of the theatre and constant media.

Entry – June 23, 2019

It was not about leaving, it was about a passage to another place and yet I was leaving. I had been living in Las Vegas since 1991 and now 13 years had passed. The cleaning out of the house became a monumental effort of getting rid of stuff (from clothing to books to furniture to accumulations of whatever had been gifted). I recall spending most of two months starting in April and daily clearing out a space, a shelf, a drawer, a surface, a memory and many memories, and clearing out myself from heart to soul through psyche.

I literally gave away or gifted or donated a wardrobe of clothing that dated back to a time living in NYC from the 1970s. I packed boxes of just neckties, of shoes I never wore again, of art papers, and of sins with the blessings of the saints. I found many things that had been stored and forgotten in one of the four bedrooms. All was meticulously arranged along a wall in the double door entrance. I had arranged to spend my last night in the home of a friend after the movers came and emptied out the house and the last day I bid the house a loving good bye by burning incense and pissing one more time in the back yard. The 1993 Black Jaguar was sent off to Illinois in a moving truck and the 2000 Green Jaguar packed “to the full” hit the road and drove into the desert through the mountains across the plains and arrived in the cornfields. What had I done? Where was this new adventure to go with my hopes and fears?

Arriving in Bloomington, Illinois, early morning after a one night stop along the road – Life repeated itself in an omen and a warning and I found a place not ready to allow me to settle. In Las Vegas in 1991, Mrs. McNair was not moved out and arranged for me to stay in an apartment for which she paid until over two months had passed and her transition to her new home was made. I started a new academic position in a new city living out of temporary housing and not unpacked and not settled.

Arriving in Las Vegas with a moving van scheduled the same day, I was greeted by Mrs. McNair and told I could place as much as possible in one emptied bedroom and store the rest on the porch and that she had arranged an apartment for me across the street from my new office. I had had an anterior cruciate ligament and meniscus operation and was in a brace and would undergo three more years of rehabilitation therapy with Jack Close in Las Vegas. This apartment was on a second stair up level and 4 blocks from my new office. I faced the challenge. This was at the start of July and I did not get to move into my home at 412 Park Way East until the middle of September. The dates in Illinois were the same to the date of moving into 1030 East Monroe Drive.

The apartment in Bloomington was owned by the man from whom I had purchased my home and it was half underground where car lights directly came into the bedroom windows. My neighbors were aggressive with their use of garlic and curry and all permeated the building and skin and clothing. Again a new city, a new academic position, continued therapy for my spine that had acted up moving from Las Vegas, and a place where I was unable to settle. I lived out of my suitcases for over 2 and a half months in each city, and I was moving into my new homes on my birthday, September 21st. Thirteen years apart life patterns repeated. Las Vegas equaled Lost Wages. Bloomington – Normal was Bloomless – Abnormal.

Entry – October 25, 2018

In Bloomington, Illinois, I awoke one morning with groin pain that caused me to crumple when I got out of bed. I located a Urologist in the community and he saw me in the afternoon. Asking me to drop my slacks and underwear, he did not touch me and he stated that I had epididymitis (testicle infection), and to take the antibiotic he prescribed.

By the next morning, I had a high fever and my testicles were turning blue. I called Dr. Fernando Ojea in Chicago and he instructed me to pack my groin in ice and immediately drive to Methodist Hospital in Chicago. When I arrived four hours later a sonogram was administered and I was rushed to a Persian urologist, Dr. Emil Totonchi, and he operated on me that late afternoon. When I awakened, Dr. Totonchi was at my bedside and told me that he had saved my life.
My problem was testicular torsion in both testicles and he had stabilized each one with three wires so this would not happen again. How it happened originally is still a mystery as the night before I crumpled getting out of bed had been spent at my computer for a time of about 6 hours. This was in the time of autumn 2007.

My recovery in Chicago took place in the home of Timothy Glisson. It was a 12 days odyssey of being packed in Ice and resting on the living room couch. Finally being able to drive my car that had been saved by Barry Johnson and parked in his garage I visited the Dr. to learn of when I could return to Bloomington packed in ice.

During this recovery time, Tim christened me with a new name – and I became Autta Mae Bea Gawzballs which was also spelled Gawz-Bohls. The Autta Mae Bea was taken form an expression i had used in Texas Slang – “Ought to maybe”. The Gawzballs stuck due to being wrapped in gauze and packed in ice.
Some time later, I received a box of 30 engraved note cards gifted by Timothy Glisson that were Lavender with a silver embossed name – Autta Mae Bea Gawz-Balls, esq

I used all of these note cards until there were none. The great humor was the recipients who did not connect with from where they were sent or me as the sender. Autta Mae Bea had struck again with her dry and dark humor.

Several months later I visited the Urologist in Bloomington. After explaining to him what had happened and that his diagnosis was not accurate he just stared at me in silence. Then he picked up a pear, took a bite, spit it out, and said, “Well aren’t you lucky that you had a Doctor in Chicago who saved your life.”
Cold
Calculated
Arrogant
and he never apologized…
another life lesson lived by Autta Mae Bea
many times we OUTTA MAYBE
Entry – October 17, 2018

Elvis Presley released Blue Suede Shoes in March 1956, and I was captivated by the music and the song lyrics. I constantly danced to the song and begged for a pair of these magical shoes of mine that you better not step on! My Mother Ruth thought that they were a luxury item and not a necessity for living. However she told me (challenged me) that If I wanted them and earned the money to purchase them that we would go to Corpus Christi and find a pair. This was all I needed as a support sign and I set about finding three part-time jobs.
1. sweeping out the local barber shop after school for which I earned a quarter each time
2. rolling newspapers and putting a rubber band around them for their front lawn tossed delivery
3. cleaning out the local feed and seed store of any debris and trash on the weekend

I was diligent and in three months I had a shoe box filled with the $40. and proudly showed and counted out to Mother my treasure in coins and bills. Her response was that she would check with the best store in Corpus Christi and we would take a trip to purchase my coveted shoes. The next weekend on Friday afternoon we drove up the coast of Texas, and checked into the nicest hotel in downtown Corpus Christi in walking distance of the elegant department store called Lichtenstein’s.

I was up with the light of dawn and we were waiting outside of the store for their opening. Mother sent me with my shoebox of money to the Men’s Shoe Department and there a portly older sales clerk assisted me. He seemed to know exactly what I desired and after a short visit to the back of the store he emerged with a shoe box which he handed to me … finally he asked if I was going to open the box and so I did and froze in time. A perfect pair of lace up round toe dress shoes in blue suede captured my heart and they were my exact size. He encouraged me to try them on and they fit.

I started dancing across the store to find my Mother and she asked is this what you want to spend your $$ on? I responded Yes! Yes! and continued dancing. As I passed through the store I spotted a pink dress shirt with navy stitching on the collar and down the front placket… Just my size! The pink shirt was priced at $5. The Blue Suede dress shoes were priced at $30.
So including tax, I had enough left over to buy my Mother an Ice Creme Sunday with a cherry on top. We celebrated! She added a pair of grey flannel slacks to my outfit.

Later I learned that Mother had called to Lichtenstein’s in advance and knew they would have my exact shoe size of 7 and a half D.
She had also asked them to display the pink shirt that caught my eye. This was an orchestrated shopping trip to Lichtenstein’s. It was also a test of my desire and learning to earn the price of luxury. I wore those shoes and shirt for every dress up occasion for the next four years and by the end of Senior prom the suede was worn off of the toes of the shoes and my toes were being curled under.

I think I was a proud and cocky boy that owned the only pair of Blue Suede Shoes in the Rio Grande Valley. The shoes were retired when I went to college in fall of 1960. In 2018, I found the dancing do not step on me shoes in a store house with other memories of those special times for earning my way lessons in life.

Entry – October 15, 2018 and September 15, 2019

In Tokyo, the first lesson with Kanzaburo was given in his private home in the dance studio. In this lesson, I became challenged by many mishaps of costume and fan. It started when I dropped my sensu (fan) and knelt down to retrieve it. I stepped on the Kimono hem and tore the fabric. With the balance of my body thrown I re-stepped onto the fan fracturing one of he bamboo bones that helped the fan to fold. As I stood to erect myself, the obi about my waist untied itself and slid down to the dance studio floor. In this instant the kimono furled itself open, and there I stood in my white boxer Brooks Brothers underwear. Broken fan, torn kimono, lost obi, and a tremendous moment in the sense of how poorly could I have performed!…and was this a hopeless quest of study?

Kanzaburo sat through all of this with a totally Noh mask face and not a reflected moment of visual comment.
As I apologized and asked of him to be forgiven for such an awkward display he was impassive.
Then he said in Japanese the equivalent of “once more, please” and I went to the side of the studio to rearranged my costume and find another fan to continue “once more” …
And so it went lesson after lesson, until I was actually performing the entire dance and being progressed to more complex repertory.

I always wondered what he must have thought of this blond haired Texan attempting to go where no other non-Japanese had attempted in the dance. But he was forever patient. He saw some gift. He blessed me with his teaching, his great acting interpretation, his brilliant technique, and his time.

When I performed in Japan, he came to see me and the next week the lessons became ever more complex.. He challenged me at every nuance of rhythm and phrasing, eye focus and hand gesture, entrances and exits….his was some of the most detailed and exacting instruction.

Then once I had mastered a new solo, his instruction would be to return to the next lesson and make it my solo with my interpretation and style or personal stamp in performance. He would give me a critique and notes to work upon about how to manipulate the costume and fan technique. I was expected to arrive prepared and well rehearsed for the next lesson.

Usually one cold run was made before he joined me in the studio and then it was a full out performance. No starting over. When and if something was not exactly correct, I was trained to fix it in the moment, make it a part of the performance, and keep going no matter what happened.

Once he intentionally placed the wrong music in the tape machine, and I reshaped the solo as I adjusted in the instant to the new music. When I arrived at the ending and bow, under his breath he whispered …keep in character until you are out of sight of the wings. This lesson repaid itself many times over in the following 50 years of world touring. The most repeated adjustment was to find the lights and perform with them where and when ever they appeared on the stage. The strangest adjustment was to find the wrong hand properties on the stage and to make them work within a solo. A basket of pine cones had been filled with freshly harvested onions. A solo about the pine forests became a homage to the onion fields, and the theatre was perfumed with the pungent smell of raw onions.

Entries – October 20, 2007 and September 15, 2019

Every time I went home to Texas and to visit Rea there would be a cooking lesson. She insisted that at least all the extended children could navigate a kitchen. There had been lessons in making fudge from all the raw materials – even the detail of melting the chocolate with constant stirring.
We had beheaded a chicken, plucked feathers, gutted, cleaned, stuffed with lemons and baked.
In the winter we baked a roast and made cornbread from scratch.
In the summer of 1989, I awoke early one morning before 7 am to find her in the kitchen with a large tub of peaches in scalding water. She was removing the skins and today I was going to learn to make peach cobblers.
First was the process of creating the cobbler dough, rolling it out, lining the pans, and cutting the topping strips.
For an unknown reason, there were to be 9 peach cobblers made in various sizes from round to oblong to square.
While I prepared the glass baking dishes, Rea skinned and sliced the fresh peaches form her trees and added sugar and let them marinate.
The oven was lit and only fit three of the cobblers in at the same time. The cobblers were lined on the bottoms and brushed with butter and sprinkled with more sugar. The marinated peaches were added with more butter in chunks on the top.
Then the artistic work began with the lattice work of the dough strips gracefully placed over the tops of each cobbler. These were pinched at each intersection, fluted around the edges, ruffled around the entire outer rim of the cobbler, and sprinkled with more sugar and a slight glaze of cinnamon. Over the next three hours, we baked the cobblers and cared each group of three to the summer porch to cool on top of metal racks or make shift metal pots turned upside down.
It was an entire days work and we stopped for sandwiches at
lunch.
About 5:30 pm, Rea announced that she was going to freshen up and that I should do the same and then ready the car.
The next surprise was that she wanted all nine of the peach cobblers placed in a separate bag and placed on the floor of the car or in the trunk. The next project was a drive to nine different friends or business associates homes and the delivery of the cobblers by the end of the evening meals. We took these delights and surprise desserts to the head of the water district, the pastor of the People’s Church, the superintendent of the PSJA school district, the mayor of San Juan, the owner of the hardware store, the owner of the lumber company, the tax accessor/collector of the county, the foreman of the ranch, and her dressmaker.
These deliveries of the peach cobblers took us to Donna, Alamo, Edinburg, Pharr, and back to San Juan.
We did not eat any of the peach cobblers we made and only licked our fingers and the bowls.
We went to the local hamburger stand and celebrated our day of work with juicy drippy burgers and chocolate malts.
Later in the evening when Rea had settled in the parlor and had read her evening paper I asked why we did not have a cobbler for us to keep? and why she selected these nine people to receive our creations? – home grown and home made and with personal delivery.
Her response was at best terse. It was also a lesson.
“You will keep the memory of creating and sharing.”
“There are many ways to pay your taxes and to earn interest.”
The next time we cooked it was autumn and we made a stew and she had me deliver a large pot to the police station.
Entry – August 28, 2007

…”This is a story of the heart and exploration and a deeper need
you have to bond and embrace and support and believe”…

In January 2007, I was in a bar in Chicago where a breathtaking
26 – 28 year old of some Arabic background walked directly into my
body and entwined himself without a word.
The fit was as a well-worn boot or many years old jeans.
After some time, I said you must tell me your name to him.
And he responded, “You are Butch, I am Saleh”.
We moved to the bar and started a long conversation about him.
From Yemen, working in a gas station 12 hour days – 7 day weeks
from a family of 12 children – a wife in Yemen – no children – does
not want to return –
his preference is a man and better a mature muscular man.
I fit his fantasy need at first visually and I refused to have sex.
We exchanged telephone #s.
He called me first.
We met again two more times and only talked.
Finally we bonded and I satisfied him thrice.
In April, I invited him to my hotel “Whitehall”,
and I introduced him to all from doorman to concierge.
He had never seen Chicago from a rooftop.
I was in the Katherine Hepburn suite with its own private deck –
kitchen – elevator service.
He slept deep and quiet with his medusa thick curls all about his face.
He has perfect teeth and delicate hands that are greased from the gas station.
We were wearing the exact same design – make and size of shoe – mine new
his worn and scuffed.
We have seen each other now 8 months.
He calls at intervals erratic in bundles and then not for a set of weeks.
He wants a commitment I can not make as now I am trying to sort out my
own future fates.
Tomorrow I will travel to Chicago for Lawyers
(a fortune of debt I will never be able to pay)
and Doctor and Hospital on Wednesday to further explore
the nature of my diabetic condition and what to do now
and try to have some control over the future.
Saleh and I will meet and he will for the first time meet 2 of my
friends if he will come and visit me there.
I have refused to go to a bar or bath or other such place and only
fulfill a carnal emotion.
He said I was the first to treat him with respect.
I retorted that if he only saw himself as a “piece of ass” that was
how he would be treated by most men in US or Yemen.
I see him as a poetic message of complex rushing narrative.
 and I also have seen my impetuous youth in his moods.
Just to talk I am satiated by his rapid rhythms.
To look into his burning ginger eyes,
I awaken and become a mentor of his inner spirit turmoil
and a quiet place inside me surfaces.
I have no explanation –
it just is –
and it is a most strange form of loving
and yet it is complete.

Now September 2019, and our friendship endures.

Saleh has moved me twice form Illinois to Texas, and he took care of me in my home in Texas for a month after my heart attack in February of 2014. When he learned that I was placed in a nursing home in fall 2018, he drove three days from Chicago to find me and get me out and take me home. There he nursed me for 9 days until I said in recognition that I was in my home. Next he drove me to Chicago to see doctors there and he drove me to the airport for my travel back to Texas. He is a rare friend for over 12 years. A blessing sent from the Yemen Gods.

Entries – August 25, 2007 and September 15, 2019

Dear Jim,
I am fascinated and absorbed.
You write in a unique gripping style. 
I hope that I can hold your interest with my life moments.
Did you receive them as attached – I am writing as I remember and dating each time I write. 
Yes, here is more to frame and I will share some of my notes. 
This will be a replenishing of spirit through recollection of memory. 
To have you to talk with through the air is a thread and a lifeline.
You have returned at the right time.

In autumn of 1979, when I was in living in the apartment building behind the National Theatre in Tokyo,
One entered the building by going across the grounds of the Hirakawa Tenmangu Jinja.
I lived on floor seven and an elevator took one up or down.
In this little apartment, Minoru came to visit and would stay overnight.
He came one night when I had a visitor from Smith College, Susan Waltner.
Susan and I had been classmates at U of Wisconsin and she became Director of Dance at Smith
and continues to teach there. 
Early the next morning, Minoru and I were in the midst of starting to engage our passion
after much drunken affection and the telephone rang and I let it ring. 
This was the first of the odd telephone calls.
Susan opened the shoji to alert me to answer the phone, and one of the most precious moments of my
time with Minoru was lost forever. 
He became embarrassed and soon took leave, and I followed him across the perspective of the temple garden. 
This was in 1979, when I was on the Japan Foundation Fellowship 
and completing my degree in Classical Japanese Dance.

The telephone continued to ring on odd occasion and I would have a conversation
with a stranger who knew many things about me and some how had received my telephone number.
The calls over a six week time increased and became most curious with details of my appearance, 
or my being seen about Tokyo, or my clothes at a sighting.  
Finally I told the caller to never call again or to meet me.
An agreement to meet was made. 
It was decided that the place would be in the front of Wako department store in Ginza at 6 pm on a Saturday,
and that each of us would wear an object of the color Yellow. 
I wore my yellow aviator glasses. 
He wore a yellow windbreaker jacket that was turned inside out with a red lining on the outside.
At first I did not spot him as he sat very still in front of the corner window on the ledge.
After about 15 minutes of my waiting, he slowly removed the jacket and turned the yellow side out 
as he displayed a magnificent hewn torso and put the jacket back on with the red to his body. 
Then we approached each other in slow motion – greeted – went to have a drink on a side street – 
and another drink at another bar – and finally touched hands at a sushi stand.
It was electric as I felt the calluses form his hard work in the Gym and from gripping the handles of his motorcycle.
This was Kohtaro Yamamoto.  He was Kohtaro Yamamoto and we visited Minoru at the shop in Kamakura. 
We became a partnership of passion and experiences for the rest of 1979 and into 1983 when he visited me 
in Seoul Korea while teaching on my 3rd Fulbright. 
I last saw him in Japan in 1995 (high in the mountains of Ouda Hazama) where he visited me at the temple where John Toler was the abbot and eventually died. 
On occasion I called to him, he worked for the city of Yokohama. 
He never came to the states. 
I pierced his nipples and genitals. 
When we last visited his hair was grey and he had a scar the length of his abdomen from too much drink. 
He was still a magnificent specimen of age and debauchery and endurance.
He knew Minoru and Yugi and that was how he learned of and found the contact to call me.
It took from 1979 up to 1995 for him to reveal to me how he first called when Minoru was in my arms 
on the fated morning the shoji was opened by Susan as the phone rang.
I think of him often and wonder of him and lost a bit of my being to his passion and ever-kind watchful eyes.
How little I knew then of how I would value his memory and the sanctuary he provided in the wildness of our exploding youth.

Entry of response letter to James Freeman –
August 18, 2007

Dear Lon,

Right. I take your point. Let us see if the ways we frame our thoughts and
the words we can find to express them are worth
the effort.

The beginning of this first chapter dates from the moment I walked into the
home of Julie Meech’s parents
one day when you were to give a performance in their living room. Besides
my curiosity about that there
was a greater incentive for me to attend. You had already told me of the
dock-fingered window washer you had met
and how charming it was to have him curl up and drift off to sleep beside
you with his hand wrapped around your dick.
You said he would be at the event. I was prepared to be interested. No
surprise, one quick glance around the room
was enough to identify him, and another glance from him to me kindled the
flame. I made a date for us to meet a
day or so later, and from that time one in the fall of 1968 I could think
of little else. He asked me to his little room
in Komagome and I brought him once to Kyoto to stay with me in that house
where I lived on the mountain path
behind Ginkakuji leading up to the top of Daimonji-yama. Through all this
not one single full-blown sexual episode occurred,
much as I desired it. Looking back I don’t see how it could have been
otherwise, given the ambiguities running through him.
And it was precisely these which attracted me the most, as if I were doomed
to be frustrated in every erotic encounter.
Then sometime early in 1969 our paths parted and I didn’t see him again
until the early 1980’s when just like you I bumped into
him by chance. He was walking toward me on a street in Kamakura. Joy! Once
again we resumed meetings, at a different level
this time. He came to Kyoto a couple of times, met Isao and then slipped
out of sight with a new wife, as I said, to somewhere
deep in the hills of Niigata prefecture, where I hope they are both still
happy today. There is no way of finding out. He is
a lovely person, somewhat sad in his limitations of opportunity, but I
guess no more so than the rest of us if we could take
a god’s eye view of everything. My best memory is the trip we took in dead
winter to his family home in Sakata on the Japan Sea
coast. Snow country. All that part of town later burned to the ground.

From years before meeting him I had developed a taste for his type. A
clever Chinese professor I had at university and who knew
me very well described this type as the “honest woodcutter.” But of course
in every so-called type there are infinite varieties.
I was to learn that some “woodcutters” were quite ready to engage in almost
any sort of sex, playful or not so playful, at any time of
night or day. That is where Thailand enters the story.

I have an old friend who teaches philosophy at the University of Hong Kong.
For many years he had been going to Thailand
and always brought back photos of the boys he met and described his
sporting life there with a kind of subdued relish that amused me.
I would critique the photos and we would have another drink, then move on
to more intellectual matters. Nothing ever really
stirred me to follow in his footsteps… until one day. In his latest album
of photos was one fellow who looked straight out not at the
camera but directly into my eyes, or so I fancied anyway. He was the
absolute epitome of the “woodcutter”, the “woodcutter”
writ large in gilt lettering, if you will excuse the hyperbole. I decided
on the spot I had to meet him, and without any delay booked
a flight to Bangkok. I knew where he hung out– in the park at the outdoor
gym in the late afternoons- so after checking into a
low-dive sort of hotel nearby I beat a quick path there. A bit late as it
turned out, or maybe just in time, for as I was entering the
park he strolled out. He gave me a sidelong look and continued on his way
with a slow, dreamlike rolling gait I came to know
and love. I followed him awhile but did not approach. The next day I went
earlier and made contact while he was exercising
bare-chested. And what a magnificent body it was, in every department. A
smile to die for, delicate hands of an artist, oddly so
for someone who had been working in a blacksmith’s shop when he was first
discovered. Preecha Narkwichit. Him I do know
how to find every time I go to Bangkok. There are too many stories to tell.
But after all, a sad boy, who has become a sadder man,
even with my friendship to rely upon. Change is to be dreaded above all.
Look at America.

Next chapter will retreat from this territory to the more demanding one of
the occupation to which I devoted my energies. I’d never
call it a business and even less, a profession.
That is, if you want to hear any more.
To you it may all sound slightly drivelish.

Jim
Entry of Letter from James Freeman –
August 17, 2007




I was not circumcised at birth. This operation waited until the summer before I was turning age 9 in September and joining the fourth grade. When we returned to school in the fall our teacher asked all of the fourth graders to bring a summer project and to have a show and tell over the next month. We had a sign up list for each student to select a date and state the name of the project
to be presented. I selected the last date and titled my project,
“Egg Castration Puppets”. The fateful day arrived and I presented my egg carton with twelve eggshell puppets that you could wear on one finger with costumes that covered the hand. Each egg had been decorated with an elaborate face and glued on false eyelashes from the ‘five and dime’. The teacher asked why I had made the dolls and the conversation proceeded:
“I had to have something to do in bed.”
“Why were you in bed?”
“Because I had to rest a lot and be packed in cold ice.”
“Why were resting and packed in cold ice?”
“I had an operation.”
“Tell us about your operation.”
Whereupon I drew a giant picture of a penis which covered the entire blackboard. Then I drew a line through the end and said that it had to be cut off. I meant the foreskin but it appeared that the end of my penis had been chopped off. There were audible gasps and smirking laughter in the classroom.
Immediately the teacher excused me from my show and tell presentation and called for a recess.
All the boys wanted to see what it looked liked so I obliged them in the restroom and they thought I was very brave and still slightly red and swollen. When I returned home from school that evening, Poppy was in a fit of laughter, Rea had a dictionary out to clarify my use of the words castrated and circumcised, and Ruth was fielding many telephone calls of condolence and curiosity from my classmates parents. I had to write 100 times “circumcised not castrated”
Entry – August 14, 2007


During one of many summers, home to Texas from Wisconsin,
in 1990, I drove over to Rea’s home in the middle afternoon and with her not expecting me. I entered the kitchen and called for her and there was not an answer. My first thought was that she must have been taking a nap/siesta so I checked her bedroom and she was not to be found. Then I heard water running and noticed the bathroom door was slightly ajar. I quietly opened the door wide enough to look into the all pink tiled bathroom and was greeted with a stunning vision. Rea was stretched on a diagonal framed in a stream of afternoon light coming through the window above the porcelain bathtub. Her hips were resting on a small blue footstool and she held her hair under the faucet at the end of the tub with the water washing through a blue tint – blue footstool, blue hair, blue water, blue eyes, and blue stain in the tub. Her body was completely nude with long legs, tight skin, and firm rounded peach breasts. She was spectacular and she was almost 90 years of age. I took in the view and thought she had not heard me so I quietly shut the bathroom and slipped away only to return at suppertime. The meal progressed as usual with the two of us in conversation meandering through many topics of mutual interest… the stock market, the low water table, the new stray cat
we named Zubedizah, the neighbors car for sale… when out of the blue, Rea enquired, “Did you visit this afternoon?”
I responded, “Yes and I was unannounced.”
Quickly she said, “ And you opened the Bathroom door to find me rinsing my hair”Again my, “Yes with apologies for catching you undressed.”
I added “What a vision you are with your tight firm body. You must have been a knockout in your flapper days.
She gave me a sharp and stern look – took a breath for emphasis and ended the conversation with, “The nudity was how I have seen you many times as a child and that is nothing between us, but to call me a knockout (pause) I was nothing less than
RAVISHING!”
Entry – August 13, 2007



Each time I would go to Asia one special family connection would die.
In 1967, I went to Japan on my first Fulbright to study in the Grand Kabuki. Poppy passed away in the winter at the exact same moment as I was stranded in a stalled ski lift over the village of Ishiuchi. The lights of the village flickered below and the snow fell softly as we hung in the air.
When I returned to Tokyo a telegram was waiting at the
US embassy to inform me.

In 1979, I was in Japan on a Japan Foundation Professional fellowship. Mimi passed and no one informed me at the time.
Three weeks later I opened a letter from Ruth while in a taxi enroute to my Japanese dance lesson. Mother Ruth informed me with a news clipping and said that all were surprised that I had not responded to the call from my brother. I never received this call.
Mimi and I have the same birth date and were thick in our fun and joy of living.

In 1983, in the middle of a November night my brother called me in Seoul, Korea to inform me of our Mother Ruth having passed. I was near the end of a year long Fulbright and performing at the National Theatre. Ruth had requested to be cremated. When I returned to Texas, I picked up the urn with the ashes from the funeral home and arranged a memorial service when most relatives could attend in January. My brother arrived late and a bit drunken after the service had started and sat at the other end of the pew.
Rea sat next to me and Barbara did not attend.
The next day there was a battle with my brother at the lawyers and I agreed to buy him out.
It took me six months to raise the money. That is another long strange story, but Rea attended all the meetings and hosted the two of us for a meal at the San Juan Hotel where she told Charles that he only had one brother and to recognize the fact of blood.
In 1995, I was going to Korea for the summer and had planned a stop in Texas before my departure. My plane was late and misconnected so that when I arrived in the early morning – 6am – I had to rent a car and I drove direct to hopefully greet Rea at Breakfast. I was greeted with her death and holding my last letter in her hands. At the funeral parlor twenty-four hours later when I was given a private visitation a pink carnation had been placed in her hands.
As I sat talking with her remains, the right hand moved toward me and the pink carnation fell.
I replaced it with a yellow rose that I pulled from a bouquet.
For the funeral, I insisted on paying for the flowers that were placed as a blanket over the closed coffin. I ordered every spring flower that I could recall she had grown. Barbara and family at first did not ask me to sit; finally I was seated alone in the middle of the front row with all behind me. Brent came for the funeral and at The People’s Church dinner after the funeral we endured the smirks of Barbara’s youngest son in reference to our friendship. I excused us, and we drove to Padre Island and the fond memories of many summers.

I had a fear to return or make a trip to the orient, yet in 2006 I went to Thailand. While I was there a personal friend passed.
I have a fear of the orient.
Entry – August 5, 2007

In 1979, I received a grant for the year to study in Japan on a Japan Foundation Professional Fellowship.
On the morning I was leaving Texas I was given a hand written letter from Rea on The People’s Church stationery with the letterhead:
The People’s Church
800 South Standard
Phone ST7 – 1034
San Juan, Texas 78589

I found this letter today – August 4, 2007 – when I was cleaning off three years of my desk clutter in the house in Bloomington, Illinois.
This is the letter…

To dear Joe:
After years of struggle and failure this philosophy has been revealed and seems to be working:
Jesus taught God created a world for our benefit and that he was a fulltime partner. The thoughts we think are molding our destiny
for good or evil. The whole of our experiences in life are but an outer expression of inner thought – Life is the reaping of a harvest we ourselves have sown. Scripture urges man to submit himself to the guidance and direction of Spirit (within given to all men) in
every area of his life in order that he can live in positive assurance of his highest good. God can do for man only what he can do through man’s will. It often takes sorrow to cause man to be still, to be meek and to listen. There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hand, you seek problems because
you need their gifts.
What a comfort each morning before arising to cast all our burdens upon Jehova and know in our heart that he will sustain us, guide us, and give us wisdom to handle our life through the day – Marie
Entry – August 4, 2007


My brother had emotional problems with me as the new arrival.
The manifestations were over the years varied and many.
When I could not play tennis as he tried to teach me at age eight – his anger mounted until he drug me across the asphalt tennis court at the local PSJA high school. My knees were bloody and ripped. The scabs took over a month healing – I told Ruth. Marie, and Mimi that I had fallen down.
At age ten, I knocked over one of his tennis trophies and broke an arm holding a racquet. We were alone in the house and he threw shoes at me and one of them hit the ceiling in Ruth’s bedroom.
The impact made a cut in the acoustical tile and left a long scar.
When Ruth noticed, I told that it happened with a broom handle.
When I was eleven, one day in the fruit packing shed Charles held my buttocks down on the conveyor belts where they turned around each other and caught my cheeks with a pinched black and blue mark that turned yellow and purple.
About a week and a half later, Ruth entered the bathroom – saw me after a bath – and caught site of the marks.
This was the first time I explained what had happened after she had several questions.
There was a long silence and then she asked, “And the Knees?”
“The bedroom ceiling?” I remained silent.
She let me finish my bath and dressing and then she took me outside and said I could not be alone with Charles again.
The anger never quite went away.
When he came to visit me in Illinois in summer 2006 he listened well to my traumas and we revisited life as siblings and years on differing paths.
After he left, he sent me a bill for all of his trip expenses.
I sent a check in full.
Entry – August 4, 2007

Poppy was not one to be harsh with discipline.
Only once do I recall him administering a spanking and then he used a limp palm frond. Some time about my age of four, I was very angry about something now long since forgotten and I took a pair scissors to the left long sleeves of his cotton work shirts and cut as high as I could reach above the elbow.
For several years he would wear these shirts with the right long sleeve in tact and the left sleeve cut off on the arm that he placed on the pickup truck window driver’s side. His left arm always had a deep tan.
My punishment was seeing him in the shirts, his silent treatment about the scissor-cutting incident, and his very tan left arm. At age seven, I was riding with him in the truck when a man at the cotton gin asked him what had happened to his shirt.
Poppy replied, “Oh! A little rat chewed on it.”
As we drove away, I finally expressed my guilt and bravely said, “I am that rat”.

Poppy looked at me with his cool blue eyes and smiled in a bemused manner. Finally he took a long slow breath and asked me, “Is it time to cut the tail off of that rat?”
I sided up to him and he put his right arm around me and held me close for several miles as we drove in silence.
Finally the silence was broken when he pulled into the rural
country store and said, “Time to buy some new work shirts”,
We did exactly that and drove back to the ranch, marched into the house headed for his closet, and took all the cut
(rat chewed) shirts and removed them.
The shirt fabric became work cloths. I used some of them over 15 years later to wash and scrub my car and to wipe the oil dipstick. Now sixty years later. I found the remnants of one of the backs of one of the shirts and the front pocket side cut and stitched together into a kitchen towel.
Good cotton and good people endure and age softly.
Entry – July 31, 2007

In my 30 and 40 years of age, I would have my hair buzzed each summer into a marine cut and let it grow out the rest of the summer on the beach and then trim it for the fall and back to school. Rea did not like my hair cut this way, but she said little about it when I would come home for the summer.
One Particular Sunday we had a visiting minister at The Peoples Church. When we were leaving the church the minister had positioned himself at the bottom of the steps in order to greet all.
When Rea greeted him she added, “…and this is my grandson who just got out of prison.” He blessed me and mumbled something about my redemption.
As planned after Church, Rea and I went to the San Juan Hotel for Sunday Lunch – just the two of us.
Once we were seated and before we could order, Rea turned to me and exclaimed,
“Today, I zapped you good!”…and she had.
The next summer I came home with my hair neatly cut and with a part on the right side.
Entry – July 31, 2007

At age seven Rea held a birthday party for me at the ranch.
She invited all of my second grade classmates. This was a special day because I was to learn to tie and untie my shoelaces before the party. I did not learn well, and I ended up with the laces tied in a mess of knots.
The party proceeded without me and with me looking out the window at the festivities and finally seeing the gifts opened.
I found a pair of scissors and cut the shoelaces open, then crawled out of a window to join in the fun. Hung in a hackberry tree were seven plastic parachute men that had been sent into the sky with popguns. The parachutes were as entangled as the shoelaces and they hung in the tree for several years as a long time reminder.
That evening I was told that I could not have new shoelaces but that I could make do with twine. I found some black bias tape used on the bottom of skirt hems and laced my shoes and learned to tie and untie. I was stylish with my black bias tape bows.
Then another boy copied me, and I saw his shoes at Sunday school. His name was Tommy, and we became the best of friends through high school. At the prom, we wore white bucks with black bias tape laces and bows. It was 1960, and we danced up a storm.
Entry – July 30, 2007

When Rea retired from being treasurer of her church –
The Peoples Church – at the end of the service she was presented with a corsage made of pink carnations. The color pink and carnations were both not favorites as a color or flower. A better selection would have been yellow roses.
Anyway, she was gracious and thanked the attending congregation with her humor.
She said that she had received flowers when she was a young bride and in courtship with Harold, now today as she retired from here role of treasurer, and the next time would be for her burial and she would not see them but thanks to all of the senders in advance. There was a wave of hearty laughter as we exited the church and drove away in my new gold Mercedes with a moon roof.
About a block on our ride, Rea asked me to open the roof and when it was accomplished she put her head back on the headrest and looked up to the sky and questioned, “Lord, after all these years don’t you think I deserve a gold watch along with the pink carnations?” I took mental note and once she was home reclining for an afternoon rest.
Action started with my call to the owners of the local jewelry store named Briton’s – and yes they could select a suitable gold watch and engrave it with:
“for Rea, our Founder, from The Peoples Church”
Next, I called all the deacons and a few special friends to come on Tuesday at teatime. They would pick up the engraved gold watch and bring a teacake. At the appointed time two days later all arrived and Rea was surprised with the gathering as I had kept her out of the kitchen all day and secretly made the preparations for tea and service.
She was seated in her maroon velvet rocker and wearing a
cotton homemade house dress with bare feet in house slippers. She bitterly complained about not being ‘fussed-up’ in her party clothes but one could sense her joy with the attention and bit of surprise. Eventually one of the deacons produced the wrapped box from Briton’s, made a short speech of thanks, and presented it to Rea.
First she shook it gently, then held it to each ear, and then looked at me with a circumspect grin and proceeded to open the box. When the engraved gold watch was revealed, the engraving read, and the new watch was placed on her left wrist she rocked a bit and then look up at the ceiling of the parlor and remarked, “Lord, prayers do get answered when you talk through the roof of a gold Mercedes!”
After many happy wishes, her head tilted back again and she exclaimed, “Lord, you best be listening tomorrow because I am going for a ride in a gold Mercedes”.
The next day at breakfast she expressed her desire
for a long drive to the island (Padre Island) and to pray all the way. We did and Rea prayed for something for everyone. Over the following years all of her prayers were answered and in one form or another came true.
Entry – July 29, 2007

Rea founded The People’s Church in our rural town and for many years (about 50) was the treasurer. I would always attend services with her when I visited home. She dressed up for church and had a wide brimmed white straw hat for summer.
She had a throaty voice and she would speak out to the pulpit or congregation, as she felt appropriate.
She always delighted in a visiting pastor and a new sermon.
On this Sunday in July of 1991, at her age of 91 the visiting pastor asked the choir not to sing and hoped the babies would not cry as we all listened for the voice of the Lord to come into our hearts.
As we sat in the silence of the sanctuary a minute passed, and she became petulant due to her hearing aid not functioning and wondering what was going on about her.
Rea turned to me and leaned over to my right ear and said in a church hearable voice,
“Well Butch, what are we listening for?”
I attempted to whisper back that,
“We are listening for the voice of the Lord to come into our hearts.”
Upon this response, Rea lifted the brim of her summer hat and looked up to the pastor at the pulpit with his bowed head and loudly announced,
“I can stay home and do that!”
Immediately the laughter flowed, the organ played, the choir sang, and some babies joined the chorus.
As we filed out of the church and the pastor waited to shake hands he greeted Rea with a presence and said,
“Yes, I can also stay home and do that.”
Entry – July 28, 2007

In 1972, I accepted a position at Southern Illinois University as the Director of Dance. I moved from New York City and lived on a 250-acre farm outside of Murphysboro, Illinois in an old Victorian Prairie Farm House. Fields surrounded the house and there was a very long gravel drive that meandered for about a quarter mile to arrive at the house on a small hill. I had made many improvements to this house … painted walls and redone floors. In the summer of 1974, – the three muses, Ruth – Rea – Mimi all came at the same time to visit and to check on my life.
One day they made a shopping list for groceries and the hardware store. At the kitchen table I heard Mimi say add a can of gold paint to the shopping list. We got organized to drive into town (a seven mile excursion) and off we went. I was driving the three muses all dressed in variations of summer white in my one-year-old green Mercedes Sedan.
Enroute to town
Ruth asked, “ Mimi, why do you need a can of gold paint? ”
Mimi replied, “ Why? Well Ruth, (a long pause ensued) we need to touch up your Halo. ”
Rea took a breath and very slowly said, “ I will need a new brush with pig bristles.”
The remainder of the ride all was silent in the car.
That next Christmas,
Ruth wrapped a can of Gold paint and placed it under the tree for Mimi,
and Mimi gave a pig bristle brush to Rea.
But best of all was when Ruth opened her present from Rea
wrapped in an old hat box and it was a hand made gold foil
angel’s halo.
Peace was made by the muses at Christmas in their ironic gifts which none had discussed with the others.
Entry – July 27, 2007

• 

Time in this life has arrived to capture some of my life moments in a written journal. There will not be an initial attempt to make a chronology…the stories of the moments will be documented as they are remembered.
Each entry will be made as memory prevails.
The three southern muses to interact with and be present with early formations in my life were…

1. Ruth Rebecca Lee Gordon – my birth mother RUTH
2. Mildred Lee Gordon Starlin – my aunt MIMI,
   the sister of my blood father, Floyd Charles Gordon
3. Marie Elizabeth Hawkins Cramer – My foster mother REA, also referred to as my grandmother.
   They will be called Ruth, Mimi and Rea.
   Because of my stuttering as a child I could not say Mildred or Marie and the shortened names prevailed and were used by community and another generation in the family.

I never knew my blood father, Floyd Charles Gordon (FLASH), as he died 4 days before I was born. Ruth carried me for the time of incubation after the first two months knowing that her husband (my father) would die. I had one blood brother – Charles Lee Gordon. He thought my entry into the world was the reason for his father’s, our father’s exit.
Charlie – Chuck – was a tennis star, Apollo Boys Choir tenor, womanizer, full scholarship athlete at Texas Christian University and wanted me taken back to the hospital. He had been a favored only child and only son until “the Runt” arrived. The runt that killed his Flash! It took years to bond.

As a child I was told that Flash died a very painful slow death from Bacterial Endocarditis that he transferred to himself through a cut he made while skinning a deer.
Two months ago, it was suggested to me that he died from cocaine injections that came from the pharmacy supply in Gordon REXALL Drug Stores.

I had a very special and loving foster father,
Harold Cecil Cramer – POPPY.

The Cramers (REA and POPPY) had one daughter of their own – Barbara Ann, and they raised me as there own son for the first seven years of my life. Ruth placed me with the Cramers at six months as she took over all my blood fathers business after he passed. At my age 7, Ruth came to take me to her home to live since I was ready to enter the second grade. At the front door I told her she was the ice cream lady and not my mother – my mother was REA! I held onto Rea under her skirt. I was finally pried away and taken screaming over and over
Ice Cream Lady Ice Cream Lady
Not My Mother Not My Mother and to the new home.
Charles Room was now my room and yet it was Charles Room with his tennis trophies and his childhood clothing.

I had a little suitcase that was always packed and went with me to visit Rea, Mimi or back to Ruth. I lived off and on and in and out of the Cramer home for the rest of my life until it was old, I was getting older – 53, and Rea passed in her sleep. I found the suitcase again in 2006 and it was still packed with my childhood jeans and boots…
Entry – July 26, 2007