This is Jerry Lee Lewis, live in England, in 1964. It is all-video, all-animal energy, all-Jerry Lee. Punk before punk was ever a word.
Like the kids in this video, I stood at the very edge of Jerry Lee’s piano while he played. Inches from the 88th key and his left hand.
The year was 1989 though, not 1964, and the setting was more subdued.
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Editor’s note: In a newsletter for former Union-Tribune newspaper staffers, a colleague in San Diego recently recalled a review I once wrote that outraged the mayor and her staff. Jack Reber, the editor of the newsletter, asked if I would fill everyone in.
Glad to do it. But, as in my online days with SignOnSanDiego.com, I take great pleasure in scooping mainstream media. So, you will read it first, here on my own blog. My newspaper friends may get it at midnight tonight. (Sorry, Jack. I can’t help myself.)
Ah, the Russian Arts Festival of 1989. Gather round kids and I’ll tell you as much as is permitted by the several nondisclosure agreements I signed to gain a generous separation bonus from the San Diego Union-Tribune.
Obviously, I kid. There was no bonus.
My one assignment during the Festival was the Tiblisi State Puppet Theatre, under the direction of the great and late-Rezo Gabriadze (below with some of his creations). Georgean puppets aren’t like the Muppets, Shari Lewis and Lambchop, or Punch ‘n Judy. They tell real and elaborate stories, often tragic, and even violent or sexually mature.
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Do not look for rhyme nor reason in these photographs.
If they have anything in common, you could file them under “things that caught my eye this morning.”
That, and the fact that they were all taken in San Miguel de Allende.
Did I mention they were all taken today?
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This is my kitchen faucet.
Well, one of them.
There are four — two basins with two faucets each, two hot, and two cold.
Earlier today, this one — the hot tap in the left basin — was leaking.
The drip was annoying as hell. I was trying to distract myself from the need to write.
And the drip, drip, drip kept breaking my lack of concentration.
“I need a plumber,” thinks I, thinking of great thoughts.
So I start to take a photo to send to our property manager.
But at this moment, the sun reaches around the corner of the country kitchen window.
And catches the gleaming brass in its grasp.
“This is rather beautiful,” I think.
“Not annoying at all.”
The brass faucet floats in the air, like a shiny spaceship lost in the cosmos
Meanwhile, I’ve been carrying full pots of water out into the courtyard.
And nominating various plants as “Most Needy” before
Showering them with water, like the beauty queens they are.
“This is art,” I say to no one. “And any moment, a guy with a tool belt and rubber washers
Is going to end this lovely presentation like some emotionally-damaged art critic for the New Yorker.”
I know what I have to do: Capture this hommage to Paul Cézanne.
If a dripping faucet can be likened to a still-life study of fruits and bottles.
So this is it.
It only took about 30 tries to get the dripping water just right.
“Leak more, you bastard!” I shout.
No, not really. I can be a very patient guy when I’m in mindfulness mode.
I was OK with it when the plumber arrived.
Though feeling a little like he’s come to put my dog down.
“Be gentle with my leaking faucet,” I urge.
(Not really. Seriously? You thought I’d say that to a guy who rips out pipes for a living?)
It takes about five minutes, with the right parts, to nip the drip.
Kind of sad.
And yet, look! It is raining out right now.
The Creator’s own leaky faucet.
Though it lacks the brass of my kitchen sink.
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After a long night of parading, doing battle with the Devil, blowing off fireworks, celebrating the city’s namesake, and just all-around old-fashioned shoulder-rubbing with neighbors — what do San Miguelenses like to do the next day?
Parade some more.
Of course.
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With all the celebrating going on in San Miguel this weekend, it is easy to forget that love is always in the air.
I submit these photographs as evidence.
These were all taken on Sunday morning before I’d even had breakfast. The peacocks sauntered over while I was having breakfast. In fact, they came up to a very large enclosure housing a quartet of finches.
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The painting of a tiny Thai jungle village set against snow-tipped blue mountains in our casita has gained a full moon.
The moon wasn’t there yesterday.
And it was not there when Rose Alcantara acquired the painting on the island of Koh Samui, off Thailand, many many years ago. (She doesn’t want to think of how many.)
It is a charming and primitive scene of four red-tiled peaked-roof houses, painted in bright tropical colors. A red-dirt road curves through the settlement. Flowers of many colors encroach on the green grass yards, pushed in by the encroaching jungle. A rickety fence or two and an ancient wooden cart enhance the setting.
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It is popular and entirely appropriate in San Miguel de Allende to say “You never know what’s behind a closed door.”
Entrances on San Miguel streets give you no hint at all as to what lies behind them.
The most humble of doors can open onto a garden of Eden, a fairyland, a small village, a rabbit warren of homes, a vast and empty park, a stately hacienda, ancient ruins, a private town square surrounded by stately homes, ageless and towering trees, private roads – well, whatever imagination and money can conjure.
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The Night-Blooming Cereus is putting on quite a show in our Colonia San Antonio courtyard tonight.
One night only, folks. By morning these beauties will be withered old crones, bereft of the intoxicating scent currently filling our home.
Rose spotted the — what shall we call it? — the chrysalis of the Cereus earlier this afternoon. Raul our gardener was just as excited to see them — there are two. We missed the blooming of several of the cactus flowers earlier.
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Parque Juarez, with its countless shades of green, sometimes surprises.
This one was a stunner, to me.
A bougainvillea, alone among the carefully parsed trees and bushes, backlit by the late afternoon sun.
It was as if on fire, a brilliant fuschia fire.
Life in San Miguel de Allende is forever magical.
When you least expect it to be.
