I tend to be a music freak. Particularly dead music. So a story on the TAMI show caught my eye this weekend. TAMI stood for Teenage Award Music International, and it was held at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium in winter 1964, when I was but a zygote. It served as a sort of Lollapalooza …
Mom and sis went to lunch recently at the Denny’s in Van Nuys, chic dining for this family. As mom and Caroline took their table, mom noticed a bald man in his mid-40’s enter with a group of other men. The man apparently stared intently at Caroline as they walked to their table. Mom was a little …
I woke up today thinking of 6-year-old Precious Wellington Flood III. I swear that was his name; his sister’s name was Pumpkin, though I don’t know her middle name. Hopefully not Carving. Precious went to Detroit public schools, where mom taught for 20 years as a first grade teacher. They say you always remember your first …
FFFFFUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKK ever screamed a primal scream in a car, sis? given that you cracked a guy’s head with a beer bottle for trying to take your boyfriend’s bar stool to hit on you, i’m guessing so. i never asked; did the bottle break? the key, i find, is to give it your all. you gotta …
it’s late, and i’m in the tub outside, lookin at stars, dogs, and trying to think out this silly story. outside. smells like my uncle’s place in georgia, where my father was born.superman. my uncle guy, after whom i am named, told me he was superman. at night, he would call me to the bathroom window. …
If you were lucky enough to know Michael Tyrone Ingram, your life was better for it. Michael was a wondrous contradiction. He wasn’t a socialite, but every relationship he forged meant something, to him and the object of his love. If you liked Mikey, you were going to like people who liked Mikey. He wasn’t …
my only sister, so teddy doesn’t care for fetching anything that’s not in water. i mean, it doesn’t get his fur standing at all. if he catches the ball, sometimes, when esme and i are playing, he’ll trot inside with it. seriously, esme has to go inside and take it like a bottle from …
I’ve never imagined myself not being a newspaperman. It’s strange, the drift, since I left daily journalism. But there’s been this odd calmness to everything. Maybe it has something to do with dad’s death. I dunno, but to have the job come end didn’t fall me like it has others who caught the blade. They’re …
“Are you Billy’s son?” It was always the first question. I had joined the Detroit News, nemesis of my dad’s paper, the Free Press, just down Lafayette Boulevard. Whenever I introduced myself, that was the response. I learned to answer diplomatically. “That depends,” I’d say. “What did he do to you?” There was no middle …
