Slice of Heaven

My birthday is about to roll around again, and that means it’s been a full year since Little Peach and I made our memorable trip to the island south of Key West. This year, she will be my birthday chaperone once again, for the third year in a row actually, and I’m sure it will be just as memorable, although the memories will be of a different kind.

I can thank my ex-husband Pretty Boy Boyd, for my friendship with Little Peach, at least in part. If my life with Pretty Boy hadn’t been so, well, toxic, I might not have felt the need to flee my home on the edge of the ‘glades and drive five hours straight north to feel safe and nurtured.  Fortunately, thanks to all you all, I now feel safe and nurtured almost all the time. (Let’s face it. There are some poisons that even you cannot prevent.)

I’m looking forward to Peach’s visit. I always feel that she brings out the best of the poetry in me. I’m a little late in sharing this with you, but August was Postcard Poetry month, and I decided to dedicate my efforts to Peach and her family. I may have mentioned this before: They are all train buffs, and size doesn’t matter. From tiny model trains to the biggest engine we can find, they are all over it. So, when I came across a stash of railroad postcards, I knew my poetry for August would have a theme.

Now I want to share them with you, too.

AUGUST POSTCARD POEMS ABOUT TRAINS

Tucson Station

Memory Loss

I can’t remember: It goes like
this: “Something something something,
Cry like a train.”
Howl like a river,
Cry like a train?
Laugh like a joker,
Cry like a train?
Scream like a banshee,
Cry like a train?
Tell me you love me,
Cry like a train?

Echo

Florida East Coast F - E - C
a few block to the west
rumbles as freight trains do.
Doppler effect
rocks me to sleep.
Open windows.
Poison jasmine
stabs the night.
Sleepless, I step outside.
Another train calls from the east -
an illusion
bouncing off the
flat canals of my mind

The Box Car Children

Sitting in my third-grade class,
desks still with inkwells then,
I read of runaway industrious
children living in a boxcar,
abandoned, like them,
motionless, steady.
“That’s where I want to be,”
I thought.
“Safe, secure:
I want to live there.”
But now I need motion.
Now I need flow.
I’d live on a boat.

For Robertson Davies

Somewhere in Alberta,
Via Rail paused in its
pursuit of glaciers and hair-pin
curves, gliding to a full stop
by a picture postcard railway station.
In minutes, my feet found
their way to the door
of a tiny bookshop,
full of Canada.

The Visit

First you need to know we
had never been friends, just sisters,
thrown together by biology. Not
much in common except family
history, something from which I’d fled.
But on that weekend, we found
something else, a ghost in a barroom,
a poem on a napkin, the sound of
of giggles in the alley, our heels on the
pavement at two a.m. Drunkenly
silly, she lay down on the tracks,
and I rescued her from absolutely
nothing as no train went by.
That’s all it took.

Copper

High chaparral, high desert,
a land not known to many,
the Phelps Dodge train laden
with ingots would chug down
from the smelter, beside that
patina green river,
echoing endlessly between
the canyon walls, as bits of copper
broke free and left a trail
of treasure
for children to find
along the track.

Chicago

It’s boring, she said, that
trip to Chicago. I had to
disagree, but maybe she
did not take the train on a day
when a deep, dark purple storm
covered the plains and cast
the landscape into a scene
from a 1950s science fiction
novel. We spent the whole trip
looking for spaceships
and little green men.

Tags: Little Peach, Poetry by Bjean
No Comments »

I am excited beyond belief to be accepted as a judge at the National Pie Championships this month, even though it does mean leaving my beloved SoFLA once again for the Northern Realm somewhere near Orland. (Golf friends, please take note that this event is the equivalent of The Masters, or The U.S. Open.  Yes, it’s The Big Time.)

I’m hoping that Nurse Crotchett, Little Peach, or one of the other regulars can join me for the event, but I’m sure I’ll be fine on my own, happy in my work and fully enjoying the Never Ending Pie Buffet.

When I told Little Peach that I was going to be a judge at the National Pie Chamionships, she laughed for a very long time, and then she said, “Have you told the kids?”  I said I had emailed them, and she said, “They are probably laughing too hard to reply.”

Now why would she react that way?

I certainly would be happy for her if she had been selected to judge an Orchid Championship or a Model Train Championship.  Sometimes I think she does not fully appreciate my dedication to pastry, or my dedication to golf for that matter.

A couple of days later, though, she called and left a fairly lengthy message on my answering machine. Here is a reasonably accurate transcription of what she had to say, having had some time to reflect upon the fullness of my accomplishment:

“Okay,” she said, “I’m thinking I’m on this long drive back from Dade City, and I’m thinking to myself okay you have to be judging pie, hopefully key lime pie, and my big question is: What does one wear as a judge in a pie-judging contest? Do you have to have a special apron?  Do they give you a wooden spoon? Do you do have to wear something with Betty Crocker written across it? I mean, did you have to whip up a little something up? I dont know. I was kinda wondering.  Is there a special judge bow that you have to wear? I dont know. What does one wear to judge pies? So anyway, then I thought, “Heels!” What about your gold heels? Those would be perfect, with a nice little apron and a fresh green wooden spoon, with a green gingham bow tied on the end of the spoon? What do you think? I’m getting a picture here. Oh! What about a tiara? Something with BC for Betty Crocker or J for Judge. Maybe you could push a button and it could light up? I dont know, but now I’ve got all these visuals. Talk to you later. Bye.”

Just right off hand, she might be right about my gold heels, but I still don’t think she is taking this very seriously.

I am, though, and I’ve got just a few days to do my homework and really learn the criterialof pie judging.  Just as a tease, though, I’ll tell you two traits that I will be reviewing: One is “mouthfeel” and the other is “memorableness.”

Oh, yes. It’s the Big Time for me, now.

Tags: Little Peach by Bjean
No Comments »

A Sundial for Little Peach

In a house full of clocks
she lives on sundial time.
I know that well, and so,
alone on a beach with
sunlight to spare, I gather shells
and make for Peach a
sundial clock that she
will never see but always
understand as the passage
of the sun through the
beach’s decay reminds us
daily that shells are not stone
and even the most
vibrant coral fades from living
being to silent debris
just as we move in our own orbits
a degree at a time.

Tags: Eternal Happiness, Little Peach, Poetry by Bjean
No Comments »

At least this time I remembered the camera.

All right, my dears, I did find Key lime in the Northwest, despite our initial stumbling block of the possibility that it might truly turn out to be a “seasonal” dish. Seriously: They’ve got a point. January is not a good time for the Washington State citrus crop.

Here’s a shot of the pie served at Flyers in Oak Harbor, Washington.

Flyers Pie

Flyers was a fun place to meet and eat. I did enjoy the aeronautical theme, and general exuberance of the place. Or maybe that was just the exuberance of my dining companions? For dinner, I had a “prime rib dip” which I’d known in a former life as a “French dip,” but I guess I should just be happy that they didn’t call it a “Freedom dip.”

I should never order this sandwich because I know it will never be as good as the one I had at the Limelight Cafe in Denver in 1972, but I am – as well you know by now – an optimist. Golf, after all, is a game for optimists, and so is the search for the perfect slice of Key lime pie.

Needless to say, the pie at Flyers met our expectations, which were low. We gave them points for presentation, and for adding nuts to the crumb crust, but the overall impression was that the whole concoction had only recently come out of the deep freeze. “Fresh” was not a word that sprang to mind, or to tongue.

The next day, we ventured by ferry to Port Townsend, and enjoyed some time out in the water. Granted, we were inside the ferry with our toes close to the heater, but we were there. I have a vague memory or two of being in Port Townsend before. Maybe you were there with me? I’m pretty sure Little Peach was my chaperone on at least one trip to that part of the world, and I did miss her this time around. She has such a wonderful knack for asking all the right questions, and that’s a gift that I envy. Traveling without her is always difficult, and when I get home, I know I will hardly be able to answer half of her well-placed questions, just because I didn’t ask. Ah, well.

In Port Townsend, this time, I did have a marvelous piece of salmon for lunch, perfect in every way. I left a gold star on the menu on my way out the door. We did give this particular slice of pie high marks for the chocolate crust, yes indeed. I like a little experimentation, when the results pay off.

Port Townsend Pie

The filling, though, was exceedingly tart. We weren’t surprised, though, since we had already leafed through the restaurant’s cookbook, in fact we bought a copy, so we knew this particular offering was full of lime juice, no mention of fresh limes. At least they did not spoil the pretty presentation with a garnish of Persian lime, and I liked how the whipped cream was a decorative option.

I copied the recipe, which was pretty basic. Just speak up if you want a copy so you can try it out yourself, and let me know what you think. It might be just the ticket to make you think of sunny SoFLA when you, too, are far from home.

Tags: Little Peach, Video, pie by Slice of Heaven
No Comments »

Your second-cousin Darnell has been talking about starting a horse-and-buggy tour of the neighborhood as a way to “support the community,” he says. Or a way to boondoogle the few tourists that we get out here so close the the ‘glades, I say.

“Just what will you cover on this tour?” I want to know. “Once you’ve gone by the Pie Shop, The Driving Range, The Swing Park, and Pancho Villas, what’s left? The bonsai forest?”

Darnell seemed a little puzzled by my lack of enthusiasm, which was tempered by the knowledge that he did not have a horse nor a buggy, and he sauntered off to The Swing Barn to see if he might have better luck with Sue Ten. I suspect that she probably gave him comments very similar to mine, with perhaps a bit less diplomacy and tact, two qualities which I am seriously trying to develop.

I do actually like the idea of the buggy ride, but I think there has to be an audience for it first, not unlike the Village Players recent production of The Mikado, in which Sue Ten had a staring role. Sadly, most of the people who were interested in hearing Gilbert and Sullivan were already in the cast, so that left but few of us to fill the seats. Still, we all had a good time, especially during Sue Ten’s encore, during which she sang the song Frank Mills, from Hair. The fact that she was still in her geisha costume made it all the more endearing, since her outfit gave the song more of a Teeny-Bopper Butterfly flavor.

Speaking of horse-and-buggy rides, Sue and I have been trying to figure out if Michel Ten, whom I met in Havana, could possibly be a relative, but we weren’t able to find a family line from here to there, so chances are that the similarity in names was either a coincidence or a misunderstanding.

Little Peach and I met Michel on our second day in Havana as we strolled past the horse-cabs. We were besieged by the drivers, a fairly raucous and noisy crew of men in crisp pastel-plaid cotton shirts and jeans. They are all cheery and optimistic that we would take them up on their tour offers, but we had already signed up for our bus tour, so we continued our stroll down the Prado.

Michel, bless his heart, proceeded to stroll with us, spewing his spiel, still, about how great his buggy tour would be. Little Peach took him aside for a moment and explained that we were in Havana without luggage or a change of clothing, and what we really wanted to know was where we could pick up a little dress or two, cheap. We also wanted such niceties as deodorant and shampoo.

None of that really stumped him, but we learned from him that most if not all the retail shops in Cuba were closed for Liberation Day, so with or without him, we would not be able to do too much shopping. We continued our walk, without Michel Ten, and admired the buildings along the Prado, and the young skateboarders operating mainly with lengths of wood and old roller-skate wheels.

Before we parted company, though, Michel Ten did warn us, “Those bus tours aren’t any good. You should come with me. If you change your mind, just ask for Michel Ten. That’s me.”

We asked his price, shook our heads, and said good-bye. When we returned to our hotel a few hours later, Michel was still out in the square, working his work, as charming as ever. That afternoon, we did go on the bus tour, where we met the Philosopher Detective and did have a pleasant afternoon and evening, but we both had to admit we could not always understand our tour guide, and Little Peach did not have an opportunity to ask the detailed questions for which she is so well known, and perhaps a little feared by tour guides everywhere.

The next morning, I told her, “I think we should go talk to Michel Ten and see if we can get him to come down on his price.”

We had a wonderful full breakfast in the elegant old dining room of the Hotel Inglaterra, admiring the tile work from days gone by and the contemporary painting of Cuba today. We chatted with the staff, sipped our juices and coffees, and smiled at the thought of where we really were, with luggage or without. Then, we went out to find Michel Ten.

Of course, he was not there, and several other horse-cab drivers claimed to be him. We said, “No, no, no.” Then they started to call from one to the other, “Michel! Michel Ten!” until suddenly he appeared, a great smile on his face. We proceeded to make our offer for a cheaper ride, but he looked said and said it could not be done.

“You see that man over there? That is my boss. I must give him the price.”

Little Peach and I suggested a shorter ride. He said no. And, great negotiators that we are, we said, “Okay, let’s go.”

I had forgotten that at some point I had tried to teach one of the other drivers how to sing “Una Paloma Blanca,” and as we began to pull away in our cab drawn by Michel Ten’s little horse Mulatta, that driver jumped up on the side of the cab and sang for us, getting the first line out perfectly, and then faking it after that, just as I had earlier. Michel shooed him away, and we took off on our slow, relaxing tour, with Little Peach asking every question that came into her mind, and Michel Ten doing his best to answer them in his almost-perfect English.

One word that he did have trouble with, though, was “horse,” which he pronounced as “whore.” We ignored that at first, until he got into an explanation of memorial statues of soldiers on horseback, and what it means if “the whore has all four feet on the ground” as opposed to “the whore has two feet on the ground.”

“I think you mean to say ‘horse’ said Little Peach, emphasizing the “s” at the end.

“Oh!” said Michel. “So what does ‘whore’ mean?”

I said “puta” and Little Peach said “prostitute” and then we all laughed, and continued our journey past Morro Castle, the open-air market, the booksellers, the museums, the Spanish Embassy, and more until we reached the bar where Michel promised us the best mojitos in Cuba. We each had one, at 11:00 a.m., and then with cups in hand, continued our tour, which ended up lasting at least 90 minutes of main attractions, side streets, and vignettes of daily life in Havana.

And was it better than the bus tour? Absolutely.

Was drinking mojitos before noon a good idea? Perhaps not, especially since we continued to drink Bucanero at lunch and through the afternoon, until the time that we decided to ride on the top of the double-decker hop-on-hop-off bus, our cans of beer neatly tucked into the drink holders. As the bus sped past the horse-cab area, we stood up and yelled, “Michel! Michel Ten!” but I do not know if he heard us.

If you ever go to Havana, please look up Michel 10. I have his phone number, and I’m sure he’d love to hear from you. Tell him that Una Paloma Blanca sent you.

Tags: Cuba, Eternal Happiness, Little Peach, Sue Ten by Bjean
1 Comment »

Little Peach stopped in at the Pie Shop the other day to show me some of the photos she took on our trip to Havana, and to reminisce a bit, especially about our dinner with The Philosopher Detective.  I wish we had a good shot of the him to show you. I know you probably think we made him up, but really he was our companion for an afternoon and evening, and quite a remarkable one at that.

We met him on our bi-lingual bus tour, the one during which I gave away my pink hat, as you may recall. By the way, I did look at a possible pink-hat replacement when I was in Costa Rica, but it still was not the same; nor was the one that I found today at the local thrift shop with “Vail’ embroidered on it. Perhaps next spring I’ll buy a Red Sox one after all.

To continue, as we all toured the Morro Castle, the Philosopher Detective and I began to chat, and then we compared our purchases back on the bus. He’d bought rum and cigars for friends, and I’d bought a single dark-rum nip for myself. Until that point, he may well have been one of the people who thought I was a Cuban. (In my memory now, as you can imagine, most people did.) I told him I’d only bought the nip to drink on the bus since I couldn’t take any of the lovely stuff home. “I’m an American,” I said, and he replied “I suppose someone has to be. Might as well be you.” He won me over immediately.

By the time we reached the walking tour part of our program, Little Peach knew much of his life history, including his long relationship with the marvelous Maggie, who was off on her own holiday with friends from way back when. By the time we all three decided to drop the tour and go off by ourselves for dinner, we were fast friends, at least for the one evening.

First, though, our tour guide did what tour guides tend to do: He led us into an establishment undoubtedly run by friends of his. We caught on to that when we noticed that the bartender already had an icy mojito waiting for our guide the minute that we walked in the door.  The place — a faux Irish pub complete with regulation mariachi band — was touted as yet another Hemingway waterhole. I think it’s safe to say that there was no drinking establishment in Havana where Hemingway did not knock back a pop or two.

We settled in upstairs, where we were pretty much a captive audience, for “a break” and shelled out a bit of cash for mojitos and beer, applauding on cue for the band. I could see that both the Philosopher Detective and Little Peach were getting a little antsy, but I wasn’t sure why until we were out on the pavement again, and TPD burst out saying, “It was all I could do to keep from leaping over the table to free that poor bird from its cage.”

Yes, a man of passion, and that’s when he won Little Peach, too. Allow me to insert a little background note here: If you were to arrive at Little Peach’s house with your car windshield smashed and cracked beyond belief, and perhaps even a shard or two of glass wedged into your forehead, she would help you mop up the blood, but she would first want you to go back and check on the health of the bird that you’d hit. (Yes, that’s one of the many reason we love her, isn’t it?)

TPD was cut of the same cloth, and we were delighted to discover that he knew of a charming rooftop restaurant where we would continue our conversation at leisure. The lower level of the place was a jazz bar, and the music was dead on perfect. We passed by the mahogany bar and beckoning chairs and entered the tiny grill-worked elevator that took us to the roof, where we were treated to a view of Morro Castle, the harbor, and the sea at dusk.

To our surprise, our waiter was reluctant to offer recommendations for dinner, but he explained that it was his first day on the job and he could not yet personally vouch for the quality of the food. I thought that was an interesting perspective, rather than telling us  “It’s all good.”

Once we had ordered at our own risk, TPD told us about his career in London, conducting investigations and interrogations, and we learned that the most valuable weapon in his considerable arsenal was silence. “Yes,” he said, “more often than not, you’ll find out what you want to know if you can just out wait the poor fool you’re questioning.”

I’ve understood that myself, by intuition, but I’ve never been able to put it into practice. I always crack first and spit out another question. What about you? Let’s try it sometime.

We also talked about humor and writing and learning to live a new life. I’ve done that as you know, as so has TPD, when his career as a working detective suddenly ended as his body collapsed and he found himself in a hospital bed, rather than at the scene of the next crime.

His dark world, in which he well knew the difference between the living, the just-dead, and the long-dead, rapidly shifted into one in which he knew he had to find a new better way to live and to cope and to communicate.

An introspective man, he shared his regrets and joys, with an self-questioning aspect that we enjoyed tremendously, as he played both the interrogator and subject in his own story. Part of the tale included a period in which he gained so much weight that he had become whale-like in proportion, but then took extreme measures to drop back down to “normal” size.

“What a pleasure it is,” he said, “just to go into a shop and buy clothes ready made. What a joy, just to walk down the street next to my Maggie, not lagging behind so people would not know I was with her.”

“I wondered about that,” I surprised myself by saying, “because you walk like a fat man, but you really are not fat at all.”

Yes, he did have that slow deliberate step, as if the ground might crumble beneath him, and he knew it.  I know what it is like to lose 35 pounds, but he’d lost 140!

As the evening danced on, we listened to the rooftop band play traditional Cuban music, heard the canon at the Castle fire, watched the sunlight fade, and saw the full moon rise among the dark tumbling clouds.

We talked of families, lovers, friends, travel, books, The Wind in the Willows, and everything else that touched our hearts at that particular moment in time, and we topped it off with some ice cream that the waiter could not identify.

“It’s tiramisu,” I told him, after a taste or two or three. TPD and Little Peach nodded in agreement. Yes. Tiramisu ice cream for dessert, on a rooftop in Havana.

Before we pushed back our chairs and headed to the elevator, I asked TPD how many people he thought were sitting behind him.  The terrace restaurant had been pretty much empty when we arrived.

“Six,” he guessed.

“Turn around,” I said. There were 18 people seated at one long table, just getting up to fill their plates at a buffet.

When I see people come into the Pie Shop and become so engrossed in conversation that they don’t even see the other people in the room, I’m always a bit jealous. Tthen again, I feel that pleasant isolation so often myself when you and I have the chance to talk the way that we do, connecting on so many levels. Let’s do it again real soon.

Tags: Cuba, Little Peach, The Philosopher Detective by Bjean
No Comments »

I’ve been wondering about adding a Pie Museum to the Slice of Heaven 24-Hour Pie Shop and Driving Range. It seems to me that it might draw in a few more people in the off season, and besides that I like the idea. There’s certainly no shortage of golf museums and gol halls of fame, but pie appears to have been short shrifted.

I’m sure that there are some glorious pie paintings, prints, and drawings that I could instal there. I already know of several sculptures, or at least ceramics. Several movies have certainly featured pie: whipped cream pie, shaving cream pie, warm apple pie, and other varieties. I always liked the John Travolta movie Michael, in which he played an angel, supposedly the very one who invented pie, and it includes a lovely scene of Andie McDowell singing about pie. Then there’s the more recent movie Waitress, and on network television, there’s Pushing Daisies about a piemaker with the touch of life, or death.

Perhaps I can also include some history of pie, science of pie, and the future of pie. There’s a lot of pie memorabilia, not to mention equipment, costuming, and cookery. For example, there’s that four-and-twenty blackbirds story. Perhaps you’d like to know more about that. Let me know. The museum is just in the planning stages, and we have plenty of time to get it right. Perhaps we can come up with something as appealing as Cranberry World in Plymouth, Massachusetts, or even the World’s Largest Teflon Frying Pan.

I like all kinds of museums, ranging from the tiny one that used to be — and maybe still is — in Silver Plume, Colorado back in the days when local residents freely grew pot plants in the window-boxes of their homes, to the utterly fantastic Provincial Museum in British Columbia.

My favorite fictional museum is the Barnum Museum in the book by the same name, written by Stephen Millhauser who also wrote the short story that became the movie The Illusionist.

In Havana, though, my favorite place in the city was the Museum of the Revolution.

When I sent my dear friend Ms. Jay my collage from Cuba, she wrote back that she was very glad that I had been to the Museum of the Revolution, and said, “I could picture you looking at the wax sculptures of Che and Camilo coming out of the jungle.”

Yes, and I could see her there, too. For me, the Musee was the high point of the trip, my primary reason for being there on the island South of Key West. The building itself was once the dictator Batista’s palace, and the ornate architecture said a lot about that time and place when there was such a huge gap between the haves and the havenots. Revolution, indeed. Our tour guide Michel Ten told us a story about a group of students who tried to storm the palace in Batista’s days, but Batista easily escaped through one of the many secret tunnels. The students? They did not survive their act of revolution.

What drives a people to revolution? Extremities, and that was very clear just in seeing the contrast of the building, and imagining it as it once had been, with the simple displays, and open windows, and peeling paint on the interior walls.

I’m sure the displays in the Museum of the Revolution did not meet the standards of even the most basic interpretation in the Smithsonian, and yet I don’t remember ever being so moved by a museum, so touched. I once read an essay in which a young boy visiting the British Museum once and reported back that that the thing he loved best was Nelson’s shirt, “with his own blood on it”

Everything in the Museum of the Revolution, it seemed, had someone’s own blood on it. And, yes, that’s what I like best, too. Nothing really cleaned up or laundered. Nothing polished or restored. But room after room, in what had once been a fabulous palace, I read and saw the tale of an island and its people, their struggles, and their blood.

The lack of artifacts was what spoke to me the loudest: A placard related the story of a hero, and then in the case, a piece of cutlery with a note: “Here is a spoon he once used.” For another, a pair of cuff-links. Letters from Fidel, written in perfect Palmer method penmanship. Photographs of friends and comrades, in good times and bad.

I read recently, that people who grew up in the time of balck and white television are more prone to dream in black and white, rather than in color. I dream in color. And I don’t know where that quite fits in here, except to remind me to tell you that nearly all the photos in this museum were black and white, and as we went through the rooms, we eventuallyl came to one with a black and white television, and old black and white television, playing a continuous loop showing a plane landing, and then two soldiers solemnly coming down the stairs, with the box containing Che’s remains hoisted on their sholdiers.

Not a coffin. A box. No pretense that all of Ernesto Che Guevara’s remains were there, so much gone already into the earth or scattered. I sat in my gray-metal folding chair in the unbearable brightness of the room and watched the loop again and again, until I felt I could finally move on to the next section where, indeed, I did see the wax figures of Che and Camilo running out of the jungle.

A crowd of school children had come into the museum earlier, surging around me as I squatted to read the inscriptions next to weapons and cufflinks. By then, I’d been asked a couple of times by adults, if I were Cuban, ut the kids had no doubt that I was a foreigner in their midst. They looked at me with curiosity, but also with comradeship, explained things to me in slow careful Spanish, which I did not understand as well as I felt the effort they were taking to talk to me, and then they ran ahead to point at their next favorite item or display.

By the time I caught up with them again, two of the boys, maybe nine or ten years old, were posing in front of the wax figures of Che and Camilo, running out of the jungle; two young boys, eerily wearing the same solemn faces as the soldiers who had carried the remains down the stairs from the plane. No joking, no fooling around.

Even now, my mind is full of those images of artifacts in tattered cases, and unsmiling school boys who have learned well the message of work, learn, and fight.

But then, all I could do was to wipe my eyes, find Little Peach at the edge of the crowd, and walk down the sweeping Scarlett O’Hara staircase to the floor below.

We next went into the ballroom, filled with gilt-edged mirrors which, I’m sure, only hinted at how opulent the building had really once been. Our eyes were drawn up to the grandios mural on the ceiling, and I lay down on the floor to see the whole thing. As I did, coins clattered out of my white-pants pockets all around me, echoing hollowly through the room. I gathered them up and lay down again, Little Peach guiding me to the best spot to see the host of angels and also the fire that they were dousing. A crystal chandelier hung down from the center of that ferocious heaven, and I lay below, thinking of Che and Camilo running out of the jungle, and the unsmiling boys.

No one told me not to lay on the floor. Then again, no one else joined me there.

I felt colorless and pale as we left the building and headed back up the street toward the Museum of Contemporary art, a modern structure built around an open courtyard and sculpture garden. We started at the top and began to work our way down, but I did not find much there that appealed to me, so I left Little Peach on her careful and thoughtful stroll and went down to the courtyard to reflect on what I’d seen — perfect, temperature-controlled and well-lighted painting and sculpture– and I wondered at the sadness that pervaded everything for me.

Perhaps the sorrow was left over from the Museum of the Revolution, or maybe it was a sense of art that was never alowed to fully blossom, kept in check somehow. The impressionist paintings there all reminded me of the French masters, but they seemed to be copies, not originals. And the more recent images seemed to be pervaded with death, disease, famine, and pestilence.

I wanted more originality, more spirit. I wanted the Cuban art of the murals and the streets to find its way into the fine galleries of the world, too. The art museum left me feeling unsettled and unhappy. Drowsy, I rested on a bench and watched a busload of teenagers in red tee-shirts milling around outside the museum doors.

In time, Little Peach joined me, lifting my spirits, and we sauntered companionably back up the street to our hotel, at an easy pace, not at all like Che and Camilo running out of the jungle.

Tags: Cuba, Little Peach by Bjean
No Comments »

It’s Friday night, and my sister Melbie wants to sing karaoke at the Swing Barn with some of the other girls. Normally, I don’t care that much for karaoke, but Sue Ten’s big screen really is big enough for me to see the words, so I’m thinking I should join Mel when I am done with my practice.

For some reason, there are more little girls on the the range than I have ever seen before. I am making a mental note to myself to have The Morning Guy check into ordering some of those wicked cute little pink golf sets so we can capitalize on this trend.

At the same time, I’m a little disheartened to see nine-year olds in pink shorts and wild, curly, uncombable hair driving balls almost twice as far as I can. Yet.  As I listen and watch, I understand what The Morning Guy meant when he told me that some golf tips, notably Tip Number 2 and Tip Number 3, must be demonstrated. I hope some day he will get around to doing that for me.

I watch a dad with one of the little girls as he demonstrates again and again the rhythm that he wants her to mimic. She listens, she hits, and her drive is good. Then the dad says, “Now do that again three more times,” and she bursts into tears. Granted, this is after almost an hour of relentless coaching, but it breaks my heart. Her two younger sisters ignore the entire scene, and soon I see all three the little girls following Sparkle Junior around as he picks up empty ball buckets and takes them back to the shop.

The dad meanwhile hits a dozen or so balls before collecting his cool and gathering up his girls to go inside for some peppermint ice cream pie with an oreo-cookie crust. He wins me over once again.

My own practice seems odd since I am watching the clock, and that’s not something I normally do anymore. Typically, I take all the time I want to hit 100 or more balls: No one is waiting on me, no one is looking for me, no one is calling my name, and I love that freedom.

I find it odd to be rushing to meet Melbie, but I am compulsive about being on time, and the rushing, in fact, does not seem to have any great affect on my results. What I’m missing, I think, is not so much improvement in my game, but the leisure to enjoy the details.

I’ll also tell you that I’m looking forward to hearing Melbie sing. I know she’ll outshine everyone there, and will totally surprise the folks who don’t already know her. Sue Ten and I will warm them up with Benny and the Jets, but Melbie will knock them out with Desperado.

I’m remembering riding through Havana on the bus top with Little Peach, who wanted me to sing some blues for her. I had offered jug-band, but she said no no no. She grew up with jug-band music and could not longer abide it. I started to sing I Can’t Make You Love Me and she stops me on that, too. “I want blues, but not sad,” she says. And I am stumped.

As I finish up my last few hits, I know the song I should have sung, and I hope it’s on Sue Ten’s karaoke machine: Double-Bogey Blues. It’s a good night, and I am ready to sing. I hope you are, too, but remember what I always say: “Introverts with microphones: A dangerous combination.”

Tags: Jukebox Suggestions, Little Peach, The Morning Guy, Video by Bjean
No Comments »

I had an interesting talk with Little Peach about this concept, and how I feel that some pictures cannot be captured by a camera, but are better left in one’s mind. She disagreed, and said she felt she could have and would have taken the shots. I don’t know. I think the camera can be too much of a wall, and I’d rather have the closeness of your magic rubbing up against mine, no molecules in between.

Here are three that I did not take:

(1) Just a glimpse into an apartment as we walk from the Malacon back to Marti Square. The lighting is dim, like in one of Paul Strand’s WPA photos of Appalachia or the Dust Bowl. The living room is illuminated only by an old television, and an even older man sits in dark pants and bright white tee-shirt, watching some show in Spanish with a little boy on his lap, ignoring the press of people walking by.

(2) Stopping by the corner of a church, I want to be blessed by a huge black woman, all in white lace, smoking a monstrous cigar. I have no time for a full reading of her cards so I just give her my coin and ask to be blessed. She does as I ask and laughs, slipping that cigar back into her pink toothless mouth. I can still see the red backs of the cards laid out among all that white. I can still smell the spritz of lavender on my hair and hands.

(3) Little Peach and I are riding on the top of the “hop on, hop off bus,” sipping our beers. She is letting her hair fly back as we cruise the roadway across from the Morro Castle. She’s singing a little “Soul sister, go sister,” but she doesn’t know the words. I sing them for her: “Voulez-vous couchez avec moi, cette soir,” and she confesses she does not know what they mean, which makes me laugh with delight.  “Hey, Joe, you want to give it a go?” And then we both sing, raising our bottles of Bucanero beer on our way down the Malacon at night.

Mixtape from http://favtape.com/search/Christina Aguilera vs Lady Marmalade

Here are the lyrics from the Christine Aguilera version:

Lil’ kim:
Where’s all mah soul sistas
Lemme hear ya’ll flow sistas

Mya:
Hey sista, go sista, soul sista, flow sista
Hey sista, go sista, soul sista, go sista

Mya:
He met Marmalade down IN old Moulin Rouge
Struttin’ her stuff on the street
She said, “Hello, hey Jo, you wanna give it a go?” Oh! uh huh

Chorus:
Giuchie, Giuchie, ya ya dada (Hey hey hey)
Giuchie, Giuchie, ya ya here (here)
Mocha Chocalata ya ya (oh yea)
Creole lady Marmalade

Lil’ Kim:
What What, What what
Mya:
ooh oh

Voulez vous coucher avec moi ce soir
Voulez vous coucher avec moi

Lil’ Kim: yea yea yea yea

Pink: He sat in her boudoir while she freshened up
Boy drank all that Magnolia wine
All her black satin sheets, suede’s, dark greens
yeah

Chorus:
Giuchie, Giuchie, ya ya dada (da-da-da)
Giuchie, Giuchie, ya ya here (here ohooh yea yeah)
Mocha Choca lata ya ya (yea)
Creole lady Marmalade

Voulez vous coucher avec moi ce soir (ce soir, what what what)
Voulez vous coucher avec moi

Lil’ Kim:
yea yea uh
He come through with the money and the garter bags
I let him know we bout that cake straight up the gate uh
We independent women, some mistake us for whores
I’m sayin‘, why spend mine when I can spend yours
Disagree? Well that’s you and I’m sorry
Imma keep playing these cats out like Atari
Wear ideal shoes get love from the dudes
4 bad ass chicks from the Moulin Rouge
hey sistas, soul sistas, betta get that dough sistas
We drink wine with diamonds in the glass
bottle case the meaning of expensive taste
if you wanna Giuchie, Giuchie, ya ya
Mocha Chocalate-a what?
Real Lady Marmalade
One more time C’mon now

Marmalade… Lady Marmalade… Marmalade…

Christina:
hey Hey Hey!
Touch of her skin feeling silky smooth
color of cafe au lait alright
Made the savage beast inside roar until he cried,
More-more-more

Pink:
Now he’s back home doin’ 9 to 5

Mya:
Sleepin’ the grey flannel life
Christina:
But when he turns off to sleep memories creep,
More-more-more

Chorus:
Giuchie, Giuchie, ya ya dada (da daeaea yea)
Giuchie, Giuchie, ya ya here (ooh)
Mocha Choca lata ya ya (yea)
Creole lady Marmalade

Voulez vous coucher avec moi ce soir (ce soir)
Voulez vous coucher avec moi (all my sistas yea)
Voulez vous coucher avec moi ce soir (ce soir)
Voulez vous coucher avec moi (C‘Mon! uh)

Missy:
Christina…(oh Leaeaa Oh)
Pink… (Lady Marmalade)
Lil’ Kim…(hey Hey! uh uh uh uh…)
Mya…(Oh Oh oooo)
Rot wailer baby…(baby)
Moulin Rouge… (0h)
Misdemeanor here…

Creole Lady Marmalade Yes-ah……

Tags: Cuba, Eternal Happiness, Jukebox Suggestions, Little Peach by Bjean
1 Comment »

The first pink hat was actually a pair, from a time long ago, when the kids were 11, and we were doing the grand tour of our nation’s capitol, staying at a friend’s house in Annapolis, and riding in on the train. Somewhere along the line, I had acquired two bright pink hats with the Pink Panther on them. I think they came free with insulation, and at that time in life, we were very well insulated. Now remember, this was in the days before cell phones and just slightly after the days in which we all felt pretty safe letting our kids run around with minimal supervision.

We did great with the hats, and I could spot the twins tearing around from a pretty good distance.  We did great, that is, until we arrive at the National Zoo shortly before a busload of school kids arrived, all wearing, you know it, hot pink hats. Hundreds of them. Fortunately, my two skinny children and I did still find each other at the appointed spot and the appointed time, but since that trip, a pink hat reminds me of a special time in my life when “family” was the three of us with our over-sized glasses and over-sized vocabularies, and we were quite happy to explore just about anything together..

The next pink hat is one that I never actually owned, an opportunity lost when The Morning Guy one day went off to a ball game & left me a note saying to call if I wanted him to pick up anything. I couldn’t think of a thing. “Like what?” I scrawled on the note. Imagine my surprise when I later saw his immaculate tiny printing that said, “I thought you might have liked one of those pink hats.”

I was stunned. I hadn’t worn any kind of ball cap for years, just wide-brimmed girlie hats like Rene Russo in the movie Tin Cup, but had come to like the idea of a pink hat, free of team color and all that, but still definitely a treasure. I especially loved seeing more and more pink hats showing up at Spring Training, no matter what teams might be on the field.  I did, in fact, want one of those hats.

Of course, you and I both know that was a one-time only offer. He will not make a similar suggestion again. He will, likely, make some other offer, and I will probably be obtuse enough to miss that one, too.  In my mind, the pink ball cap would fit me perfectly, covering my ears just so, but there’s still the nagging doubt that it might have had the wrong team logo on it.  I’ve been tempted, as you can imagine, to buy my own pink hat, possibly a Red Sox one, but even that will not fill the void of the gift not accepted. I can easily obtain the hat. It’s the gifting that I want.

Now, I could ramble on here about gifting for quite a long time, but I know you have other things to do, so let’s just move up to the present day, and even more hats.

I like to go to Miami once a year and meet up with some of my former colleagues to find out how they are doing. This year, I was delighted when some of the folks from New Zealand brought along some ball caps with their company logo on them. I was even more delighted when my Dutch friends said they could do better than that, and quickly produced a pink hat. Perfect, or almost perfect. A gift. Pink. I could add the Red Sox logo to it later.

This was all shortly before Little Peach and I headed south, lost our luggage, and began to tour The Island for four days in the same clothes. I wore white slacks, which grew less and less white, a yellow sleeveless golf shirt (which I eventually supplemented with a Cuban tee-shirt), walking shoes, and my pink hat.

As I’ve mentioned before, I wished I had know what to take to give away or trade with people, and now I really know: chiclets, fishnet hose, pads of paper, and pink hats.  I would outfit the entire population of Havana with pink hats.  But I would have to do it in a roundabout way. The gnarly old man who first took a liking to my hat was not, as it turned out, all that interested in the hat, but what he might get for it.

Is this how capitalism takes over?  I don’t know.  I had already given him more than enough in coin for the newspaper, but the hat was what drew him. I understood.  I took it off and handed it over.  He smiled.  He kissed the hat. He walked away with it, and Little Peach and I watched him go.  In fact, we continued to watch him from the tour bus, and we saw the next exchange take place, the pink hat moving right along for a few coins.

And then we watched as the vendor who bought it examined it, checked it all out, and examined it again. As he did that, a new customer came appeared and made an offer.  It must have been a good one, since before we knew it, the hat was being slipped into a bag and the transaction was done.

I’m curious about the bag, though. That means whoever bought it did not plan to wear it. Perhaps a gift, perhaps one that was absolutely perfect.

Tags: Characters, Cuba, Eternal Happiness, Little Peach, The Morning Guy by Bjean
No Comments »

One of the great pleasures of my recent trip with Little Peach to the land south of Key West was meeting The Philosopher Detective, traveling on his own while his dear partner Maggie was off for a reunion with some long-time chums. We went through the usual tour-bus chat, which was laced with those wonderfully dry remarks that some people, perhaps, just don’t get. For example, when I said I was an American, he said, “Someone has to be. Might as well be you.” Yes, a philosopher.

Little Peach and I hit it off with him quite well, and the conversation flowed, in part — I think — because I no longer have to explain the incomprehensible nature of my former employment anymore.  I did have brief visit down that road, but The Philosopher Detective quickly pointed out my mistake by saying, “Quite a conversation stopper, that one.” Yes, indeed.  It is such a delight these days to be able to say to people, who care to ask ‘What do you do?” that I own a pie shop. And a driving range.  I tell you, there are damn few people who don’t like one or the other.

Now, see how these Cuban boys reacted after I told them that I own a pie shop:

Tags: Cuba, Little Peach, Video by Bjean
No Comments »

Just a fantasy, really. What if Little Peach and I never did get out of the Nassau Airport?  And it did look like that for a while, but we are now safely ensconced in the Hotel Inglaterra on another island even further south.  We did have a small glitch checking in at the airport and that turned into a bigger glitch when our luggage did not arrive.

We had a difficult time telling Customs where we were planning to stay. They didn’t buy our “Holiday Inn” answer, but we came up with another story. We are now probably well within the folklore of the airport: The woman who is celebrating her birthday with no luggage, but who gets on the next plane anyway.

Still in Nassau, though, we noticed a lot of pirate hoo-hah in the News Stand and immediately started thinking in terms of pie pirates, and even paw paw pirate pie. We think that pirates might like a salty crust, ho ho.

I learned that Little Peach, when young, had recurring dreams about monkeys.  No monkey pie for her.

We also wondered about what might go into an Island Time Pie.  We believe it might be the type of pie that is hard to started on.  It might be the kind of pie you eat when your know you want dessert, but maybe just not yet.

We also discussed the “While You Wait Pie” — some of you may remember my previous scheme for creating and selling While You Wait kits for stranded travelers (Little Peach & I could have used one yesterday) — and decided that might be the pie you make while you are waiting for the Island Time Pie to bake.

Su Ten, dear, forgot to tell you that the Gay Whores for Christ Anonymous called to reserve the Swing Barn for their annual meeting on the 15th.  I hope that’s not the same night as the USCG Academy reunion. I know you can handle any possible conflict.

In other news, I wondered what we should have brought along with us for giveaways. I’m reminded of going on board the Russian trawler Riga some years ago, and wishing I had brought along a supply of ping pong balls to replace the ones they had lost as sea.  Here, I wish I had brought chiclets, bananas (lost to the Island during the recent cyclone), and fishnet stockings, which are very popular among the female customs agents.

Outside of that, all I can say is that I do love a city where you can get beer out of vending machines. And if I were a drinking person, I might consider installing one in the Slice of Heaven 24-Hour Pie Shop and Driving Range.

We really did not spend four days in the Nassau Airport, it just felt that way. I also wished I’d brought along my clubs and some pink plastic practice balls. Oh yes. Those long empty halls just called for a little extra excitement.

Today’s song: Una Paloma Blanca.  If you can find a link, please post it.  The little band at the roof top restaurant last night, tried to play it for me, but they didn’t actually know it so they played Happy Birthday, some wonderful Beatles song which the mojitos have erased, and some other paloma song.

I was worried about not  being able to go to sleep without reading — not to mention the far-from-normal consumption of caffeine & sugar of late — but I was able to swipe an English paperback from another fancier hotel’s “library,” plus watched The Motorcycle Diaries in Spanish, which was just ideal.

Today we head out on a double-decker bus and pray for luggage. We miss you all.

Tags: Cuba, Dreams, Eternal Happiness, Little Peach, pie by Bjean
No Comments »

I’ve been thinking about Darnell a lot lately. He’s always seemed like family to me, even though he’s your second cousin, not mine. I’m so glad that he moved back to SoFLA and got out of New York City, although it was always fun to hear the women on the Montel Williams Show talk about him, even though they never really had too much that was too good to say about him.

I guess what brings him to mind is that I keep hearing that Tom Waits song, “Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night,” in my mind, and I love that one line, “Telephone’s ringin’; it’s your second cousin.”

Yes, that would certainly be the heart of Saturday night here, or any other night for that matter. Darnell does a good job of looking out for all you all, especially now that he’s found that elusive place called home.

Since Slice of Heaven is open 24-hours-a-day, I don’t really have the sense of Saturday night that I once did, if I ever did. For me, it’s always Friday night when I want to be out and about, and that’s some of what drew me to the driving range part of my life. Fish and chips and an endless bucket of balls? What could be better than that?

I know I will look forward to spending some time out there this evening after the sun goes down. I hope I’ll do better than I did on Monday, when almost every single shot was low and stupid. I mean, so low that some of them just jumped right back and bit my ankles.

I know I’ve been a little distracted lately, maybe overdue for a break from the usual routine, so you’ll be glad to hear that my dear friend Little Peach and I are going to take ourselves on a little adventure in about a week, when we head to Havana to celebrate my 60th birthday. We’ve packed up our guidebooks and our comfy walking shoes, and we’re ready to hear some new tunes. I don’t know that I’ll get to enjoy any golf there, but we are determined to come back with at least one new pie recipe, and I’ll tell you all about it when we get home.

In the meantime, though, I have a busy week to survive taking care of business in the city. I’ll be leaving the Slice of Heaven in the capable hands of Sue Ten, The Morning Guy, and Sparkle Junior. I’d love to know if you are a Saturday night person, or a Friday night one like me. In either case, though, I hope you find the heart of it and it’s just what you always wanted.

Tags: Cuba, Fantasies, Jukebox Suggestions, Little Peach, Video, Your Second-Cousin Darnell by Bjean
No Comments »