I saw Ed Begley, Jr. on the Red Line subway in 2014.  It was spring or early summer.  Even though he sat at the other end of the train car, I couldn’t help but notice him.  He has that presence that celebrities—most celebrities—have.  And a man with expensive glasses and an excellent haircut and a nice shirt and blazer is not an everyday sight on the Red Line.  I looked down the long length of the train car, eyes drawn by his anomalous presence.  I said to my sister (paraphrasing) “Holy cow, I think that’s Ed Begley, Jr.  Yes.  Yes, it is.”

We left him alone.  I think New Yorkers have the right idea about how to encounter celebrities around town.  Leave them alone.  They’re just trying to pick up their dry cleaning or buy milk or drop their kids at school or go to a show like anybody else.  Begley, Jr. and the attractive woman with him (wife or daughter, presumably) exited the Red Line at Hollywood and Highland, where there is a shuttle to the Hollywood Bowl, probably their ultimate destination.

Startling as it was to see him in person, it was no mystery why Begley, Jr. would ride the Red Line to the Hollywood Bowl.  His commitment to ecologically sound ways of living are as legendary—maybe more legendary, these days—than his acting roles.  Begley, Jr. was “green” long before many other celebrities, politicians, and regular Janes and Joes jumped on the bandwagon.  He is earnestly green, but he can be good-natured about it, too—witness how he gamely parodied his environmental zealousness when he appeared “The Simpsons” episode “Home to the Max” in 1999.

What is truly impressive about Begley, Jr.’s green creed is that he practices what he preaches.  The actor has no need--no need—to take a subway train and shuttle to the Hollywood Bowl.  He could certainly afford to drive to the Hollywood Bowl and park there.  He could sooth his conscience about using an individual car by driving an electric or hybrid vehicle.  Heck, Begley, Jr. could hire a limo if he wanted, and be dropped off and picked up at the Bowl.  In fact, Begley, Jr. probably could hire a helicopter to fly him over the Bowl, and former Seal Team Six bodyguards to tandem-parachute him and his companion onto the Hollywood Bowl stage.  Begley, Jr. has plenty of resources.  That’s what I’m saying.

The point is, even though he could afford it a thousand times over, Begley, Jr. doesn’t want to put another car—even an electric or hybrid car—on the road.  Or a limo.  Or a helicopter in the sky.  Why do so when he and his companion can use public transportation and the power of their own legs and feet—it’s called “walking”— to get where they need to go?

As I sat at the end of the train car, watching Begley, Jr. talk quietly with his companion, I was pretty darn impressed.  This guy really, truly, literally “walks the walk”.  When he says we should try to leave small carbon footprints on the planet, he leads by example.  His restrained lifestyle creates small carbon footprints, but when it comes to being a responsible steward of the planet, he establishes awfully large footprints for the rest of us to fill.

Especially remarkable is his willingness to “be green” where no paparazzi lurk to capture the moment.  For I promise you, no paparazzi frequent the subterranean carnival that is the Red Line.  Begley, Jr. will never find publicity ops in these man-made caves.  In 2013 I published a YA novel about children who find magical portals in Downtown LA, portals that lead to strange and magical landscapes.  The Red Line is itself its own strange and magical landscape, garish and toothy, pungent and unpredictable, its denizens often seeming to have materialized from otherworldly realms.

For Ed Begley, Jr. to descend into this underworld cavalcade of business people and tourists, mothers with strollers, elderly persons, the clearly suffering homeless and the clearly dangerous cons and junkies, this fun-house mirror of the upper world, with urine pooling in the elevators, emaciated buskers twanging battered guitars with missing strings in hopes of begging a dime or quarter, and disturbed individuals chattering—sometimes shouting or shrieking—while tourists and the mentally stable passengers gaze hard at their books and smart phones and try to shut out the chaos enveloping them … For Begley, Jr. to willingly submerge himself and his be-gowned companion in this surreal landscape when he could nosh canapés in a limo or helicopter, that is a true commitment to a green life.

When a celebrity of Begley, Jr.’s stature walks and takes public transportation even when it is not necessarily comfortable or pleasant, he is engaging in a bit of disruption.  Environmental disruption.  Green disruption.  Seeing him on a subway train jolts us out of our ingrained patterns and routines.  He is making a point, quietly but powerfully.  If a star of his caliber and resources can be that conscientious about how his actions affect the planet, if he can make sacrifices so the world will be a better place for future generations, then what can we do?

If a celebrity can endure the volatile lunacy of the subway to keep a vehicle off the road, maybe we can start turning off lights in unused rooms.  Turning off the faucet when we brush our teeth.  Walking to the corner store instead of automatically leaping into our vehicles for a two-block drive.  Separating our plastics from our bio-trash.  Recycling.  Composting.  And that other green stuff.  Because the smaller we make our footprints, the more we fill Begley, Jr.’s large shoes.

[Leslie Le Mon is the author of fantasy novel Sircus of Impossible Magicks:  Chosen and the Downtown Los Angeles in Photographs collections, available at Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com.]

#Environmentalstewardship  #EdBegleyJr  #GreenDisruption  #LosAngeles  #leslemonauthor

Yesterday I thought--for the first time in, literally, years--about my grandparents' pink kitchen in the Massachusetts house my grandfather built, by hand, using GI Bill money after his service in World War II.  The pink of my grandparents' kitchen was a very specific pink, not hot pink, not Pepto-Bismol pink, not rose, not baby pink, but a rich true-pink color that was popular in the 1950's.  Look at color photos from the '50's and '60's, or magazine ads from that era, and you will see appliances and furniture and fabric in that shade.  The cabinets, floor, and walls in my grandparents' kitchen were painted that mod pink when I was a small child.

Because we now live in the age of Google, the instant I thought of my grandparents' pink kitchen, I Googled "pink kitchens" and learned a) that pink was a popular mod color, b) once upon a time you
could buy almost anything in that shade, and c) there are people today who love that color, particularly in vintage kitchens, and those aficionados have created Pinterest pages devoted to mod pink kitchens.

Naturally I clicked a link and proceeded immediately to Pinterest, and there viewed a variety of pink-painted vintage kitchens, as well as pink refrigerators and pink blenders and pink
dishes.  I had a strange sense of traveling through time because, as stated above, this was a very specific shade of pink.  Gazing at the "pink kitchen" pictures on Pinterest, I returned to my grandparents' old kitchen via memories that were more textured and three-dimensional than any I had conjured before consulting the Pinterest pages.

I am a recent convert to Pinterest.  A month ago a friend and fellow author (Jack Witt, "Cut, Cool & Confident" and "Tight, Tone & Trim") suggested that I create a Pinterest site for inspiration and to promote my books.  Jack's advice is usually spot-on, so I created a Pinterest site (it was quite simple) and then a few "boards".  The concept of Pinterest--a highly visual environment--is that you post or search for images (sketches, paintings, or photos) of items that interest you, and you then "pin" each image to a "board".  If you like soccer,
for example, Pinterest allows you to "pin" your own soccer photos, and others' soccer images, to a virtual corkboard that you name something such as "Soccer".  Other Pinterest users--called "Pinners"--can view your boards (unless you designate them as "Secret" and allow access only to friends).  Other Pinners can "favorite" and "share" and "pin" your images.  Theycan follow your "boards" and you can follow their "boards".

Pinterest won me over quickly.  It was simple and intuitive to set up, and simple and intuitive to create boards.  At its most basic level, it's like a virtual scrapbook.  If you like the theater, you can pin images of theater marquees, posters, press releases, and cast photos.  It you like a certain city--let's say, for example, Philadelphia--you can pin images of its landmarks, landscapes, and famous people.  If you like jazz, let the jazz-image pinning begin!

For visual people--and most of us are, to some degree or another; it's hard-wired into us to help us recognize and elude danger--Pinterest rapidly becomes more addictive than, well, anything else
(name your poison).  Once you create your boards and populate them with images, you want to find more images.  And then more.  Pinterest is a deep, deep rabbit hole that branches off in myriad directions.  The images you encounter suggest other images, and even other boards.  Like a hunter stalking its prey or an artist pursuing a muse, you scour Pinterest for that perfect image of, say, a ballet slipper.  Or a banjo.  Or a Peruvian basekt.  Or a Christmas tree in the snow.  Or an Irish Setter.  There are so many things to seek and collect, and each discovery sparks another idea.  Before you know it hours have passed and you have created multiple boards and collected hundreds--even thousands--of images.
 
At its most basic, Pinterest is a virtual scrapbooking site.  But it quickly grows to much more than that.  Before you know it, you are a gallery, even a museum, curating collections.  The
"boards" become collections and rooms and wings of your virtual gallery, your virtual museum.  Pinning is an exciting and rewarding endeavor, and when you have completed each hunter-gatherer-curator session, you actually have something to show for it.  Something instructive.  Something beautiful.  Something moving, even.

And so I pen this blog, a complete and unapologetic Pinterest addict--although I prefer the term "curator".  And I encourage you to join the Pinner ranks.  Pinterest is free, simple, educational, and inspirational.  It will give you ideas for your own projects, whether you are an artist, mom, mechanic, gardner, musician, athlete, or historian.  It will give you a forum to collect your favorite images of bottle caps or fans or gardens or statues or parkour moves or jars of jam or Civil War battlefields--anything that interests you, anything you care to imagine.  And it allows you to share all the wonders that you collect, your Aladdin's caves of treasure, with other Pinners and
even with non-Pinners (who are allowed limited yet intoxicating glimpses of the visual riches Pinterest holds).

Perhaps most wonderfully of all, Pinterest can transport us to other times and places.  A cafe in Paris.  A library in London.  A garden in Tokyo.  A farm in the 1920's heartland.  Anywhere.  Even to our own pasts.  As when I view a snowy street in Germany.  Or pink kitchens like the one in which my grandparents' cooked for us and made us laugh.

We do indeed live in an amazing age, a nearly magical age.  The world comes to our computers, and we can find and create and share beauty with everyone around the globe.  It is a new era.  An age of Pinteresting times.
 
[You can follow the author's Pinterest boards at http://www.pinterest.com/leslemonauthor.]

It’s difficult for us, in the present day, to picture what the 1920’s were like, but we all have iconic images stamped in our minds from history books and movies and PBS documentaries and, of course, cartoons.

We think of a college kid in a raccoon coat and pork pie hat, waving a pennant and saying nonsensical things like “23 Skidoo”.  We think of a flapper in strands of beads, madly dancing the Charleston on a marble-topped bar.  We think of big tin automobiles with hand-cranks, juddering and clanking along dirt roads that were even then being paved and laced with electrical and telephone wires.  We think of champagne and gin and hot jazz, a party that never seemed to end.  We think of the stock market, soaring up and up, no one dreaming it could crash so hard.

By and large, these images have truth.  You can hear the mad, mobile merriment of the age in its music, and you can hear the music on Buena Vista Street, peppy tunes like “Shake That Thing”.  We had won World War I, and everyone was dancing in the 1920’s. Progress was in full swing, and the thing to be was modern. Everyone moved to the cities and talked slang and played the market and moved fast and had unlimited confidence in the future. We were industrializing, electrifying, motorizing, refrigerating,
agitating, and animating.  Cartoons were the perfect medium to communicate the zany speed of the new age, and the possibility of the impossible that it promised.

Los Angeles was humming with endless possibility when Walt arrived in 1923.  Former ditch-digger William Mulholland had brought water to LA—seemingly all the water it would ever need—by 1913.  Dirt roads had given way to paved roads, gas to electricity, horses to automobiles—Downtown LA had installed more than 30 traffic signals by 1923.  Real estate was booming, oil was flowing, and the moving picture industry was about to explode.

Walt Disney moved to LA at a golden moment, a perfect match of personality and place.  He was an optimist among optimists, a dreamer and doer among dreamers and doers ...

[From "Buena Vista Street" in "The Disneyland Book of Secrets 2015 - DCA" - To be released Sep. 2015.]

I believe in dreams.  That's my nature.  I was a dream-believer as far back as I can remember.  I still believe in Santa Claus ... and I'm almost fifty.  Anyone who's worked with me or for me knows that I believe in dreams, that we can conceive and achieve almost anything.  We have to envision it and we have to dream it and want it and believe it.  But for dreams to come true, we also have to do something.  Luck matters, and timing, and there's at least a little bit of magic mixed in with any success.  But above all, making dreams come true takes action.

Conceive.  Believe.  Achieve.

My heroes have always been dreamers and doers.  They didn't just imagine.  They took action.  Alexander the Great.  Queen Elizabeth I.  Charles Dickens.  Abraham Lincoln.  Jane Addams.  Florence Nightingale.  Thomas Edison.  Nikola Tesla.  Louisa May Alcott.  Houdini.  Thurston the Great.  George Gershwin.  Walt Disney.

Since 2011 I have been researching, writing, and publishing independent guide books/histories about the Disneyland Resort.  It's been a labor of love, with a lot of help and input from friends and family.  It was one of my dreams, and I achieved it "with a little help from my friends" as the song goes.  I wanted to share with readers around the world, in great detail, and with great enthusiasm, the history and wonder of "the happiest place on earth"--and every year I release an updated edition.

Achieving that dream led to the achievement of other dreams.  Publishing histories and photo collections of Los Angeles.  Launching a YA fantasy series.  Publishing a book that will help job-seekers land a good job.  Most recently, publishing my first mystery novel.  Dreams are seeds.  They are not merely ends unto themselves.  When you accomplish one dream, it nurtures new dreams, and you sail toward new horizons.

Right now I am approaching the launch of the fifth edition of the book that started it all, "The Disneyland Book of Secrets 2015".  A lot of hard work, research, and enthusiasm went into this project, as with all my projects.  And this time I am seeking backers to complete and launch the book.  Because this is going to be a special book.  And some dreams are so big, they need participation.  Sometimes "it takes a village".

There are rewards--great rewards, fun rewards--for supporting the book's completion and launch.  There are photographs and signed paperbacks and dinners with the author, and, even for modest donations, seeing your name in print on the "Donor Roll Call of Honor".  But mainly there is the satisfaction of backing a labor of love, of being part of something special and positive in a world where, every day, the news sometimes seems grimmer and grimmer.

Please consider being part of this dream, of participating at any level.  And whatever your own dreams are, share them.  And take action.  Conceive.  Believe.  Achieve.

 Dream on!
....................................................

Kickstart the Independent Magic:  "Disneyland Book of Secrets 2015":  https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/leslemonauthor/disneyland-book-of-secrets-2015-independent-magic 

Yesterday I saw Friday the 13th for the first time. I mean the original Friday the 13th, the movie that was released in 1980.  I didn’t sneak into the movies to see it in 1980, when I was thirteen, and somehow I never caught it on VHS or cable or DVD during the next 34 years.  Yes--Friday the
13th is 34 years old.  Chew on that if you want to feel ancient!

 While I write I typically keep the television or radio on for background noise, for company.  If a really good (or entertainingly bad) show airs, I’ll pause in my writing, a few minutes here, a few minutes there, to enjoy key scenes and plot points.  At times a real gem will sweep me away and the writing will be forgotten. Chinatown can do that, for example, every time, as perfect and minimalist a film as has ever been crafted.  I would have bet strong odds that Friday the 13th would not have been able to commandeer my attention—but yesterday I would have lost that bet.

 Friday the 13th is not a great movie.  In many ways it is a terrible movie (and not the cool terrible, as in "You’re terrible, Muriel.”)  But Friday the 13th has a sort of hypnotic pull, and having seen it now, I understand why it spawned a multiplicity of sequels and reboots as well as (eventually) an iconic villain.

What drew me in first was the classic purity of the set-up.  There is a place, nicknamed “Camp Blood,” that is supposed to be a bad place, where awful, even supernatural things happen.  You are not supposed to go there.  So, naturally, the film begins with a cadre of energetic and cheerful young people--not bad, but irreverent--headed toward this accursed place for the express purpose of reopening the camp!

There.  That’s the launch of so many horror and ghost tales, going back thousands of years.  There is a forbidden place, and there is a cheerful innocent—in this case, a pack of cheerful innocents—who will disturb the place.  Nothing but slaughter can ensue.

 I was next drawn in by the realization that Kevin Bacon—yes, that Kevin Bacon—was among the cheerful innocents headed to the slaughter. While he was in no danger of being nominated for an Academy Award, Bacon’s was the only performance in the film that seemed wholly natural.  That is, he was the only actor in the production who already knew how to act. He looks inconceivably young and vulnerable, and while there is nothing very interesting about his character, you still care that he is probably (OK, definitely) going to die.

The third element that drew me in was the almost documentary-like patience and simplicity of the film.  Friday the 13th is not showy, not just because there’s no budget for pyrotechnics, but because the script is a simple story that will demand patience of the audience. There’s no hint here that the sequels will mutate into ever gorier and more over-the-top supernatural thrillers.

 All of the characters are ordinary.  No one is a superhero or a super-villain.  No one is, even, a hero or villain.  The young people who are reopening the camp are typical young people. They are neither particularly likeable (with the exception of Bacon) nor unlikeable (with the exception of prankish “Ned”). The activities that they engage in are typical activities. They paint.  They clean. They organize.  They swim.  They talk. They laugh. They cook supper.  They play music and games.  A young couple slips off to be alone together.  It’s all very human and ordinary, and the camera lingers over those ordinary moments as if they matter.  If it weren’t for the fact that every ten minutes or so someone gets murdered, this would be a rather ho-hum “How to reopen your summer camp” documentary!

But someone does get murdered every ten minutes or so, and in very grisly and variable ways (the common theme being that a blade is typically involved).  A knife for one victim, a hatchet for another, and so on.  And on.  The pull of the movie becomes the question “Will anyone survive?”

The answer (SPOILERS ahead) is that, yes, there will be one lone survivor.  One of the young women survives until the end.  She is not the most attractive or intelligent or wise or likeable of the cast, but that seems to be rather the point.  What she lacks in other aspects is balanced by her tenacity.  In what becomes an almost agonizingly drawn-out final face-off, she confronts the murderer, then escapes, then confronts the murderer again, over and over, in a painful cycle.

Our heroine—though she isn’t, really—makes ludicrous and repeated mistakes.  She constantly gives away her hiding places by whimpering, shouting, wrenching drawers open and shut, knocking things over, turning on lights, turning off lights—you name it, and she does it, which is how the killer keeps finding her.  By all rights, our lone survivor should be as dead as the other victims.

 But this isn’t a film about justice or logic.  It’s a film about survival.  And sometimes the survivor is the one with the most cockroach-like qualities, an ability to be found and knocked down, and found and knocked down again, and so on and so forth, while continuing to refuse to just give in.  In this story the survivor’s tenacity saves her where intellect, cunning, etc.—qualities we tend to laud in such filmic situations—have gone by the board.

 Who is the killer, anyway?  For the one other person besides me who hasn’t seen the movie yet:  another SPOILER alert.  The villain is not the soon-to-be-famous-and-iconic-and-unkillable Jason Voohrees but, rather, Jason Voohrees’ off-the-rails mother.  Once she heard that the camp at Crystal Lake was going to be reopened, Pamela Voohrees dove off the deep end of sanity, into the abyss. She decided she simply had to kill those meddling kids who were disturbing the accursed land where her son drowned, years before, due to the inattention of his camp counselors.

 Film and TV veteran Betsy Palmer does a capable job chewing the scenery as wronged mama Voohrees, swinging blades and channeling the voice of her drowned son with gleeful intensity. Sporting an eminently sensible woodland sweater-and-slacks ensemble, Jason’s mother chases the lone survivor from cabin to cabin, building to building, room to room, wounding and being wounded, and refusing as steadfastly as her prey to surrender.

They fight, they draw blood, the girl slips away, and the psychotic mama Voohrees pursues. It happens again.  And again.  And again. At no point does the girl arm herself with a suitable weapon, although she stumbles through a wealth of them during the pursuits.  “Come on!” I found myself shouting at the screen, “Grab that kettle/pot/pan/knife/hatchet/etc.!”  Instead of which, she would grab nothing, or she would grab something woefully inadequate, like a cheap-looking brownie tray, and immediately discard it after using it only once.  The lone survivor in Friday the 13th is no Buffy the Vampire Slayer—she is a fumble-fingered stand-in for us, if the truth be told.  It’s tough to admit, but wouldn’t most of us be as clumsily terrified as this girl is if Pamela Voohrees were stalking us?

 The showdown goes on and on. I would like to think that the writers were making a point about the painful struggles of life, struggles that drag out, and cycle back, rearing their heads just when you think everything is going to be OK.  I would even like to think the writers were tapping into the female empowerment zeitgeist of the early 80’s, making both the bad guy and good guy of the movie women.  However … the endless final battle might merely have been due to too light of a hand in the editing bay.

 Well, allrighty then. Mama Voohrees is finally dispatched.  She was full-bore crazy, but she was mortal.  Lone survivor girl floats around the lake all night, huddled in a canoe, using the water as a protective zone between her and whatever other evils might be lurking in the accursed woods. The next morning she has a nightmare (or is it?) about a rotted and malformed boy, Jason himself, leaping up from the depths of the lake like a demented flying fish, attacking her, trying to drag her under.

 Smash cut to the hospital where she is recovering.  Minor-characters-only-there-for-exposition assure her the attack by Jason was only a dream.  She’s going to be fine. Riiiiight. One of the rules of this genre is that even if you physically survive such ordeals, emotionally, mentally and spiritually you are never fine again … Unless you are the film’s producers.  Then you are more than fine. You are running to the bank and diving into piles of money that only drift higher as sequel after sequel is released.

 If you haven’t seen Friday the 13th in a while, why not see it again? It’s a perfect “early summer” flick.  You can probably Netflix it.  Or adjust your rabbit ear antennae and find the old movie station on which I caught it. Pop some popcorn, make sure the kids are asleep (or at least out of the room—it’s an R-rated horror flick, for crying out loud!) and let Friday the 13th pull you in once again, like it did 34 years ago. And this summer, if you’re thinking about fixing up that old camp down the road, the one they used to call “Camp Blood,”or your mother-in-law’s old house, (or any other potentially accursed property)… let it go.

Summer is here.  It doesn't begin officially until June 21, but with June glooms burning away to long sunny days, and the kids out of school, summer has already started.  The question now is what to do with your summer.  One answer:  Explore your city.

Los Angeles is an ever-changing puzzle box of delights--many of them free.  Plan summer city excursions with your kids and family.  The possibilities are endlessly varied.  A simple walk down Broadway or Hill Street, for example, carries you past historic landmarks and architectural treasures.

A city excursion doesn't have to be complicated or expensive.  It can be as light and effervescent as sun on water, as well as a fun learning experience for you and your kids.  Break your adventures over multiple weekends.  Map your general route or destination in advance.  Don't forget the sunblock, hat, comfortable walking shoes/sneakers--and your curiosity.

Some suggestions to kick-start your adventures:

LA's Central Library - FREE - A historic landmark that offers art exhibits, architectural tours, story time and free lunches for kids--and, oh, yeah:  books.

LA's City Hall - FREE - A portrait gallery of LA's past mayors, and an observation deck offering 360 degrees of stunning views of your city.

LA Times - FREE Tours - LA's venerable flagship newspaper offers free tours--check the website for details.

The Last Bookstore - FREE to browse - Bargain books and vinyl records, concerts, book signings, art exhibits, poetry readings and oh-so-much-more.  One of the hipster cultural hearts of renaissance LA.

Grand Central Market - FREE to browse - Classic produce stands and mom-n-pop stalls interspersed with hip new restaurants.  A long-time LA landmark not-to-be-missed.

Grand Park - FREE - Throw a frisbee, catch a concert or late-night outdoor movie, grab a bite at a food truck, meditate, read a book, or take a stroll.  One of LA's newest green spaces, where your tots are allowed to run through the fountain.

Bradbury Building - FREE ground level - One of LA's most iconic and dreamlike structures, used frequently in films and TV shows.  Check the Bradbury Building website for information about free tours on the ground-floor level.

Million Dollar Theatre - $10 - One of LA's first theatres, the beautiful and partially refurbished space has begun showing classic films in partnership with "Vintage LA".

St. Vincent's Court - FREE to browse - This Jewelry District gem is tucked away--you have to make an effort to find it.  Nosh deli treats while soaking in the old-world European atmosphere.

Olvera Street - FREE to browse - Wander one of LA's oldest thoroughfares, perusing the imported fabrics, toys and bags, eating delicious Mexican food, exploring one of LA's oldest adobe residences, and visiting the Church of Our Lady Queen of the Angels.

Chinatown - FREE to browse - Everything from bargain T shirts and sunglasses to live poultry, delicious Chinese cuisine, and lovely Chinese architecture and history.  Take the time to chat with the shop owners, some of whom have been in Chinatown for many decades.

Little Tokyo - FREE to browse - Japanese food and imports, a large Japanese supermarket, the Japanese American Cultural Center--and a ukelele store!

Summer is here--where will it lead you?

Leslie is the author of Downtown Los Angeles in Photographs 2013 and Downtown Los Angeles in Photographs 2014--Broadway, available at Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com.
  

The beauty of the desert is a challenging beauty, alien, and sere.  Flat expanses of salt and sand and mineral are softened, slightly, by clumps of spiky-haired vegetation.  Every great once in awhile, a flash of distant water, some thirsty trickle bounded by jutting stones, or a flash of fragile color, some wildflower that dares to bloom in that washed-out world of tans, olives, and duns.

 Now and again a hill breaks the monotony. It is not an old Appalachian hill, worn smooth by time and the
elements.  It is still, as geological time is reckoned, quite a young hill, all angles and sharp edges casting crisp contour shadows under the pitiless desert sunlight.

 In the distance—always in the distance, like mirages that have no substantive reality—purple jags of low mountains zipper the horizon.  Roads run parallel to these distant monuments, but not toward them. If you went off-road, arrowed toward the mountains on horseback, galloping across the mineral flats and spiky vegetation, would you reach them before thirst closed your throat?

 The mountains’ indistinct remoteness discourages such mad feats of exploration.

 The distant mountains are the only indistinct elements of the landscape.  Everything else—the flat sands, the serrated foliage, the sharp-edged, youthful hills, the limpid air, the sky so starkly clean—is in startling focus. Everything unmistakable for what it is.

 That is a road, that is a cactus, that is a desert bird vectoring in the clear sky, those are the bleached bones of some unlucky creature.  There are no illusions here in the desert, no disguises, nothing to filter or mediate or prettify the images you see.

 In a world increasingly filtered through the manipulated images of marketing, media, virtual reality, whimsical architecture, and even our own smart phone apps, deserts might be one of the few places left on the planet where what you see is, genuinely, what you see.

 Hence the alien quality of the desert, the sensation of viewing the landscape of the moon. Overlook the few billboards and occasional mining plant, and desert travelers might be navigating a lunar surface.

 But there is life here, though it is often camouflaged.  Life blends with its surroundings by imitating the angled patterns and washed-out colors of the land, or by burrowing under the parched soil.

 In a land of difficult beauty, life must melt into the wan world, or dig under it, to survive.

Just as World War II was winding down, my father's father died.  Dad was 16 or 17.  His father was his hero, and Dad took the death hard.  He talked his mother into signing a parental consent form so that he could join the army.  Dad was 17 then.  Before his mother quite understood, I'm sure, what had happened, her youngest son was an Army PFC shipping out to US-occupied Japan.  The army would become his father.

Dad loved Japan.  The architecture, the culture, the people.  When he had time to himself he explored Tokoy and its environs.  And, being an intelligent and good-looking kid, he managed to arrange some pleasant duties among the grind of life as a PFC in an occupied foreign nation.  He joined a USO troop and toured the country playing a small role in the play "Brother Rat".  He had fine manners and knew how to dance and wear a tuxedo properly, so he was tapped to serve as the date to some function or other with the Swedish Ambassador's daughter.

Dad was in and out of the army in his twenties.  He would serve his hitches in the army, and greatly enjoyed them, even when he had KP duty.  Back in the civilian world, he appears to have supported himself at times as a musician in New York City.  He was a New Yorker, born and bred, and a magnificent pianist.  When he was twelve years old his parents bought him a baby grand and music lessions, but he was largely self-taught and though he could read music, he played mostly by ear.  Throughout his twenties he played piano in NYC and took college courses and somewhere along the line he met and befriended some of the young Beats.  But he always ended up re-upping for another hitch in the army, and then another.  The army drew him.  It gave him structure and brotherhood and seemed to serve as a parent in absentia of his deceased father.

In the army, he was always on the move.  He served in Korea during the Korean war.  He was posted to most of the continental United States at one point or another.  He studied French at the army's language academy in Monterey, CA, and then was posted to France and Germany in the mid-to-late 1950's.  He had training duties and clerical duties and paymaster duties.  Wherever he was posted, he explored the place, the people and the architecture and the culture.  In France in the early 1960's, he was instrumental in organizing the great Aerospace exposition.

Somewhere along the line he began writing for the army's newspapers and magazines.  By the mid 1960's he was a sergeant posted to the Pentagon and writing speeches for a colonel.  He met my mother in Washington, DC.  She was the niece of a Navy Commander (my great-great aunt) who was friends with his widowed mother.  Dad and mom "met cute" as I always say; Dad arrived for dinner with his mother and the Navy Commander just as my mother was leaving for a date with an Annapolis boy.  Army won.  Dad and Mom married in 1966.

In 1967 I was born, and a few weeks later Dad went to Vietnam.  He served as an army reporter and editor, often near or at the front lines.  Not long after he returned, he was promoted to Sergeant-Major, the highest non-com rank in the army, and not long after that, we--Dad, Mom, my baby brother and I--flew to Darmstadt, Germany where Dad was editor and reporter for the army's "Stars and Stripes Magazine" until 1972.

My brother and I remember Germany as our childhood home, because that was where we were toddlers, and where our earliest memories were formed.  That was also where our baby sister was born.  In 1972, Dad finally left the army.  When that hitch ended, he retired, and we all flew back to Massachusetts, settling in a beautiful little rural village within a half-hour's drive of Mom's parents.

Dad took up a series of jobs and projects then.  He always worked hard and made sure we had a nice roof over our head, and food on the table.  He worked in retail, as a security guard, as a debt collector, as a substitute teacher, as a reporter for the local paper--so many different jobs, but always gainful employment.  He played piano at restaurants sometimes, too, to make ends meet for his wife and three children.  He completed his undergraduate degree, too, and he went on to earn his law degree.

But whatever he did, nothing was ever like being in the army.  Being a soldier had been his career, his vocation, in a way that nothing in civilian life could be.  In the early 1980's he returned to active duty for just one year, working at the Pentagon to assist with a retiree program championed by then-President Ronald Reagan.  Dad's year at the Pentagon meant lean times and belt-tightening for Mom and us kids up in Massachusetts.  Mom returned to work at the phone company to help make ends meet and keep that roof over our head and food on our table.  She had been working at the phone company when Dad met her in DC. 

After that final one-year assignment, Dad never returned to active duty.  He retained his love for the army, however, until his passing in 2011.  He subscribed to Army Digest.  He marched in every Memorial Day and Veterans' Day parade.  He kept his uniforms in good order, and was proud to be able to fit into them when he marched in the parades.  Of all the jobs he ever had, and all the degrees he earned, that is how I think he will be remembered most--as a patriot, as a soldier, and, yes, as a musician.  Service to his country, and music, were his true callings.

 On Memorial Days we miss him keenly.  He hasn't been gone quite three years yet.  It still doesn't quite register that he won't be dusting off his uniform, and walking in the parade.  We three children all live in California.  Mom and Dad, having retired to Maine, would send us photos every summer--Dad in his uniform, Dad marching in the parade.  Mom took a photo of him in his uniform that last Memorial Day, in May 2011, but he wasn't strong enough to walk in the parade.  They sent us the photo, not mentioning that he hadn't marched; they didn't want to worry us.  By November, he would be gone.

 His father had served in the military, and my mother's father and uncle, and mother's great aunt, and later my brother would serve.  We've always been patriotic on both sides of the family.  On this day, I thank and honor all men and women, family and friends and strangers, who follow that calling to serve our country, in war and in peace.  They make our dreams possible.  They make our freedom possible.  God bless them, and God bless my father, on this Memorial Day.  I can still hear Dad playing the see him marching in his uniform.

LJL, May 26, 2014  


    

This isn't a typical blog post--It's a highlight reel of survival tips & information for Disneyland's 24-hour "Rock Your Disney Side" event coming up May 23-24th.  If you're going to Disneyland/DCA for the event, give these tips a gander.  Have fun--and I might see you there!

Survival Guide for Disneyland 24-hour "Rock Your Disney Side": Going to the parks for the summer kick-off this weekend?  Some tips/info that will help you make the most of your time:

 * DL/DCA open May 23-24, 6am - 6am

 * Premium, Deluxe & SoCal Passes Valid (SoCal Select Pass BLOCKED)

 * "Know Before you Go":  Check the Website for announcements, ride closures, rules, prices, etc.  Be prepared. https://disneyland.disney.go.com/calendar/#/default/2014/05/23...

 * Grown-ups can dress like their fave Disney/Pixar/Marvel/Star Wars/etc. characters for this event, but check the rules & restrictions in advance.

* Arrive early!!  Thinking of arriving at midnight or 1 am on the 24th?  If the parks are mad-crowded, you might be in line for a long, long time before you get into the parks, even though, intuitively, you'd expect lines to be shorter at that time.

* Prepare to enjoy a lot of excellent music, all different styles, from rock to pop to swing dancing.  Disneyland goes all-out on the entertainment, even during the wee hours.  The Castle and Tomorrowland Terrace and Big Thunder Jamboree (Disneyland), and Hollywood Land and Paradise Pier (DCA), are good bets if you're looking for great bands.

* Extra performances of shows like "Fantasmic!" (Disneyland) and World of Color (DCA) are usually added during 24-hour events.

 * Don't forget to ride "Ariel's Undersea Adventure" in DCA and check out the excellent changes.

 * If you plan to stay all 24 hours:

 - Stay hydrated and remember to eat.

 - Take regular rest periods.

 - Book a hotel room in case u can't stay awake the whole 24 hrs.  #1, you don't want to drive home sleep-deprived.  #2, you can't fall asleep at the parks; to (mis)quote Principal Vernon, "This isn't a rest home".

 - Bring money, sunscreen, and a hat.  Check weather report in advance.

 - Don't nickel-and-dime yourself with pricey snacks.  Bring snacks & water; save your money for actual meals, and maybe a souvenir.  The parks will probably sell special event pins, shirts, and hats.  A free souvenir?  Your park map/guide for the event.

 - Expect heavy crowds.  Prepare to be patient.  Yes, there might be 40 minute waits for "Haunted Mansion" at 3 am, e.g., or 90 minute waits for "Space Mountain".

 - Expect that while most attractions, shows, shops and restaurants will be open, some will be closed during the night shift.  Major venues (e.g.the Matterhorn; California Screamin'; the Village Haus; the Emporium; Elias & Co.) ar more likely to be operational than minor ones. Also, some attractions (like "Finding Nemo") are down for refurbishment.

 -  Get ready to meet a ton of interesting fellow Guests and have a lot of fun!

HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY FROM "THE DISNEYLAND BOOK OF SECRETS"!

:)
 
 


 
 

In celebration of  National Record Store Day on April 19, 2014, I'm blogging my never-published  "LA City Guide" piece about the beauties of vinyl and the shops that sell it. 

If you grew up spinning Floyd and Zepp way too loud on turntables in the basement, you understand the near-mystic allure of  listening to music on vinyl.  The warmsizzle-pop-hiss of an LP isn’t a flaw– it’s a strand of music.

Angelenos and tourists who miss the hiss can rediscover the natural beauty of records at one of the music shops – mostly mom-n-pop, pocket-sized caves – where L.A.’s vinyl renaissance thrives.  The city that launched bands as diverse as the Doors, the Beach Boys, N.W.A., the Go-Gos, the Byrds, Black Flag, Metallica, Tierra, and the Runaways is, not surprisingly, a center of old, new, and rare vinyl.

You don’t have to be a hipster-of-a-certain-age to understand vinyl’s appeal. 
Digital technology paints every overproduced note with unsettlingly perfect clarity, so music lovers of all ages turn to vinyl for a toothy sound  that feels deeper and more real.  For oldsters it might be nostalgia.  For the D.I.Y. generation, the sizzle of vinyl feeds a craving for authenticity.

Art lovers worship vinyl’s eye-popping cover art (which is never as seductive when shrunk to fit CD sleeves or clickable “download” icons).  Album covers
make an ideal canvas across which images flow in a swoon-worthy melt of color.  There is something primal in eyeballing a great piece of cover art, picking up the album, and turning it over in your hands.  Holding an album is the musical equivalent of the hunter’s “proof of kill”.

Amoeba Music is the King Kong of L.A. music shops, boasting an encyclopedic selection, expert staff, and frequent concerts.  Amoeba came early to the
vinyl renaissance.  It launched in Berkeley in 1990, opening the Hollywood store a few blocks from the iconic Capitol Records building in 2001.  Scoping records at Amoeba on Sunset is like digging through the exhaustive vinyl collection in your cool friend’s basement pad, if he had a really big basement, say, the size of an underground NORAD hangar. In a contemporary twist, Amoeba is now digitizing a curated vinyl collection in their Vinyl Vaults.

At the other extreme, small record shops are quirky labors of love launched by owners who share the magic of vinyl with their neighbors in historic districts that have tumbled into decay – hello, reasonable rents! – but are trying to rise from the ashes.  Local culture – art, eats, and vinyl – often play a big part in steering a depressed neighborhood back from the brink.  These little shops can feel held together by twine, tape, and wishful thinking – but deep music passion and knowledge are there.

Small music shops excel at handcrafted touches like the silver labels affixed to many records at Mount Analog, album descriptions ranging from the workmanlike to the poetic (consider “bubbling funk,” or comparing an album’s sound to time spent “in Laurel Canyon”).  Mid-size shops have their charms and treasures too, like the bargain bins at the Last Bookstore, where a discerning customer can purchase the “Carousel” LP (cover graced by an impossibly young Shirley Jones) for 99 cents.
 
Four fabulous vinyl destinations for music lovers in L.A.:
 
1. Everything and the Kitchen Sink

 Amoeba
Music –
6400 W. Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA  90028
 (323) 245-6400  |  www.amoeba.com 
  Hours:  10:30 am – 11:00 pm Mon – Sat, 11:00 am – 9:00 pm Sun

 CDs, DVDs, and armadas of vinyl.  Buy, trade, sell.  Concerts and events. Vast selection.

 
2. Shoot from the Hipster

 The
Last Bookstore
–
453 S. Spring Street, Los Angeles, CA  90013
(213) 488-0599  |  http://lastbookstorela.com 
Hours:  10 am – 10 pm Mon – Thu, 10 am – 11 pm Fri – Sat, 9 am – 9 pm Sun

 Used books and vinyl.  Art galleries.  Events. Quirky, artsy, gritty downtown hipster-haven.

 
3. On the Dark Side

 Mount
Analog –
5906 ½ Figueroa Street, Los Angeles, CA  90042
 (323) 474-6649  |  www.climbmountanalog.com
 Hours:  12 pm – 8 pm Tue – Sat, 12 pm – 6 pm Sun, Closed Mon

 New, indie, and rare vinyl.  Dark and edgy, with occult wares like Tarot cards.

 
4. Cheers!

 Wombleton
Records –
5123 York Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA  90042
 (213) 422-0069  |  www.wombletonrecords.com
 Hours:  12:00 pm – 10:00 pm Thu, Fri & Sat, 12:00 pm – 7:00 pm Wed & Sun, Closed Mon & Tue

 Classic, imported, and rare vinyl, with a heavy British inflection.