My first memory of American politics is 1956, when, six-years-old, I loved the conventions. It was exciting. Yelling, signs, balloons, people with microphones. I remember a delegate being asked which candidate he was supporting and tossing off a name which the interviewer had never heard before. Somebody said, “I guess he’s a favorite son.” I couldn’t figure what that meant.  My parents had two sons. Was I the “favorite?”

    Having loved the ‘56 conventions, I was primed for 1960. It didn’t disappoint. So many people wanted the Democratic nomination that it felt like a gameshow. And I loved the name of the Republican Vice-Presidential candidate: Henry Cabot Lodge.  I learned that “Cabot” was a  big name in New England, as witness this:

Boston, the home of the bean and the cod,

Where theLowells speak only to Cabots,

And the Cabots speak only to God.

             We had a mock election in our 5th Grade classroom, I was campaign manager for Richard Nixon. Sorry. And we won! Well… Indiana.

Our next door neighbor, Mr. Pangburn, asked me who my parents were voting for. Even at ten years of age, I knew better than to answer, so I said, “I don’t know.”

He said, “They’d better vote for Nixon. If Kennedy wins, the Pope will be running this country.” Even to a kid, that sounded wacky.

With no school on election day, I worked for my dad. Hey, I was ten years old. A guy’s gotta make a living. At the end of the day, I wanted to get home to watch election returns. But Dad stopped on the way, leaving me in the truck while he talked business with someone. He took forever so the returns started rolling in without me. 

‘64-- not much of interest. I was LBJ, all the way, but I remember that Barry Goldwater, the Republican candidate, while obviously WRONG about everything, still seemed so disturbingly smart.

‘68 was memorable, for all the wrong reasons. I watched as the Chicago police rioted and as Mayor Daley’s face was forever ingrained in my brain as the precise image of corruption.

My dad dropped by in his police car one night during the convention. I sat in the police car and raged about what was happening in Chicago. It was the cops I was particularly angry about, and my dad sat there listening, in his police uniform. All he said was, “mmm…uh huh…” He’d never seen me in this mood. No one had.

‘72, finally of age to vote. As the bumper stickers would soon read: “Don’t blame me, I voted for George.”  McGovern, that is.

‘80--I voted for a third-party candidate. I was a Carter man, but it was obvious that Reagan would take Indiana easily. Well…Indiana.  I read that the third party guy, John Anderson, would only receive federal matching funds if his vote total reached a certain level. So I voted for him, hoping to stave off his bankruptcy.

‘72 again: I accompanied Dad to his voting place. I was told that I should vote there. No, I said, this is not my voting place. Yes, someone with my name was on their list, but the address was not mine. “That’s not me,” I said  

But a guy--the son of our sitting mayor and also a jerk--was haranguing me to vote, assuming that I would vote for his dad. 

He put his arm around my shoulder, and whispered, “c’mon, what does it matter? And you could vote again at your other place.” And he laughed. So, okay. I voted there where I shouldn’t. I voted for the guy running against his dad. As I left, we exchanged winks at having cheated the system.

And, no, I didn’t vote twice.  

 There are three people in the photo, two women and one man. The camera recorded this image outdoors, on a gray day, in a cemetery. The black and white image is clearly old. From another time.

The man is in a coffin and he is, without doubt, dead. The coffin is standing upright, though leaning back a few degrees in order, I assume, to insure that the corpse wouldn’t pitch forward, out of frame. Because what’s a corpse photo without the corpse? 

The guy looks pretty darn awful. Utterly, undeniably dead, and terribly, terribly unhappy. Two glum, plain-faced women, both in long plain black dresses, stand on either side of his container. Probably wife and daughter. Their look toward the camera is no warmer than his, just with their eyes open. They both look like the farm wife in Grant Wood’s “American Gothic” only maybe a little sadder. Maybe their mouths are a bit more downturned. Sad they were, but not terribly, terribly unhappy like the enboxed gentleman. I assume this was because they, unlike Dad, were still alive.

My grandmother had this photo and that’s how I came to see it. Assumedly the people, living and dead, were family to us in some fashion. I’m guessing my sister has the photo now. She can have it, she can keep it. I don’t want it, wouldn’t have it. I don’t care to stare at the dead, kin or not. I saw it once and that was enough. That was too much actually, because I still see it. 

Like right now.

Audition for Jon Jory

Jon Jory was artistic director at Actors Theater of Louisville.  The Theater had

blossomed under Jory’s stewardship and was becoming even bigger, premiering

shows which would transfer to Broadway or Off-Broadway, fostering plays which

would win major literary prizes. Jory was the man behind the curtain,

orchestrating all that.

And, 1971 or ‘72, I was going to audition for him. For the life of me, I cannot

remember how the audition came about. It was nothing I arranged. Somebody--

no idea who--told me I had an audition appointment with Jory. I’m sure I asked

how this came to be, but I have no memory of ever knowing.

I was nervous. To me, Actors Theater was the bigtime, the real bigtime, second

only MAYBE to Broadway. And I was going to audition for Mr. Actors Theater

himself. So, yeah, nervous.

The day arrived, I entered the building and met Jon Jory. He led me into the

theater auditorium.

I stepped on stage. He sat, entirely by himself, in the house. He asked what I

was going to do. I told him I had a monologue from HENRY V. It wasn’t

really a monologue, at least Shakespeare wouldn’t recognize it as such. I’d

taken a large section of the proposal scene and edited it into a one-man thing. 

It was a wonderful bunch of words, touching and romantic and quite funny.

My paste-job ran about nine minutes. But that, of course, is too much for most

situations, so I’d also figured out a couple of shorter versions, one about six

minutes, one about four.  But no shorter than that. At four minutes, all that was

left was gold.

At whichever length, I did it. As I recall, I did hear Mr. Jory laugh. When I

finished he said, more or less, “very nice. What else do you have?” Ah. I was

not prepared for that. I figured it was just a fluke that I was auditioning for this

man. While I hoped that he’d take me seriously, I didn’t expect him to give me

a lot of time. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

“Another monologue?” I asked. 

“Yes, if you have something.”

Did I have another monologue? Well…yes. And no. I had memorized Tom’s

opening speech from THE GLASS MENAGERIE, simply because I liked it.

But I’d never rehearsed it, never thought about actually using it. I had never

even spoken it aloud. So no way I should be premiering such an unknown,

unplanned quantity at any audition, certainly not a big one like this. 

  I said, “Yes, I have the opening speech from GLASS MENAGERIE.”

Yeah, I said that. 

“Great,” he said, “perfect.”

This is not a practice I recommend to young actors. Or to old actors. Or dead

actors. It was a stupid, reckless thing to do. But…Jon Jory wanted to hear

more from me. I was flattered. So I did it.

And it was…I think…all right. Such a wonderful speech. “Yes, I have tricks

in my pocket, I have things up my sleeve. But I am the very opposite of a

stage magician. He gives you illusion disguised as reality. I give you reality

in the pleasant guise of illusion…” 

When I finished, Mr. Jory again said something nice, then stood and said,

“let’s go up to my office.”  More unexpectedness. We traipsed upstairs to

his small office. He sat behind his desk and I sat in the “client’s chair”.  He

asked if I’d like a cup of coffee. Uh..well, yeah. Sure. 

So we sat sipping coffee and talking, just barely-over-voting-age me and

the director of a bigtime regional theater. At one point he had to take a

phone call. I started to leave but he said, “no, just sit, this won’t take

long.” He talked to someone for about four or five minutes as I sipped

coffee and pretended that this sort of thing happened to me every day. 

Once off the phone Jon Jory offered me a job. Unbelievable. It wasn’t

a job on the main stage but rather a spot in their Adventure Theater

troupe. These guys toured around the state, performing at high schools

and colleges.  On occasional Monday nights, the main Actors stage was

turned over to them for a performance of whatever they’d been doing. 

Secondary company or not, I was bowled over. I said, “thank you. I’d

have to figure how it would fit in around my classes…”

He jumped in, “you’re still in school?”

“Yes,” I said, “I’m….”

Jory said, “I withdraw the offer. I’m not taking anyone out of school.”

Then he talked about my future. Mine. He said I should consider

post-grad work at a school with a solid theater program. He named a

couple that he thought were good and said, “if you do that, come see me

and I’ll write you a recommendation.”

He went on, “if you don’t want to go to school, you should go to New

York. BUT…if you plan to take acting classes, call me and I’ll recommend

some people. You have to be careful. 95% of acting teachers are fakes and

scams.” 

And that was it. Jon Jory had given me more than 45 minutes of his time.

And he’d offered kind assistance. I was never so happy after an audition

from which I got no work.

I never had another one-on-one with the man, but I’d occasionally see

him in the lobby when I’d attend shows at ATL. He’d always walk over,

shake my hand and ask how I was. He called me Mr. Pruitt, I called him

Mr. Jory. 

I never worked at Actors Theater, and that’s too bad. But my meeting

with Jon Jory was a nice substitute.

 

        I do know what I look like, I really do. Every couple of days I force myself to take a look at the old man in the mirror. He’s craggy and saggy, scarred and marred. His eyes are clear and still blue, but everything else about his looks is pretty disastrous. Still… horrible as the decay has been, I think he’s still recognizable as the young man he once was.

Today my sister sent me a recent photo of my ex. We split over 50 years ago and it’s been almost that long since I last saw her. I would, of course, expect that time has had its evil way with her as it does with all of us. She would no longer be the trim, pretty, fit brunette that she had been. I understood that. But the image of her I saw today was shocking. 

It wasn’t just that she was aged, though she was. Nor was it that she was rather ugly, though she certainly was. She looked not just like an older person, she looked like a different person. Not only did she not look like her young self in any way, she looked like an entirely different sort of person--a person who was hard and cold. And legendarily unattractive. 

I told my sister--and I meant it--that if I’d been shown that picture without the person having been identified, if I’d been told that this was someone I knew years ago…I would never have guessed it was her. I would have guessed every other white female I’d ever met in this world before guessing it was my ex. It was unbelievable.

        At least it’s a boost to my ego. Next time I see that ancient troll in the mirror, I expect I’ll think my decline, bad as it is, to also be not unlike that of the aged Cary Grant. An exaggeration, yes, but in the right direction.

The New York Times recently published a list of “The Best Books of the 21st Century”

and they got a lot of nice (and some snippy) publicity for it. The list was compiled from

the choices of over 500 writers, critics, celebrities, and maybe some real people too.

This was quickly and efficiently followed by another list, this from the comments and

offerings of Times’ readers. 

Since I don’t read a lot of new fiction, aside from a few primarily genre authors, I didn’t expect to have read many of these titles. And I was right. From the original “experts’” list, I had read exactly one of the 100. That’s a solid 1%.  That one book was LINCOLN IN THE BARDO, which I had read only at the insistence of a casual friend.

As I expected, I did a little better on the Readers’ list. Four of 100 (4 sweet %). These were: LINCOLN IN THE BARDO (again), HAMNET, 11/22/63, and THE DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY.

I’d love to say that I’m going to make a strong effort to read all those other unread modern books, going to take a lot of those folks’ suggestions. But I’m not. Frankly, while those may be wonderful books, genuine classics-to-be, they just don’t seem interesting to me. Call me doofus, I don’t care. I already have a couple of shelves of unread books to conquer. Plus I’m sure there will be more from Stephen King, Michael Connelly, John Sandford, Nick Hornby. Those are my 21st century books. So, thanks Times, but I’m good.

Today is my mother’s 100th birthday. Spoiler!--she didn’t make it. 

Momma’s was not a joy-filled life. Most of her 83 years were not so good.

Too much illness, too much sadness, too much worry, too much poverty,

too little joy by far. 

If I could know that she’d live 17 more GOOD years, I’d wish she was still

here. But odds being what they are, and age being what it is, the cards are

seriously stacked against that.

         So I'll not be selfish and, instead, try to be glad she was spared the likelihood

of more unhappy years.

         Whatever I am is entirely due to my mom. Those who know me will, I hope,

forgive her for this. She did the best she could with the materials at hand.

I miss you, Momma, not only on this centenary, but every day.  To you,

to the empty, unhearing air, I wish a Happy Birthday.

Couple of days ago, I had to attend a sort of Zoom meeting, something very rare for me. I found the

channel, twisted the red wires together, tuned in on the electrical device, threw the necessary switches,

adjusted the rabbit ears, pushed the big red button and lit the fuse. My face popped up on screen and

I flinched. Hard. Almost fell out of my chair.

Now, I do know what I look like. Despite my best efforts to the contrary, I see myself in the mirror almost every day . I know I’m old, grey, wrinkled, sagged and generally repulsive. So this shouldn’t have been such a gol-durn shock to the system.

But I quickly realized the problem. I can’t explain it, but I recognized it. I knew my face would pop up onscreen, but, for whatever reason, the image I expected, the image I previewed in my mind ahead of time, was not the old man in the mirror. 

I thought I would see myself as I was maybe forty-fifty years ago. No grey hair, no more than sun wrinkles, relatively fit and tan. Not as I look now, but a face which would not scare children. 

Why did I expect such unreality in my appearance? I don’t know. I’d recently been sorting some old photos online, so maybe--maybe--I expected to see the same young face on Zoom that I’d seen in my computer’s photo files. That’s the best I got.

But, lemme tell ya, there must be some sort of denial (or perhaps decay) in the mind of a man who knows the ravaged face in the mirror all too well and who still expects to see young Dorian. Must be.

For Father's Day, my wonderful, kind, brilliant, generous son took me to the movies, at my

request. We saw FURIOSA (my choice) and I loved it. George Miller is, always has been,

and always will be, a moviemaking genius. 

The opening credits tell us that the movie stars Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth, in

that order. I knew that Anya, The Alien Who Doesn’t Look Human At All, was playing

Charlize Theron but I had no idea what role Hemsworth filled. 

Since I'd first read that Hemsworth was in the movie, I was doubtful. That sort of

uber-muscled, chiseled-profile movie star seemed wrong and out-of-place for a “Mad Max

Saga.”  I could understand Hemsworth taking the job. After all, working in a Mad Max

must be like a blessing from the gods for any Australian actor. I couldn’t understand,

however, why George Miller would cast him. It just felt wrong to me--Thor and Max

don’t mix--but I was hopeful of George and Chris showing me how stupid I was.

So we’re about two hours into the movie, half-hour to go, and I’m thinking. Always a

dangerous thing.  I was just about to lean over to my son and whisper this wisdom:

“Chris Hemsworth has the best billing since Mark Hamill in THE FORCE AWAKENS.

He’s got second-billing, we’re two hours into the movie and no sign of him.

Thankfully, I did not say that. Sudden doubts. Didn’t want to reveal myself as an idiot. 

Clearly the hook-nosed villain was the second-largest role, but that was not Chris Hemsworth.

I knew it wasn’t. It just wasn’t, don’t contradict me. 

I actually thought, when we got our first look at the baddie's muscles, that we'd eventually see

a posing battle between Chris and the villain. Yeah, I thought that.

But I wanted one more look at him. Really look into his eyes, really take stock, see if there

was any way it might be beautiful Chris. 

And there he was. I leaned forward and stared deep into his eyes. Tried to peer all the way

into his soul. No. That simply was not Chris Hemsworth. There was no sign of his totally

familiar, disgustingly beautiful features in that bad guy’s face. Not a trace.

End of the movie. I decided that the villain was played by…Chris Hemsworth. I know it

now and I accept it. But I will swear to the end of days that no bit of Thor peeked through

that disguise. So well done, I guess.

I have told you that I’m really old, haven’t I?