12th Street and Vine

How we ever found this place is a mystery, located just south of the historic intersection at 12th Street and Vine, as is what logical thought went into making our way here, night after night, long after the more intelligent people had gone home.

Since 1930 musicians have gathered here, at the Mutual Musicians Foundation, on Friday and Saturday nights around midnight, after the regular gigs were over, to play together until the very early hours of the morning. The Foundation is on the east side of the city, an area not known for its low crime rate. We hosted my father's 60th birthday party at Arthur Bryant's, just down the street; the white suburbanites were in the cars and on their way home by sundown. Our night had just begun.

I'm going to Kansas City
Kansas City, here I come
Going to Kansas City 
Kansas Cit,y here I come
They got a crazy way of loving there 
And I'm gonna get me some

Thank heavens we had the good sense, at midnight, to never drive to the Foundation. Sadly we never had the good sense to realize that taxis, readily available in many parts of the city at midnight, are not too easy to come by at 4 a.m. when you want to go home, at least not at 18th and Vine. Fooled early on by rows of unmanned taxis parked in front we soon learned that they belonged to drivers sleeping at the transient hotel next door, who were not too interested in waking up to take us home. More than once we relied on the kindness of a departing musician to get us to a neighborhood that was at least semi awake.

I'm gonna be standing on the corner
12th Street and Vine
I'm gonna be standing on the corner
12th Street and Vine
With my Kansas City baby
And some Kansas City wine

They sell cans of Bud Lite for one dollar out of a blue Igloo cooler. The musicians rotate in and out of play, highlighting one then another, as seamlessly as if they played together always. The room is always warm, even in January, when it feels like a thick July night inside. The neighborhood, alive only hours earlier with sounds of jazz and smells of barbecue, is quiet now, save the music emanating from the old brick building on Highland. That guy, the one just walking in, has given up his search for a taxi and is going in to dance with his girlfriend, the one in pearls swaying to the saxophone solo. They are having the time of their lives. Thank goodness they weren't smart enough to go home with their friends, hours ago. Thank goodness there are still places like this, on the east side of Kansas City.

Well, I might take a plane, I might take a train
But if I have to walk I'm going there just the same
I'm going to Kansas City
Kansas City, here I come
They got some crazy little women there
And I'm gonna get me one.

Lyrics to Kansas City: Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller

This post was inspired by 2 A.M. at the Cat's Pajamas, a completely original and engaging debut novel by Marie-Helen Bertino. I could have written about nine year old girls, or teachers, or love, or Philadelphia or the kindness of community, as this book is so full of options. I was provided with a complimentary copy for the purposes of this post, as a member of From Left to Write. Join us August 28th, 2014 when we discuss this book and our unique impressions from its many themes.

How Will I Know?

The carpet in the hallway was a blue and green geometric pattern, a truly bad choice to welcome home college students who had been out far past bedtime. The walls were a blue green color, a textured paper that was beginning to peel away at spots near the floor. Our door was near the middle of the long hallway, to the left when you came out of the elevator. On one side lived the cowgirls, with whom we shared a bathroom. They were from a small town in Kansas, spoke with deep country accents, and rarely spent any time anywhere near us, or school at all. On the other side lived two boys from St. Louis, wonderfully nice and quiet boys who I now assume are living a fulfilling life as gay men somewhere in Missouri. They were the next door neighbors, the NDNs which, left us, Egg and I, in between the cowgirls and the NDNs.

Egg and I shared room 222, my bed on the side of the hallway, the door always open. Every day the guy down the hall would stick his head in and yell "Hey!". He soon became Mr. Friendly, and then Kenny, and now, over 20 years later, Uncle Kenny. He still greats me, and my children, with "Hey!" each and every time we see him.

It was sophomore year and I had landed in this dorm because all my friends went through sorority rush; I did not, and I had nowhere else to go. My parents made this choice for me and I was furious, convinced that a much better option would have been an off campus apartment. My parents were right and I was wrong. It was a private dorm, which meant that they sold themselves as having better food and maid service. Maid service consisted of a once per week trash dumping, a quick once over of the shared bath, and a vacuum of the roughly two feet of unoccupied floor space in our tiny room. To the delight of Kenny, I would scream, obnoxiously, from my open door, "DUST" whenever I heard her make her way down the hall. Better food was debatable; I once took a box of Rice Krispies, dumped them over a bowl of marshmallows from the hot chocolate area, and stuck the entire thing in the microwave. Marshmallows blow with great force when microwaved.

Disgusted with these horrid living conditions, I protested by rarely leaving the building. We spent hours in the study room, doing everything but studying, or lounging in the poorly adorned hallway, disturbing anyone who had come to college to actually learn something. Across the hall was the really tall guy and his roommate Booger (so named for the large booger we once saw hanging from his nose while running). Next to them were Jason and Tom who decorated their walls with the packaging from the 24 can pack of Bud Light. Beyond that, Kenny and Steve, Lex, Juli, Maria, Pam (the art student who got a good dose of whipped cream blown under her door), Books, Brady (who allowed himself to be tied to a chair and sent on the elevator), Danny, Andy (and his smelly feet) and Margo who technically lived across the street but became an honorary hallway dweller by spending every free minute of her time on the second floor.

We spent an enormous amount of time in that blue and green themed social artery, sprawled out on the floor from one end to the other, when we should have been studying or sleeping or performing some random acts of community service. Little work required to find a playmate when 20 of your best friends live down the hall; it was like the perfect childhood neighborhood block but without pesky parents to call us home at bedtime. We carved pumpkins, did handstands, created small fires, explored the wonders of jello, and erupted into late night dance parties when speakers were moved from desk to doorway.

Without much effort I can smell that hallway, as I have every time over the past 26 years, when I hear Whitney Houston sing "How Will I Know?", the ballad of the second floor. Creating the most vibrant memory, Whitney Houston reminds me of a wonderful year, spent with people who became life long friends; of a time when everyone was happy and voices were never silenced for too long.

Night Moves

Occasionally running late, missing the train and being forced to drive downtown to a meeting has advantages, not fully realized until the warm night follows you home, windows open, along Lake Shore Drive.

In a city where there are very few places to drive as fast and for as long as you want, like those available to a suburban Kansas City teenager, finding yourself alone in a car on a warm night with an open stretch of road is quite a treat. And given that I rarely drive, much less by myself and at night, having this fun sneak up on me was invigorating, especially given my basic disdain for driving in general.

But there I was, top down on my white bug, racing home along Mission Road, Kathy in the seat next to me, "Don't Stop Believing" blasting from my old AM/FM dashboard radio. With parents who looked the other way with regard to curfews, we were often the last ones home, watching all our friends scurry like late night bugs to arrive before the designated bewitching hour. "Paradise By The Dashboard Lights" took me to the top of Metcalf, looking at the queen in the lights from Brad's Jeep, the open car allowing too much wind to hear or think as we raced down into the suburban sprawl of lights before us. No finer choice for spying on boys from other schools than "Every Breath You Take", from the cassette deck in Becca's mother's car, at a time when neither one of us actually knew how to drive.

For the very short drive home, my car was full, not with children and husbands and responsibilities, but with Deb, Laura, Peter, Kathy, and Susie, bad eighties music and wonderful memories. That kind of fun simply cannot be found on a bus.

Goodnight Mogul.

The Eagle and the Beagle

I am the eagle, I live in high country

In rocky cathedrals that reach to the sky

John Denver

I am the beagle, I live in the country

In chasing the seagulls that race to the sky

Mary

Sing Me A Song

The list he put together was painful, lining me up and shooting me straight at middle aged suburban motherhood when I was just barely 30. He started with Michael Bolton, and then it got really bad, Celine Dion, Rod Stewart. We were sitting in his car, listening to his edgy Nebraska music, which caused me angst and occasional pain, whereas Celine and Rod would put me to sleep, the latter preferable as it was late and I was ready to go home. Jack thought he knew me so well, smug so early in our relationship.

Several years ago he bought me a Barry Manilow CD for my birthday. "Barry Manilow, come on", but I loved it, and I knew all the words. There is no such discovery when John Denver sings and no hiding the love, John Denver is the music of my childhood, of summers spent in Colorado listening to him sing of poems and prayers and promises while breathing in the crisp evening air tainted with smoldering logs on the fireplace next door. Perhaps I can hide my Barry love but I'm all out when it comes to John Denver.

But in high school, when everyone else was listening to Prince and Madonna and Michael Jackson, my heart belonged to the Piano Man,

A bottle of red, a bottle of white, perhaps a bottle of rose tonight.

I'll meet you anywhere you want, in our Italian restaurant.

He sang that and an amazing list of others, but of course there was so much more, including my favorite love song, that missed the cut. Elton John was there also, they sang together, they sang apart, and I sang along, every single song, my middle aged housewife self, serenading my husband, and 40,000 others at Wrigley Field last week.

Two years ago I was a purist, music at Wrigley Field? Please no, Wrigley Field is for baseball. No longer do I stand on antiquated baseball principle; bring on the music, it was a magical night.