I know these streets, and the layers of asphalt cannot erase the footprints of my childhood. East Dallas is like music that drifts back to me. Distant, but familiar faces in every crowd of strangers remind me that in some ways this is a small town. Returning to where I started is a pilgrimage for me. “Coming home to myself…” like Melissa Manchester used to sing.
I drink cappuccino at the Donut Shop owned by a nice Korean couple. The owner comes from behind the counter to chat for 20 minutes. They sold their 16 “rainbow donuts” shops to start again. We talk the language of the gambler.
I walk around the block to smoke a cigarette past the house where Cathy’s grandmother lived. Cathy and I got sober together. We were both at North Texas State at the same time. We are the same age. She spent a year in Timberlawn Psychiatric ward when she announced that she was a lesbian. She didn’t have to announce she was a drunk. My sobering was easier than hers. In our lives we have taken different paths. She is a rather brilliant artist and I believe she currently lives in New York.
I stand in the parking lot where I work and look across the street to St Peter’s Catholic Church. There is a carefully painted addition to the sign. It says “Vietnamese” in almost matching letters. I visited there once with Annie to light some candles.
Down the street is the theater I worked at in highschool. The Casa Linda Theater has been closed for years. It still has “Sleepless In Seattle“on the marquee. I heard it has new owners and soon it will be converted for live theater. The movie posters that are plastered all over the walls were the handiwork of the crew that I worked with in 1973.
Two blocks South is the apartment I rented from my parents in the early eighties. It was a part of one of the oldest farms in the area. The large renovated farmhouse was destroyed by fire in the mid nineties. I lived in the maids quarters up some rickety stairs. It was detached building to the main house. In this odd shaped place across from the railroad tracks I spent the early eighties.
My family converted the downstairs into an apartment. The downstairs was rented out to colorful characters….some of which are still in my life….
There was Marvin the Hermit, Butch with the Harley, Ray S, Neil with the rich Dad, and once briefly to a guy who was in the throes of DT’s and was removed by the police never to be heard of again.
I spoke to Marvin last week. We miss our midnight runs to IHOP since he moved a year ago. His depression has been under control for sometime now. Marvin is one of my people that I still need to write about.
Once I a year, I see Neil. He is sober. He celebrates his anniversary with a talk that is mainly religious. His families wealth could not save him then or now, but he has found comfort for the journey. He came to AA younger than I did. I always suspected he stole my Mexican chess set. My Daddy gave me the set when we went to Mexico. I’m sure it ended up in a pawn shop in the mid eighties, money for one of Neil’s wild drunks. My ex fiancée (the one I didn’t marry) and I played many games of chess with it. The game never ended although we only lived together for 8 months in 1983 or so. I still remember the feel of the carved pieces in my hand.
Butch ex boyfriend of Cat, partner of my daughter’s sponsor in AA was also an ex lover of mine. “Harley days” in my memories, it was a time when all the guys had motorcycles and the lake was a Sunday adventure. The last time I saw Butch he was still living in the slip and slide of a life of tragedies. Sobriety never stuck with him. Cat and P will never give up on him. Life turns. Women who were always friends became life partners. Who knew?
Ray S. committed suicide a year ago. He was sober, but plagued by demons and chased by ghosts. Another ex lover from my twenties….. I still see his brother, my ex fiancée” from time to time. Chess games without foreplay with a man who I used to love.
Last night I was awakened by the phone. Annie is breaking up with the latest in a string of boyfrinds and husbands since 1982. A year ago I had to distance myself from the negative drama. She has a good heart, but I have lost patience with the sickness that is always directed at others. This morning she called to say she had changed the locks.
Annie who started climbing mountains at 55, turned 68 years old in April. April is the anniversary month we both share in AA She looks 40. A remarkable woman. I will always love her. I am not sure if I will allow her back into my life. In 1985 we lit a candle at the Catholic Church on Garland Rd for my friend Linda who took her own life all those years ago.
I know these streets. They are the streets where my people lived. I still hear their voices. I still share their laughter. I will celebrate them with my morning coffee. The past is an open door and the future is a window to the possible.
I am coming home to myself these days. Perhaps I will be home for Christmas after all.
