Tuesday, January 03, 2012
Richard Laurence Baron - my brother.
Before the turn of this new year - on December 29th, in fact, while talking on the telephone - my dear brilliant brother Richard dropped dead of his final heart attack.
His wife, dear Barbara, called to tell me the facts of this mere hours later, and I've not stopped crying since. But one day, I probably will stop crying, won't I? How can such a tall redwood tree of a man be gone?
Peter and I will fly out to Houston on this coming Friday, for his Life Celebration Memorial Party thing on Saturday, where 300 some people are expected. My brother was well-loved by friends, family and colleagues, so it should be a swell and happy time, considering the sad reason for the gathering.
We've all been requested to wear Hawaiian shirts, as colorful as possible. I went and bought mine at the Aloha Warehouse yesterday, here in San Francisco. The young man behind the counter, seeing me weeping over my brother's death - and after I explained to him that we were all requested to wear Hawaiian shirts to his memorial party - gifted me with a beautiful string of candle wood nut beads, which - as he explained to me - are worn traditionally to Hawaiian funerals. The oil inside them is burned in honor of the dead, and if it burns well, the passed person is considered a demi-god. Richard would like that. I know his oil would burn and burn and burn. His was a mighty flame in life. His planetary pull massive, his orbital energies highly attractive. People loved him.
I did too. I do. If only I'd told him so, more often.
My first thought - after thinking "oh no!" on hearing the news- was "I'm glad Momma is gone because this would have done her in." I'm so glad she's spared this pain.
And I don't know why it's taken me this long to write this fact down in this blog....i certainly posted it on Facebook and on other sites...and have told everyone I know about this sad sad thing. But I've not blogged about it yet, until today. So maybe I just needed some distance. Maybe I need to let the memories flow..here or elsewhere...but let them flow. God knows there are lots of them....
After all, he was there before I was born, and has been the backdrop to my entire life as only an older sibling can be...i was merely a pesky spoiled bratty presence in his life....though i do think we came to some sweetly affectionate accommodation later in life, until we both knew our caring for each other was genuine and deep.
I am stunned at how I am unable to stop crying over Richard being gone forever. Sharp, ragged edges of sobbing crying, coming ,seemingly , out of nowhere and lasting short but deep spurts of time....just when I think I'm safe, another one begins and I cry so hard that my nose runs until I must blow it into rawness and it bleeds.
I think I am also angry at him for going off and leaving me. He's my older brother. He's supposed to take care of me in this wilderness. Drop the breadcrumbs. Blaze the trails to the safe places. Come up with a plan for escape from the Witch's ovens. Well, maybe that's what he did do by dying so young - he was only 66...three years older than me.
He's blazing a trail?
Not good enough....i needed more time with him. Here.
More on RIchard soon. I hope, dearly hope, he's having a good cold beer with Momma and Daddy in Heaven and that there's is as large a celebration up there on his arrival as there will be in Houston this coming Saturday on his departure......i want him to be happy. Ad to rest. And to know I love him.
Always have. Always will.
Always.
His wife, dear Barbara, called to tell me the facts of this mere hours later, and I've not stopped crying since. But one day, I probably will stop crying, won't I? How can such a tall redwood tree of a man be gone?
Peter and I will fly out to Houston on this coming Friday, for his Life Celebration Memorial Party thing on Saturday, where 300 some people are expected. My brother was well-loved by friends, family and colleagues, so it should be a swell and happy time, considering the sad reason for the gathering.
We've all been requested to wear Hawaiian shirts, as colorful as possible. I went and bought mine at the Aloha Warehouse yesterday, here in San Francisco. The young man behind the counter, seeing me weeping over my brother's death - and after I explained to him that we were all requested to wear Hawaiian shirts to his memorial party - gifted me with a beautiful string of candle wood nut beads, which - as he explained to me - are worn traditionally to Hawaiian funerals. The oil inside them is burned in honor of the dead, and if it burns well, the passed person is considered a demi-god. Richard would like that. I know his oil would burn and burn and burn. His was a mighty flame in life. His planetary pull massive, his orbital energies highly attractive. People loved him.
I did too. I do. If only I'd told him so, more often.
My first thought - after thinking "oh no!" on hearing the news- was "I'm glad Momma is gone because this would have done her in." I'm so glad she's spared this pain.
And I don't know why it's taken me this long to write this fact down in this blog....i certainly posted it on Facebook and on other sites...and have told everyone I know about this sad sad thing. But I've not blogged about it yet, until today. So maybe I just needed some distance. Maybe I need to let the memories flow..here or elsewhere...but let them flow. God knows there are lots of them....
After all, he was there before I was born, and has been the backdrop to my entire life as only an older sibling can be...i was merely a pesky spoiled bratty presence in his life....though i do think we came to some sweetly affectionate accommodation later in life, until we both knew our caring for each other was genuine and deep.
I am stunned at how I am unable to stop crying over Richard being gone forever. Sharp, ragged edges of sobbing crying, coming ,seemingly , out of nowhere and lasting short but deep spurts of time....just when I think I'm safe, another one begins and I cry so hard that my nose runs until I must blow it into rawness and it bleeds.
I think I am also angry at him for going off and leaving me. He's my older brother. He's supposed to take care of me in this wilderness. Drop the breadcrumbs. Blaze the trails to the safe places. Come up with a plan for escape from the Witch's ovens. Well, maybe that's what he did do by dying so young - he was only 66...three years older than me.
He's blazing a trail?
Not good enough....i needed more time with him. Here.
More on RIchard soon. I hope, dearly hope, he's having a good cold beer with Momma and Daddy in Heaven and that there's is as large a celebration up there on his arrival as there will be in Houston this coming Saturday on his departure......i want him to be happy. Ad to rest. And to know I love him.
Always have. Always will.
Always.
Labels: family
January 2012 Marina TIMES column: enjoy....
Enter Stage Left: A New Coast
Take my tired boots, yearning to be tossed
December 2011
Take my tired boots, yearning to be tossed
December 2011
Happy 2012. My resolution: to throw away my snow boots, let go of my last winter coat.
The old, grotty pair of boots is being trashcanned this week, the coat Goodwilled – even though folks have told me that if I visit Lake Tahoe, I’ll need those boots and regret the loss of that coat. But when I experience a Lake Tahoe winter for the first time, I want to do it in gorgeous, young snow-bunny boots, not the worn leather ones that have trudged through too many NYC winters, filthy with soot. I want the freedom of lightweight, pastel skiwear – even though I don’t ski – not the fake-fur caskets I once put on: coats so heavy, I’d get exhausted just wearing them.
Why this optimistic disposal of cold weather outerwear? Why this cavalier letting go of part of my wardrobe history?
Peter and I have lived here a full year now, but I’ll continue to share how I see the world from a West Coast greenhorn’s perspective and how that perspective differs from the squinty, grit-filled point of view I spent 40 New York City years developing. I write about San Francisco because it makes me happy. Reading this, I hope it makes you happy too, to be reminded what a swell city is yours. And what a pleasingly mild one, weather-wise.
For back East it may be a new year, but old snows are on the ground.
By New Year’s Day, and for the rest of the winter, those snows are filled with trash, filthy with traffic and pedestrian grime, and they are, of course, often yellow because of dogs on winter walks. It is fun to see how the pups are dressed up for the season, with cute sweaters, coats and lined booties, but the poor canine bundles still have nowhere else to go except into the piles of snow covering their familiar fire hydrants. So Bing Crosby’s White Christmas, which had us all misty-eyed just months before, becomes something entirely different after a long NYC winter. Add in the other doggie contributions discovered when the snow thaws, and would anyone like to write that song?
When the temperature drops on a freezing night, snowfall turns into a pedestrian’s downfall. Many were the winter events I missed because I couldn’t ice skate. NYC is difficult to negotiate with enthusiasm when you may break an arm or a leg attempting it. Sure, people shovel, spread salt, and New Yorkers trudge into their futures with a sigh and a workmer-like shrug, but it’s all grey, dirty and dangerous – a time of hazards I hope never to endure again. Blinded by heavy fog, I may bump into a building or two here in my new home city, but slipping on spiky ice? Never again!
Plus, you can’t wear pretty shoes in wintry NYC. Winter footwear, is clunky, uncomfortable, and thick wool socks ruin your pedicure no matter how long you give your toes to dry. I could ramble on about how ugly a NYC winter can make you feel: the grey skies, the nasty chill impossible to dispel with hot cocoa and rum, the short tempers getting shorter along with the days, the darkness that falls early both within and without.
But here? Entering this new year feels so much more benign.
Oh, I see San Franciscans bundling up in their gorgeous sweaters, crafted scarves, and light jackets, keeping their toes warm in calf-clinging, clean boots, looking all the world like good, solid citizens of Winter. But come on! Even when the mornings and late nights plunge to below 50 degrees, it’s been my experience that sunshine soon comes along and clouds disperse, warming this city up again to a very bearable temperature. I’ve laughed out loud when my fellow San Franciscans complain, “Oh , it’s freeeeeeeeeezing outside!”
Really? I mean, REALLY? Has the snow started falling yet? Have you felt the lash of icy rain against your West Coast cheeks? Have you slipped, bruising your elbow on that frozen patch outside your door? No? Well then ...
I know. I sound peevish and sullen. But I have an excuse.
It’s because my old snow boots are staring at me from across the room – they know they’re on their way out, after many years of hard labor on my behalf – and they are sending a curse across the bedroom floor:
May thick fog come, so you’ll stub your toes on those pretty palm trees! May you slip, may you slide! And your little dogs, too!
But as I pick the boots up, laying them gently in their trashcan grave, I smile, sensing both their weariness and also, possibly, a yearning for a well-earned rest.
Pace, old pals. Welcome to a warmer place.
The old, grotty pair of boots is being trashcanned this week, the coat Goodwilled – even though folks have told me that if I visit Lake Tahoe, I’ll need those boots and regret the loss of that coat. But when I experience a Lake Tahoe winter for the first time, I want to do it in gorgeous, young snow-bunny boots, not the worn leather ones that have trudged through too many NYC winters, filthy with soot. I want the freedom of lightweight, pastel skiwear – even though I don’t ski – not the fake-fur caskets I once put on: coats so heavy, I’d get exhausted just wearing them.
Why this optimistic disposal of cold weather outerwear? Why this cavalier letting go of part of my wardrobe history?
Peter and I have lived here a full year now, but I’ll continue to share how I see the world from a West Coast greenhorn’s perspective and how that perspective differs from the squinty, grit-filled point of view I spent 40 New York City years developing. I write about San Francisco because it makes me happy. Reading this, I hope it makes you happy too, to be reminded what a swell city is yours. And what a pleasingly mild one, weather-wise.
For back East it may be a new year, but old snows are on the ground.
By New Year’s Day, and for the rest of the winter, those snows are filled with trash, filthy with traffic and pedestrian grime, and they are, of course, often yellow because of dogs on winter walks. It is fun to see how the pups are dressed up for the season, with cute sweaters, coats and lined booties, but the poor canine bundles still have nowhere else to go except into the piles of snow covering their familiar fire hydrants. So Bing Crosby’s White Christmas, which had us all misty-eyed just months before, becomes something entirely different after a long NYC winter. Add in the other doggie contributions discovered when the snow thaws, and would anyone like to write that song?
When the temperature drops on a freezing night, snowfall turns into a pedestrian’s downfall. Many were the winter events I missed because I couldn’t ice skate. NYC is difficult to negotiate with enthusiasm when you may break an arm or a leg attempting it. Sure, people shovel, spread salt, and New Yorkers trudge into their futures with a sigh and a workmer-like shrug, but it’s all grey, dirty and dangerous – a time of hazards I hope never to endure again. Blinded by heavy fog, I may bump into a building or two here in my new home city, but slipping on spiky ice? Never again!
Plus, you can’t wear pretty shoes in wintry NYC. Winter footwear, is clunky, uncomfortable, and thick wool socks ruin your pedicure no matter how long you give your toes to dry. I could ramble on about how ugly a NYC winter can make you feel: the grey skies, the nasty chill impossible to dispel with hot cocoa and rum, the short tempers getting shorter along with the days, the darkness that falls early both within and without.
But here? Entering this new year feels so much more benign.
Oh, I see San Franciscans bundling up in their gorgeous sweaters, crafted scarves, and light jackets, keeping their toes warm in calf-clinging, clean boots, looking all the world like good, solid citizens of Winter. But come on! Even when the mornings and late nights plunge to below 50 degrees, it’s been my experience that sunshine soon comes along and clouds disperse, warming this city up again to a very bearable temperature. I’ve laughed out loud when my fellow San Franciscans complain, “Oh , it’s freeeeeeeeeezing outside!”
Really? I mean, REALLY? Has the snow started falling yet? Have you felt the lash of icy rain against your West Coast cheeks? Have you slipped, bruising your elbow on that frozen patch outside your door? No? Well then ...
I know. I sound peevish and sullen. But I have an excuse.
It’s because my old snow boots are staring at me from across the room – they know they’re on their way out, after many years of hard labor on my behalf – and they are sending a curse across the bedroom floor:
May thick fog come, so you’ll stub your toes on those pretty palm trees! May you slip, may you slide! And your little dogs, too!
But as I pick the boots up, laying them gently in their trashcan grave, I smile, sensing both their weariness and also, possibly, a yearning for a well-earned rest.
Pace, old pals. Welcome to a warmer place.
EVALYN BARON is an actress, director and teacher who worked on Broadway and in theaters across the country. Here in San Francisco, she’s finally getting some writing done. E-mail: evalyn@marinatimes.com
Labels: Marina TImes columns
