Tag Archives: Karen

In Which I Make a Spectacle of Myself

Posted by XperDunn on

What town was I in? Nelsonville, aka Cold Springs, NY. Where? On Main Street.

Jessy’s dog, Tuesday (the ring-bearer) and our son, Spencer, and myself had just been driven there by Karen, Claire’s Mom. My Mom, Ethel, had already arrived at a nearby hotel, where she shared rooms with my niece, Danielle, Kathy’s eldest, and Danielle’s daughter, Boston (the flower girl). Our neighbors, Harlan and Sherryl, were there. The rest of the forty-odd wedding party were Burrs from South California.

They had excused me from the rehearsal dinner so that I would be fit for the wedding—and Claire had gotten a sudden case of shingles, so she stayed home, too. If my Mom hadn’t made it, Jessy would have had no family there! I felt bad for Claire—between her work and her courses and helping Jessica with wedding arrangements, she’s been busier than a one-armed paper-hanger. So, I figure the shingles were stress-induced. Now that it’s all over, I hope she can find a little ‘me-time’ again.

So there I was, walking down Main Street on a busy Saturday afternoon in a tuxedo with bow-tie and two-toned (black and white) shiny dress shoes. People were shouting at me, “Hey, nice suit” and “Looking dapper, there” and so forth—I had never felt so exposed in my life—and I wasn’t quite sure where I was going. I wandered into a bed and breakfast and asked if Jessy was there and, for a miracle, the lady said, “Yes, she is. Come on in.” So I stood there in the foyer and I guess I was a little winded—she looked at me solicitously and asked if I’d like to sit down—which I suddenly realized I very much wanted to do—and asked me if I wanted a cup of tea or some water—which I suddenly realized I needed almost as badly.

So she disappeared upstairs to the girl’s party that brides-getting-dressed always seem to become. I sat in an armchair sipping ice water and dreading the long walk up the street to the library where the wedding would take place. I didn’t want to walk that far, but as father of the bride I felt obliged to escort her wherever she went in her bridal gown—and she was walking up Main Street, so I was too. In the event, it was five of us, including the beribboned dog, walking through town and causing quite a stir.

At the library I ignored all the stairways and what-not, focused on being the ‘arm’ Jessy was ‘on’. The service was surprisingly long (considering it was secular—I would’ve expected it from a Catholic wedding service) and then it was back down the hill, but it was dark, I was no longer obligated to escort anyone—so Claire and I walked down rather slowly. I was running on fumes at this point.

We got to the reception, an illegal storefront with no liquor license. As soon as I walked in, the sonic assault made me dizzy—O, do I hate loud music in a small place when I’m expected to make small talk with strangers—OMG, as the kids say. I soon retreated to the sidewalk again, had a smoke, and steeled myself to re-enter. Before too long it was time to eat, and then they danced. I had to do the traditional Father-Daughter dance—but I can’t dance, of course, so I just went from side to side, trying to lift my feet off the floor a few times just to make it officially ‘dancing’.

But Jessy was so happy and so loved and really enjoying her own wedding—something much rarer than you might think—it was a pleasure just to hold her in my arms, regardless of my awkwardness. And she had told me, days before, that the father-daughter dance would be my last mandated activity, so I was relieved to be close to the ‘finish line’, if I can call it that. I would miss the bulk of the reception, including the cutting of the cake, and the after-party—which I assume only the young people had the energy for.

Today, if I remember correctly, they are on their way to Cancun for their honeymoon. Jessy had been married once before, alone in Vegas, to an army recruit who spent most of their married years in Iraq—and this ceremony had much more of an air of permanency about it. I hope that remains the case—they are wonderful people, the now Mr. and Mrs. Burr, and life is so much nicer when you have someone to share it with!

And me? Well, I have a renewed appreciation for lying in bed and watching TV all day. And something about this wedding made me feel that Jessy was taken care of, parentally speaking—and that’s a great feeling. Now, all we need to do is find a girl smart enough to see Spencer as the beautiful man he is…

A Song, An Improv, & An “Are You Dunn?” Addendum….

Posted by XperDunn on

A Song,

An Improv,

& An “Are You Dunn?” Addendum….

click to Play my YouTube Video

XperDunn plays Piano
August 25th, 2013

Cover of the Carpenters’ single, “Goodbye to Love”.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[“Goodbye to Love” : Single by The Carpenters from the album “A Song for You”, Released on June 19, 1972, Label A&M #1367 / Writer(s) Richard Carpenter; John Bettis / Producer Jack Daugherty

“Goodbye to Love” is a song composed by Richard Carpenter and John Bettis. It was released by The Carpenters in 1972. On the “Close to You: Remembering The Carpenters” documentary, Tony Peluso stated that this was one of the first, if not the first, love ballads to have a fuzz guitar solo.

While visiting London, he saw a 1940 Bing Crosby film called “Rhythm on the River”. Richard Carpenter noticed that the characters kept referring to the struggling songwriter’s greatest composition, “Goodbye to Love”. He says, ‘You never hear it in the movie, they just keep referring to it,’ and he immediately envisioned the tune and lyrics starting with:
I’ll say goodbye to love
No one ever cared if I should live or die.
Time and time again the chance for
Love has passed me by…

He said that while the melody in his head kept going, the lyrics stopped “because I’m not a lyricist”. He completed the rest of his arrangement upon his return to the USA.]
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click to Play my YouTube Video

XperDunn plays Piano
August 25th, 2013

Improv – Goobers
(music fades out instead of ending–the result of a dead battery-sorry.)

Start and End Cards source: http://www.winslowhomer.org/hound-and-hunter.jsp

Homer’s watercolor sketch for Hound and Hunter showed, lying behind the boy, a rifle that the artist later painted out. When this final canvas was exhibited in 1892, its subject was condemned as a cruel sport then practiced in the Adirondacks. Some viewers believed the youth was drowning the deer to save ammunition. The artist curtly responded, “The critics may think that that deer is alive but he is not—otherwise the boat and man would be knocked high and dry.”

To clarify that the stag is already dead and no longer struggling, however, Homer did repaint the churning water to hide more of the animal. The hunter, therefore, simply ties up a heavy load, calling off the hound so it will not jump into the boat and swamp it.

Homer once asked a museum curator:
“Did you notice the boy’s hands—all sunburnt; the wrists somewhat sunburnt, but not as brown as his hands; and the bit of forearm where his sleeve is pulled back not sunburnt at all? I spent more than a week painting those hands.”
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Sunday, August 25, 2013            4:06 PM

“Are You Done?” (Cont’d):

I am aware that the previous ‘essay’ (if I may use that word) was both ludicrous and without any substantive ideas for moving forward. I think one point I attempted to make is that People have to wake up to the very powerful forces being arrayed against them at present. And that civil-rights-oriented and community-activity-oriented crowd-sourcing is a very promising new tool that we can either use or have used against us—our choice.

The other point, the main idea I wished to illustrate, was that individuals are wooed by many associations and organizations, including political parties, multi-national corporate giants, and banks—and that the only organization intended for our own self-interest, the federal government, being so wrapped up by capitalized and specialized interests, has ceased to perform that function. And that leaves us with only two choices.

We either have to wrest control of our government back towards the protection of civil rights and the providing of social services, or we have to find some way to sidestep those ‘clogged arteries’ and create an organization outside of government. I had intended to mention, further, that such an organization, by virtue of the digital revolution, and what may be called the enhanced social conscience of our society here at the start of century twenty-one, would operate so much more efficiently, cost-effectively, and speedily that the existing government would be pulled along in its wake, so to speak.

Why do I see this issue in this way? That’s easy—because we have already learned that Authority is not a ‘God-given’ right, such as monarchs used to claim; neither is Authority a prerogative of the wealthy, such as the wealthy have been used to claiming; nor is dogma an Authority, as religious extremists persist in insisting. Authority is a necessary evil, plain and simple—someone has to be in charge to enable groups to create something greater than what they could do as a disorganized group of individuals.

And that greater creation, or ‘progress’, if you will, is always a source of Power to those in authority. Power is an addictive drug which no human has ever been immune to—thus authority inevitably changes its goal from a common good to an entitled elite who skim the cream of organized effort and (usually) begin to work counter to the original common good.

We have attempted, by democracy, by socialism, and by communism, to create a more perfect organization, to put in place checks and balances which restrain, as much as possible, the natural tendency towards corruption in authority, including favoritism, and elitism—but all have been overwhelmed by the constant pressure of those natural human drives. Unfortunately, authority has to reside with someone—so I won’t bother trying to invent a new system that partitions or restrains authority from abuse—it’s like trying to lift yourself by your own bootstraps.

And this is why I have no suggestions as to how to fix ourselves—human society has built-in structural flaws that prevent us from Utopia. The only thing we can hope for is that the Elite become ashamed enough of all the starvation and poverty that they eventually find a way to accommodate the millions of losers in the great game of capitalism. Or, for the truly optimistic, we can hope that our global society matures into something less of a dog pile than it’s always been, and is now. If I had a religion, that would be it—people starting to work just as hard to cooperate with each other as they do now to compete with each other.