In the gauzy evening of our disparate lives, we stand by our loved ones and convictions. We continue to grow strong in spite of our spiky imperfections and ominous shadows on horizons beyond us.
We are not always as close as we appear, but–because we grew from the same earth–we are never too far apart from the history we share as we reach higher toward distinct patches of blue.
At times, we wonder what binds us. But–with a nudge or two–we recite lines from the pages of our youth, we remember trailblazers before us, we whisper today’s dreams and tomorrow’s travels.
It’s been happening under the slanted roof of the Polynesian Paradise clubhouse for decades.
Old and young residents and guests gather a few times each month for old-school, low-tech Arizona fun.
They flock there to play BINGO on Wednesday nights in January, February and March when the snowbirds have returned.
Spirits are high, but stakes are low.
Fifty or sixty friends and neighbors huddle over long metal tables with wooden tops. They scan their BINGO boards with dreams of leaving with fifteen or twenty dollars in their pockets.
Hit the switch and you can hear the hum of the BINGO ball cage as it spins. The caller pulls a number and announces it over the microphone. B-15, O-66, and so on.
Over the years, the number callers have come and gone. Phyllis and Sherry shared the duties admirably on January 31, 2024.
Last night’s first game was dedicated to Bill H. He passed last year. In his honor, you had to cover all the numbers on one of your boards to fill the shape of the letter H to win $10.
After that, each game was more traditional. You needed to get five in a row across, up and down, or diagonally to win $5.
Or–if you were lucky enough to cover the four corners or create a “postage stamp”–a four-square shape in one of the corners–that would suffice too.
The final game of the night is always “black-out” BINGO. The goal is to cover every space on your card. The first one to do it, shouts BINGO and wins $20.
Last night, two–Theo and John–landed there at the same time and shared the winnings.
But the beauty of BINGO isn’t really the amount of cash you win.
It’s about the shared experience of sitting side-by-side in the same room.
It’s about the kitschy camaraderie, silly laughter, and goofy cross talk before, during, and after each game.
It’s about celebrating the “what ifs” of life … “Oh, if only she’d called I-30. I would have been the big winner!” … no matter your political preferences or social status.
It’s about the realization that the small, yummy square of lemon cake Jean baked for consumption at the half-way point contained a splash of zesty lemon from one of our luscious community citrus trees.
It’s about the reminiscing with friends as you walk back home to your respective condos at the end of the day on a mild desert evening.
It’s about hugging and bidding each other a good night … until the next game of BINGO.
My three BINGO cards. I didn’t win.Our fun table causing a ruckus.Theo and John won several games.
January 1984 felt promising, but exceptionally cold, in the Chicago area.
Jean was due to deliver our first child on January 17. But that day–and several more–passed with no consequential developments. Just a few rounds of snowfall.
Late on January 23, Jean went into labor. When we arrived at Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, Illinois, the nurses examined her. They told us it would be several hours before our child was born.
Jean and I weren’t prepared for the day-and-night-long ordeal that followed. After twenty-three hours of labor, Dr. P pulled me aside.
At that point, he was worried that a traditional delivery would place Jean and our unborn child at risk. He recommended Plan B: an emergency C-section.
Jean was scared; I was worried about her welfare. I insisted on staying during the operation (masked up on the other side of a curtain, away from the medical staff, while they performed the procedure). The doctor agreed it was a good idea for me to be there for emotional support.
A short time later, at 11:37 p.m. on January 24–twenty-three minutes until midnight–our son Nick arrived intact. Jean was okay, too, but totally spent. We both breathed relief.
Our newborn son wailed as the nurses wrapped him in a blanket. His head was slightly misshapen from the birthing process, but they told us not to worry. They laid Nick across Jean’s chest. We had a healthy son.
Jean and Nick stayed at Lutheran General for a few days, which was protocol for the time. Several days later, we signed a few papers, and prepared to leave the hospital.
Jean cradled Nick in a wheelchair that morning. A nurse pushed them down the hall. I pressed the elevator button, carried flowers, and juggled a few possessions as the doors opened.
An older man already onboard smiled as we descended to the ground floor. He wished a good life for our newborn son.
We exited the building. I walked ahead in the cold to bring our car around while Jean and Nick waited with the nurse at the curb. The sun shimmered on a dusting of snow from the night before.
Day-old Nick and me at Lutheran General Hospital on the morning of January 25, 1984.
***
When Nick was born in 1984, I didn’t expect his mom and I would split eight years later. But we did in 1992, just three years after Kirk (his younger brother) was born.
In the aftermath, my sons spent Monday and Wednesday nights–and every other weekend–with me (Tuesday and Thursday nights with their mom) until they were teenagers when they each opted for a home base with Jean. Thanksgivings were with me; Christmases with her. Two vacations occurred every summer. One with her. One with me.
On “Dad nights and weekends” in the early 90s, my boys and I devoured pizza in our cramped apartment in Arlington Heights and on cold, gray days swam in the indoor pool. It was a cheap way to have fun and burn off energy.
During the school year, with their backpacks in tow, we grabbed donuts downstairs in the apartment lobby on the way out the door.
I dropped Nick off at Kids’ Corner (before-and-after-school program), then hustled Kirk off to preschool before I commuted into Chicago’s Loop for work.
Looking back, it was a tumultuous period of disarray, intimacy, and estrangement for all of us. Nonetheless, somehow, we survived. We found our rhythm as a family straddling two homes.
In 1996, I saved enough for a down payment on a modest three-bedroom home nearby. Nick, Kirk and I played catch in the backyard and tossed the football on the open field across the street.
That same year, I met Tom and introduced him to my sons. I know that Nick–particularly as a teenager–felt uncomfortable with having a dad who was different. But, in spite of it, he knew I loved him.
We weren’t your prototypical American family, but with time we found our stride and Nick and Kirk accepted Tom and me.
At first, our basset hound Maggie (we adopted her in 1998) was the comic-relief glue that adhered us.
With time, that connectivity broadened. We found more in common: birthday celebrations; grounding visits with their wise and supportive grandma in St. Louis; fun and thought-provoking movies with Tom and me in the Chicago suburbs.
Not long after Nick–and then Kirk–graduated from college, Maggie died. We all mourned her loss in 2008.
Tom and I knew at the time that our parents wouldn’t be far behind. The nest emptied quickly. They were all gone by 2015.
That same year, at age thirty-one, Nick asked if he could rent our Arizona condo while he looked for a job out west. He needed a change. He wanted to chart his own course, away from the cold, heavy responsibility of the Midwest.
Nick began a new life that January (two years before Tom and I made Scottsdale, Arizona, our permanent home) when he landed a job with a technology company in March.
Over the past nine years, I’ve watched my son’s confidence and self-esteem multiply. He has a good life here.
Of course, during that period, he’s changed jobs and apartments, discovered new loves and suffered a few losses.
But Nick is happier in the sunnier Southwest. And I’m happy that I get to see him occasionally.
After I suffered a heart attack in July 2017 on the way west, Nick helped Tom move some of our bulkier pieces of furniture.
It gave me solace seeing them bond more deeply as I struggled to regain my strength and equilibrium.
Life so far in 2024 is good for all of us. Kirk is planning to visit us in Scottsdale in March. He lives in Chicago and has found a rewarding life as a trauma counselor. He needs a warm escape now and then to stay sharp.
In spite of the vast distance, my younger son and I have managed to deepen our relationship and stay close. As Kirk quarantined in his Chicago apartment during Covid, Tom and I played Scrabble with him online and Zoomed from time to time.
We talk frequently now. Whenever we do, I realize how lucky I am to have two smart and compassionate sons who are contributing members of society.
A few weeks ago, Nick stopped by and watched Oppenheimer with Tom and me. On other occasions, we’ve shared ballgames and dinners or picked ripe citrus fruits off our condo community trees (Nick loves grapefruit).
Next week, Nick and his girlfriend Anastasia will join Tom and me for dinner to celebrate his birthday at a local Scottsdale restaurant he’s been wanting to try.
No doubt, we’ll raise a glass. We’ll toast his first forty years. We’ll recall Nick’s journey west to discover a warmer life of promise.
As a dad, I will always be there for my sons. I’m glad I stuck it out during those trying years in the 90s, because seeing them become who they are–full-fledged adults–is the most gratifying part of fatherhood.
We all endure specific days–or months–that test our best intentions and weigh on our psyches. January is that month for me.
Long before Tom’s father died January 14, 2012, and my mother followed January 26, 2013, the first month of the year represented a period of Midwestern malaise, forced hibernation, and cold, lingering darkness.
Of course, I live in a warmer, brighter climate now (despite freezing temperatures the past few mornings). I am thankful for that, especially as Tom shares images of his sister and brother-in-law snow blowing and shoveling outside their suburban Chicago home.
Since my mother’s death nearly eleven years ago, the years have passed with a gauzy flutter like pages of a book swept away by a winter’s squall.
Yet January’s weary sensations–grief masked in a cocktail of Christmas memories, vanilla lip balm, and her last graceful smiles during breathing treatments designed to ease her congestive heart failure–appear on cue.
Last weekend, Tom and I packed away our Christmas decorations and recounted cherished memories of quiet holiday moments together and the adrenalin rush of my holiday concert. Adjusting to the rise and fall of this season is always a bittersweet process.
But this week I was eager to recoup our less-cluttered space. To move ahead. To read and write new pages. To protect, nurture, and regain a more normal rhythm away from the madness of news that reminds me–frequently–just how fragile our democracy has become.
My mother and father–who survived the Battle of the Bulge in World War II–would be horrified.
In the depths of 2020, my husband and I began a tradition of buying bouquets of flowers to place in a vase in our living room. As the walls and woes of Covid and our political angst closed in, it gave us hope to see a splash of color on our coffee table.
Less than ten days into 2024, like each of you I have my dreams and doubts, wonders and worries.
But writing about this spray of lavender carnations Tom and I brought home (then displayed in a smoky-blue ceramic pitcher my mother left behind, and placed atop a Spring-like, bird-laden runner my sister gave us for Christmas) helps me breathe, reflect, and relax.
As we embark on this even-numbered journey, the season reminds us that we get to decide what to keep. What to build upon. What to change or cherish.
It’s time to relinquish extra pounds, unhealthy habits, and heavy losses. To let them fall away so that we can focus on luscious fruits, ripe with possibilities.
***
Happy New Year! Join me on my 2024 blogging journey. Just fill out the information on my Contact Me page and I will add you to my subscriber list.
On January 1, 2024, I plucked ripe tangelos from one of our community trees in Scottsdale, Arizona.
From time to time, it’s important to take stock of where we’ve been and how we’ve grown. In that spirit, as December’s light wanes, I look back over the fence at 2023.
Here are ten important things–in no particular order–I’ve learned (or been reminded of) this year. Each is connected to one or more blog posts I wrote in the past twelve months.
***
#1: Creative opportunities are rare butterflies; grabthem when they appear.
#2: Music transforms the human heart with joy and hope.
#3: Cats are resourceful, cuddly, and conniving characters.
#5: Trees keep us rooted to the places we love most.
#6: Good poetry simply IS; no explanations are required.
#7: My husband is a sweet guy, who really knows his movies.
#8: Carol Burnett is a national treasure and a kind human being.
#9: You can’t replace your mother or father, but you can remember them fondly.
#10: We all need a sense of community to connect and nourish our souls.
***
Join me on my blogging adventure in 2024. Just fill out the information on my Contact Me page. I will be sure to add your email address to my subscriber list.
My friend Adele Singer captured this glorious musical moment during the second act of Thanks for the Memories: A Gay Christmas Carol, on Saturday afternoon, December 16, 2023.
Today I find myself straddling two worlds: the joy of what was (three fabulous, sold-out holiday concerts last weekend with the Phoenix Gay Men’s Chorus) and the reality of what is (a post-concert malaise and head cold).
Minus the minor illness, this is a feeling I’ve become accustomed to as a writer and performer. You work tirelessly to tell your story, edit it, publish it, and wave goodbye as it bobs on the waves of readership.
Or, in the case of a stage performance, there are the weekly (and then daily) rehearsals that crescendo on opening night–and all the behind-the-scenes machinations of memorizing notes, lyrics, and choralography at home in your robe or underwear.
Then, standing on stage with your chorus mates. All of you wearing black accented with a sparkly, sequined, rainbow-colored vest–mine was blue–waiting with anticipation for the curtain to rise before the opening number–That Christmas Morning Feelin’–and the applause of a full house that followed.
Then, ninety-minutes later, realizing the show is over. Making your way to the lobby to hug and thank loyal friends and family who attended and (based on their enthusiastic response) were most-definitely entertained.
Even listening–as a total stranger who smiles through her tears–grabs you, looks directly into your eyes, and tells you how moved she was by the music and the transformative holiday tale.
She told me it was something she and her partner desperately needed to experience–see, hear, and feel–away from this frightening world.
For me, there is also the added component of savoring my libretto. Remembering when it was a kernel of an idea. Developing characters (three flamboyant-and-visionary Celestials who would visit one lost-and-misguided protagonist).
Then, writing lines of humorous and topical dialogue–that cascade like a string of colorful Christmas lights connecting the branches of each song–in July and August when it was 115 degrees outside in the Phoenix area.
These are the memories I savor on a post-concert Wednesday, five days before Christmas.
***
It rained in Scottsdale early this morning. Heavily. That’s a novelty in the Valley of the Sun, but we’ll take the moisture whenever it comes. More is expected Friday.
As Tom and I sipped our coffee in our den, I read an article Making Space, written by poet and author Christopher Soto, in the November/December issue of Poets & Writers.
In it, he artfully acknowledges the act of fully embracing the process of letting go, once your creative work has landed. In his case, he traveled to Joshua Tree and the desert of Southern California for a farewell ritual for his debut book of poems, Diaries of a Terrorist.
After considering the success of his book, he pulled out his journal and began to write something new.
I haven’t read his book. Maybe I will in 2024. However, his story certainly resonated with me–now that this latest libretto/performance–and my five books that preceded it–has sailed away.
The best thing all of us writers can do as 2024 approaches is to set our sights on writing another story, essay, poem, or libretto.
After all, the world–especially now–needs its artists to step forward and paint a picture of what the world is and what we hope it will become.
***
P.S. I’ll be taking a break until early January. To join me on my blogging adventure in 2024, send a message via my Contact Me page and I will add your email address to my subscriber list. Happy Holidays!!
Tom snapped this photo of me outside the Herberger Theater in Phoenix after our final performance of Thanks for the Memories: A Gay Christmas Carol on Sunday, December 17, 2023.
When the gift is musical theater–when the right notes, lyrics, blend, dialogue, choreography, and staging surround and transport the spirits of the audience and performers in a positive, fun, and meaningful way–its dimensions, ripple effects, and entertainment value can’t be measured or quantified.
That’s the transformative mission of the Phoenix Gay Men’s Chorus this weekend at the Herberger Theatre. We will perform our holiday show–Thanks for the Memories:A Gay Christmas Carol–twice Saturday, December 16, and once Sunday, December 17.
What’s my involvement in the concert? I’ll be singing second tenor alongside about eighty of my mates. I also wore a second hat in preparation for the shows. I wrote the libretto for the program and am proud to report that all three performances are sold out.
To say that I am fully vested in the outcome of this program–and brimming with excitement–is an understatement.
My journalistic impulses prompt me to preview the show for you, since few of you reading this will be in the room. Here’s the scoop.
Our concert will be a parody of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol with an array of significant topical and cultural differences.
As the curtain opens, the Phoenix Gay Men’s Chorus is busy in their holiday workshop. Their mission is to select, influence, and transform one person–Lance, a fictional, homophobic sports figure and Scrooge-like character–into “one less hateful human.”
In the first number, That Christmas Morning Feeling, the audience meets a trio of divine spirits called Celestials: Starina (with their magic wand); Dione (with their rainbow fan); and Stella (with their shiny tiara).
Over the course of the next ninety-minutes, these wacky, playful and somewhat visionary Celestials and the spirit of Dirk (Lance’s Marley-like, ex-publicist colleague) visit Lance.
They lead him on a part-serious-part-campy personal journey of discovery through his past, present, and future holidays.
By sharing scenes of his life, told through music and images, they shine a light on the mistakes he’s made and encourage him to take a more productive path.
Ultimately, they help Lance realize the positive “ripple” effect he can have on the world by opening his heart and mind, correcting the error of his ways, loving himself and his gay identity, and embracing the cultural diversity of his community.
In the process, he repairs an important lost relationship, and even ends up committing to “doing a little good” in the world.
That’s a lot to accomplish in less than two hours, but I believe those in attendance will be moved, inspired, and maybe even dazzled this weekend.
Now, in order for that to happen, I need to get some rest. So, it’s time to take a power nap to recharge my battery between last night’s four-hour rehearsal and tonight’s reprise.
You won’t be surprised to learn that my energy-recouping strategy includes naps Thursday and Friday before our technical and dress rehearsals. Then, I will break a leg (or two) this weekend.
Look for a recap story next week–long after I recover from whatever happens on stage and Sunday night’s cast party.
Nature’s mid-century palms rose early without caffeine’s jolt. The quartet whisked breakfast into curls of golden cotton candy best consumed in a wondrous hush.
Perched on sprinkled pavement and slanted roofs, a mix of mourning doves, misplaced pigeons, and I marveled at December’s delight beyond distant flurries.
Mark Johnson Stories 