Rhapsody in Bluegrass

Tuesday began dark and cool. There was a heavy overcast and so our morning walk was chilly. I came home and lit a small fire because I did a laundry and I dry my clothes indoors now that it is so humid outside, and to do that I like to have warm air circulating. I turn on the overhead fans when I have laundry hanging in the house to dry.

By lunchtime, the sky was clearing to I got busy watering all the beds I didn’t do yesterday. I remain amazed at how much I enjoy every day at Pinecone Park. I love having day after day all to myself to do as I see fit. It is such a privilege to be retired. 

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My friend Beth sent me a link in an email. It was a clip of Jayne Mansfield’s violin performance on Ed Sullivan. It was embarrassing to hear, but I think she wanted people to know there was more to her than her breasts, hips, and face.

She periodically came to Vancouver, and she stayed with my Uncle Jimmy. Jimmy was my uncle because his sister Mary was my aunt, and Mary was my aunt because she was the woman who picked me up from the orphanage I was at, and she delivered me to the Tyrells. There was no blood bond, but I loved this adopted aunt and uncle team.

Jimmy was well known in wealthy and governmental services. He was Vancouver’s authority on floral décor. Every year, at the city’s annual exhibition, the PNE, Jimmy was given an entire building to fill with floral displays. It was like a miniature Chelsea Flower Show. Must I say it? He was gay.

Jimmy lived with his mother. Aunt Mary, who lived in NYC and was a Canadian diplomat, stayed there when she visited, and I always visited when she was there. Jimmy had bought an enormous old Victorian home. He renovated the top floor into a gorgeous one-bedroom suite with a lovely deck, and his mother lived there. And he renovated the basement floor and extended it to build himself his separate suite that opened into an incredible, magnificent, illuminated garden. He’s bought the lot next door to allow him to have a large landscape.

And the main floor of the house was one huge room with mirrored gold walls. He went full-on Liberace in the room, right down to a gold grand piano. The walls were gold as well. It was so over-the-top that I felt uncomfortable whenever we were in it. Once, when I was there for dinner with Aunt Mary, Jayne was there, and after dinner Jayne played her violin for us while Jimmy accompanied her on the piano. I thought I would fucking die then and there as they played. I detest being played for or sung to by anyone, I get extremely anxious about what I will have to say when they stop. But I was impressed. It felt like being in Versailles, with all the gold and chandeliers, listening to a chamber concert. But I didn’t know then, how poor her playing was.

Footnote: I was going to Expo 86. I, personally, had rented an entire train car, and I sold beds to friends and friends of friends to recover my costs. I rented a dorm at Collège du St. Laurent, in Laval, for us to stay in. We were to be there for 3 weeks, and I knew that I’d have a lot of responsibilities on the trip, so I decided before I left, to leave Montreal and the tour, to go to NYC and stay with Aunt Mary.

When I called Jimmy to tell him I was going to the city to stay with his sister, he invited me to dinner before we left. After dinner, in conversation with him, he brought up the subject of homosexuality. I was 19; I didn’t come out until I was 24. I remember him saying he was introducing the subject because I was young and attractive and that I might provoke some contact. He wanted to warn me and let me think about how I would handle it on my own.

I did not realize he was telling me I was gay. And I learned a new word for homo at that dinner, and I liked it. It was a happy word. I didn’t have the courage to tell him I was gay, but I loved him forever afterwards for his kindness to me. And, for introducing me to the beauty of flowers that I have to this day.