When I'm 68 1/2

I don't get asked to do this sort of thing much anymore, which is fine with me, since for the most part I'd rather write about other things or work on my book, but someone was kind enough to send me the 50th anniversary edition of Sgt Pepper last week, and I decided to play it last night. Herewith, some thoughts. 

* * *

The weird thing is not that Sgt Pepper is fifty years old, it occurred to me this morning as I lay abed looking for a good reason to get up at the ungodly hour of 7:30. It's that I was only 18 ½ when it came out, and that I found it inevitable when it happened. I'd already gone to San Francisco, where the good folks at 1836 Pine, the people who'd started the Family Dog, took me in for a few days while I roamed around the fragile, doomed attempt at Utopia they were building. One night they'd left a tab of acid on the dining room table for me, because they trusted I could handle it, but I didn't take it. Not yet, I thought. That had been February, and I was supposed to bring back a report for Aspen, the magazine in a box. I'd dutifully interviewed Alan Cohen, one of the proprietors of Haight Street's Psychedelic Shop and one of the editors of the Oracle newspaper, who was articulate enough, while at the same time (although this bit didn't make it into the excerpt they ran) gently suggesting that the thing to do wasn't, as Scott McKenzie suggested in his about-to-become-a-hit "San Francisco (Flowers In Your Hair)", to come there, but to make it happen in your own home town. That advice certainly resonated with me, and when, a month or so later, I returned to college, I found, unsurprisingly, that a lot of my friends there were of the same mind. That's when I took the acid. 

I'd caught as much music as I could in my few days in California, most notably the "Second Annual Tribal Stomp" on either February 17th or 18th, headlined by Big Brother and the Holding Company, which I recorded on a remarkable new tape format called the cassette, a recording that was in high enough fidelity that it awaits a friend's attention and, presumably, the permission of the Joplin estate, to be publicly issued. 

I wuz dere!

I also got to see Country Joe & The Fish at the Old Cheese Factory (aka Finnish Hall) in Berkeley, another show at the Avalon with Lee Michaels and (visiting from L.A.) the Peanut Butter Conspiracy, and, just around the corner from the Pine Street house, the Light Sound Dimension and the Orkestra, a psychedelic "multi-media" event (ie, a light show and some horrible music courtesy of future Manson murderer Bobby Beausoleil) that I remember walking out on.  

This kind of thing appealed to me more than the Beatles, although they'd caught my attention with Rubber Soul and even more with Revolver, but, in a way I didn't yet understand, things were different in England, no matter that George Harrison visited Haight Street a little after I did, after soaking up the Monterey Pop Festival. I liked music that jumped off a cliff, hoping for the best, because I knew it could be very good indeed when it took flight. Like most Americans, I didn't get pop music, which, as they were about to make perfectly clear, was the milieu the Beatles (and not the Rolling Stones, whom I preferred, of course) inhabited.

Still, there was no denying the power of this thing when it appeared a couple of months after I returned to school in March.  Everybody bought a copy, myself included, and it just as it was reported happened throughout the Haight-Ashbury, it poured out of dorm windows, open to the newly-hatched spring. Everybody was listening to it, all the time. I was. I don't even remember where I got my copy, but it was presumably in the campus bookstore like everyone else. (Not necessarily: I was also known to catch rides to Dayton, where a sort of hip record division of one of the big department stores stocked things like Kinks singles, which I couldn't live without). 

Of course, due to its ubiquity, Sgt Pepper became one of the first models of a problem all pop potentially has: being enjoyed to death. I'd kind of like to look at my copy of the thing again (it's nearby, buried in the bowels of the Barker Texas History Center in an archive where I donated all my vinyl many years ago) to see just how worn it was. I listened to it a lot, perhaps expecting more revelation than was actually in the grooves, which was a product not only of the times, but of my being a teenager. I know that there soon came a point when I no longer listened to it, and in fact, until the release of the complete Beatles catalog on CD a few years ago, I hadn't paid it any attention at all until I was obligated to for a Fresh Air piece. 

And so to last night, when I lugged the 5 lb. 14 oz. box (I just weighed it) onto the couch and opened up the facimile album cover with its six discs and figured I'd listen to the work-in-progress stuff as much as I could, and then onward to what was supposed to be Giles Martin's astounding new mix of the original. 

Image stolen from Rolling Stone

I was actually surprised. I got through three of the CDs: the two of studio snippets (including work on both "Penny Lane" and "Strawberry Fields") and the stereo mix of the final product. The studio stuff was fun, and, in the case of George Harrison leading the Indian and Western string players through the instrumental track of "Within You, Without You," quite engaging, since I'd never realized that he actually had much knowledge of Indian musical vocabulary. (There's nothing particularly challenging about the track, but what he does is make sure the Indians adhere to his sense of time, which is different from the one in which they're used to operating). 

In a number of cases, the unfinished tracks have details that are in the finished product, but ones of which I'd been unaware and which the new mix -- every bit as spectacularly detailed as I'd read it was -- makes audible. The harp and string bits for "She's Leaving Home" are presented naked, which is fine with me: I remember hearing this and thinking "Jeez, 'Eleanor Rigby' but more mawkish!" And the sharp new sound re-emphasizes the Beatles' instrumental acumen even when the final product ("Good Morning," "For the Benefit of Mr. Kite") is less than interesing. Oh, and speaking of instrumental acumen, nobody who hears this will ever again accuse Ringo Starr of being a plodding dimwit. He and George can battle it out for the title of Most Virtuosic Beatle. 

The best part of not having listened to this record in at least eight years (that Fresh Air program is dated 2009, and I doubt I listened too hard then) is that I was able to take it in without nostalgia, as an event happening in May, 2017. I guess at some point I'll look at the little film on the making of the record, and for sure I'll read most of the hardback book that gives the package most of its heft, because it's not by the Usual Suspects, but people like Joe Boyd, whose take on the times (if his superb book White Bicycles is any indication) should be fresh and un-cliched. 

As for the fifty years that have passed since I first slipped this on to my record player, it's been full of surprises, some delightful, some not. When I was 64, there was no one to feed me (I can do that myself quite well), no kids (let alone grandkids), and (thank heaven) no holidays on the Isle of Wight -- and it's still that way. But I get by with a little help from my friends, and, as someone once said, tomorrow never knows. 

The Travails of Toothless Ed

At first, unbearable pain sent me to a dentist in Berlin, Dr. Basic. Which is how the friends who took me there pronounced his name, like basic training or something. But when he talked, it was obvious that he was from Eastern Europe and his name was really pronounced BAH-sitch. His office was scary. So was what he said to me.

"There will be danger. There must be danger." I didn't like the sound of that. I stayed just long enough to ascertain that it was his accent. The word was "dentures."

But, at that time, there would be no danger, and no dentures. There was no money, and even scary Eastern European dentists in bad neighborhoods in Berlin have to get money for their services.

Then the pain got worse. Somehow I was referred to another dentist, an Australian in a somewhat better neighborhood. It was between him and an Orthodox Jewish woman in a really bad neighborhood -- hell, I used to live there -- who'd gone to the same dental school as my maternal grandfather (just joking about the bad neighborhood, folks). What they all had in common was that they spoke English, something I require for overseas medical problems whenever possible.

The Australian's was the highest-tech dentist's office I'd ever seen. We did X-rays and I handed him my Röntgen-Karte, a government document that keeps track of how much radiation you've absorbed. He looked at the results. "See this here?" he said, noting some white clouds where my gums were. "That's pus, and it could go any minute, into your bloodstream, into your heart or your brain and bingo! You're dead!" The solution, it appeared, was to get rid of the rotten teeth that were causing it to exist. He gave me a quote. Okay, let's do it.

There are neighborhoods in Berlin that go on and on and contain nothing edifying. Kebab stands, hairdressers, bars, dentist's offices. That's where he was, a subway ride with transfer and another transfer to a bus. No particular landmarks. Just undifferentiated ugliness, with him somewhere in it. He'd given me a prescription for some kind of antibiotic to clear up some of the infection, which meant that on my first date with the woman who was to become known as Lady Drunkula, I had to abstain. (You know the type: only drinks white wine because you can't be an alcoholic if you only drink white wine, right?) So when that was over, I made my way back to his office, my pockets stuffed with €50 notes. It was time.

He prepared a couple of needles. "This," he told me, "is a great anaesthetic. Developed in Finland. You Yanks can't get it. FDA hasn't approved it. Fools." But it was. Seconds later, my entire head was numb, but I was perfectly conscious. "Right," said the doctor. "Let's see the money." That was rather abrupt, but I pulled it out of my pocket and he snatched it from me. He snapped each bill from the roll, loudly, and held it up to the light. Then he did it again. And a third time. He handed two of them back to me. "Here. A discount for cash." And without changing his rubber gloves, he got to work. It was amazing.

Close your fist around a finger. Pull the finger out. That's what it felt like. Seven? Eight? I don't know how many teeth he pulled. Once I felt a twinge of pain. But just a twinge. The teeth were gone. Then I chomped down on some goo. "You'll have to do without your teeth for a couple of days, but we'll have your bridge ready by the end of the week, so I'll make you an appointment and you can come in and we'll get you straight." So I left, numb head and all, waited for the bus, got on, made my transfers and soon enough I was home. A couple of days later, I went in, he looped some metal around two of my molars, and there were my falsies. We shook hands and I was out the door.

Over the weekend, they snapped in two. I called him on Monday. "Get in here," he growled. He was livid. Unbelievably angry. He took the bridge, disappeared for a while and came back. "Here, this'll work. I don't want to see you here again." Fair enough: this one held except for one tooth that snapped out. I could deal with that. I was more concerned with my growing relationship with Lady Drunkula, anyway. She lived right around the corner. "Plastic teeth," I warned her before the first time we kissed. "Aaaah, I've dated older men before. C'mere."

The teeth worked out far better than the relationship. At least they hung around and never tried to kill me. About six months later, I got a postcard with Garfield on it. It was from the Australian's partner, Dr. Schreck. (This was another thing that gave me pause about him: Schreck means horror in German. The star of the incredibly creepy 1921 German vampire film Nosferatu was Max Schreck, which I'd always figured was a made-up name to capitalize on his role in the film, but it was apparently his real name!) It reminded me it was time for my checkup, which I didn't remember having been told about, and a subsequent check revealed that the Australian had vanished utterly.

The teeth and I got along well for the next few years, but I knew there was more disease to deal with. I had other things on my mind, though, not least of which was leaving Germany for France. Of course, as this blog has documented, not long after I got there, I lost my sense of taste and smell to some sinus polyps, brilliantly diagnosed and treated (although it took a year to get back to normal) by the great Dr. Jean-Claude Marrache. In 2013, though, I had a recurrence and went back to see him. He wrote a prescription, said "I guarantee you'll be back to normal in 48 hours" (it turned out to be more like four), and, when I asked him if there were any relationship between the gum infection and my problem he paused a moment and then said "Duh." He sat down and wrote a name and an address on a scrap of paper. "This guy's office is literally around the corner from you, and he's a friend of mine. Every year he goes to America and rides a Harley down Route 66, so I assume he speaks English."

But I'd already decided to move back. A couple of years ago, unfortunately, both of the molars anchoring the bridge had fallen out, so I had to be careful eating. Then two upper teeth began to hurt and push themelves out. I looked awful. Then I moved and one day one of the uppers fell out at my desk. The next morning, the other fell into my orange juice with a pretty clink as it hit the glass. I now looked like someone's meth-addicted hillbilly cousin.

This was me on Sunday. I had an appointment on Monday. Just in time: I had another tooth threatening to leave, I had only two teeth to chew with, and I was a mess. I had been to see Dr. Shane Matt and his crew,  bit down on some allegedly blueberry-flavored gunk several times and waited over a month for some dentures to be made. I was about to lose every tooth in my head, and I was glad.

I won't pretend it was fun. It was worse than the Berlin experience because some of the teeth really, really didn't want to come. A couple shattered. And when it was over, they slapped some dentures on me. A friend came and drove me to Costco to buy the antibiotics and pain-pills I'd been prescribed, and I was drooling blood all the way. Naturally, they didn't have the pills ready, so I wandered over to Whole Foods next door to see what was available in terms of bottled smoothies. Some good stuff, actually. A company with the unpromising name of Bolthouse Farms makes interesting combinations, like the breakfast smoothie I had this morning. A company named Evolution Fresh makes a delicious product called Protein Power that I bought despite the note from the founder, one Jimmy, on the side which says, in part, "You deserve to drink something you feel good about, because it makes you feel good." Nobody who puts something that stupid on packages of his product deserves to get rich.

Yes, I'm drinking three meals a day, dammit. (Please spare me the jokes.) My gums are swollen, the teeth don't fit quite right, and more importantly they don't meet right, which means I can't chew. Biting, too, isn't going to happen for a while because of tenderness. It pisses me off: the refrigerator is filled with leftovers of Indian, Chinese, and Italian food I'm going to have to throw out because no way I'll ever get to them in time. But I keep telling myself I'll be able to eat stuff I haven't been able to eat in years -- this story began over ten years ago, after all -- and that's going to make a difference. And hell, I might just be losing weight with all these damn smoothies and stuff.

But although I'm not any prettier, I do know I'm already healthier: all my nose issues have started clearing up ("Duh" -- thanks, Dr. Marrache) and my digestion will improve once I can chew thoroughly again.

Definitely no prettier

I appreciate having friends close enough by that they haven't minded taking me to the dentist's office and shopping for liquid food, and once I'm cooking real food again, they'll be glad they did. As for me, I gotta go slosh some saline solution around my mouth again and take another antibiotic.

First Migas of 2014

Odd Sign of the Year (so far): A church I pass frequently is displaying on their sign the message "Attend a local church in 2014." Now, the general tenor of this message is one I basically support, what with my efforts to patronize independent businesses, local enterprises, and all. But...is there anyone in Austin who gets the family up on Sunday morning, gets them all dressed and into the car to attend services in Wimberley? San Antonio? Waco? Even Taylor? I'd tell this pastor that if nobody's showing up on Sunday, it's not because their churchgoing isn't local.

* * *

Sticker Shock: For years, I've been getting blood-pressure medication, the same basic mix of pills. This started in Berlin, continued in France, and, last week, I ran out of my French pills. Thus began an adventure. 

First off, I needed to find a doctor. Having become officially old in November, I qualified for Medicare, which was something to take into consideration when choosing one. I did what any sane person would do: I asked the Austintites on Facebook. I then followed up all the suggestions that weren't too surrealistic and made an interesting discovery: every single one of them said they would only take Medicare from "established patients." In other words, sign up before you're 65. But I hadn't had that option, having arrived back in the country a few days before my birthday. Or, rather, I had, but it didn't seem like the most important thing at the moment. 

Foolish me. Not only was it very important, I also missed the deadline for signing up for the program that would pay for prescription drugs, unfortunately. (I'll get another chance much later this year). So suddenly it was January, and I needed a doctor and prescriptions. 

But social media to the rescue  once again! I mentioned that nobody at all would accept me, and someone mentioned that if a current patient made a recommendation, perhaps someone would bend the rules. So that's the route I took: I asked someone to ask their doctor, a guy whose setup looked particularly nice, and next thing I knew I had a same-day appointment with a guy who seems very well informed, smart, and maybe not so inclined to overprescribe and suggest unnecessary procedures as I hear American doctors tend to do. (I actually had an encounter with one of these a few years back, but that's another story). 

A few days later, my French pills ran out. I picked up my prescription slip and headed out to one of the many pharmacies that dot the landscape around here, choosing a Walgreen's which seemed to be the closest. I walked in, handed the slip over and was told to come back in an hour and a half. Which, given the labor at hand, seemed excessive. In France, that only happened when they were out of something: they'd go to the back, open drawers, pull out boxes, and that was it. Then I'd get stuck for something like €27 for four kinds of pills. This was only three, but I knew it wasn't going to cost me any $36.85. 

Probably more like $60, I told myself as I headed back to Walgreen's. As if: the damage was a whopping $110 -- $109.97, to be exact. Good thing these pills work, or my blood pressure would be through the roof. And yes, they're all generic and so on. 

America seems to be a rather expensive country to live in!

* * *

There's also a food angle to this story: the doctor's office turns out to be approximately in the same complex as Austin's Trader Joe's. Disparaging Trader Joe's, as I recently did, provoked a storm of complaints from readers and friends. (One told me they had real good, cheap tortilla chips, and I had to remind him that if there's one thing that's not scarce in Austin, it's real good, cheap tortilla chips). Thus, after the doctor's I walked over and took a look at the place again, which was useful because there were things I needed and I had the list right with me. So here's what I found. 

* Wine: there were inexpensive wines I recognized, wines for under $10 a bottle. This is worth remembering. Also the famous Two-Buck Chuck, their house brand, which is now Three-Buck Chuck, at least in Texas. I picked up a bottle of pinot grigio to cook with. 

* Juice: there were several flavors other than orange. I don't get this: in France, we had one-liter containers of juice from Tropicana that came in a bunch of different flavors -- at least a dozen. Here, the smallest size seems to be 1.75 liters, and the only thing available is orange in your choice of a dozen different varieties of how much pulp is included (why is this a problem?) and whether or not you want calcium or not in it. 1.75 liters takes a long time for a single guy to go through, but so far that's what I've been doing. Trader Joe's had a liter of tangerine juice, so I picked it up. Unfortunately I hadn't looked at the expiration date, and the next morning it was swollen up and fizzy. Dang. 

Other than that, there was a lot of packaging: I noted plastic boxes with jalapenos in them, which I thought was odd because any old supermarket has plastic bags and piles of peppers to choose from, which I, certainly, prefer to do. But all the fruit and vegetables were packaged. 

And there were a lot of prepared dishes. This is the deal, as I've been noticing when I go shopping: Americans don't cook any more, preferring to buy frozen and packaged items they can just heat up. (And before anyone jumps on me, this is just as true in France, from what I could tell). And Trader Joe's has much more creative and interesting items in this category than most places, so that, I believe, is what the foofaraw is about. 

I have another doctor's appointment on the 27th, so I'm still on the case

* * *

That, however, is the only food-related item this time. Sometime just after Christmas, my nose shut down again. I'm not really anxious to return to France, but if I could fax myself to my nose doc in Montpellier long enough to get a prescription and pick it up, I would. On the other hand, maybe not: I've had problems with my kitchen sink since I moved in here, and the landlord's been over to fix it several times, on the last of which there was also a plumber along. But the thing still doesn't work right and the other night it flooded the kitchen again. It's the drain, the same drain the dishwasher uses, so I can't use that and I can't wash the dishes by hand in the sink, so they've piled up and probably stink. And my poor landlord came down with the flu, which then turned into pneumonia, after which he tripped and fell down stairs. He's a young guy, so he'll likely be fine eventually, but every single dish in the house is now dirty, so I guess I'm going to have to clean the bathtub out and wash some of them there so I can cook more meals I can't taste. The silver lining is that it's not quite cockroach season yet. 

* * *

And while I'm waiting on my book proposal to sell, I've got some work around here that probably pays. I had a great meeting with a woman from the Writers' League of Texas, and I'm going to be giving a workshop with them in February, which you'll all want to sign up for, I'm sure! Then, two months later, in April, I'll be taking over a very popular class at the University of Texas' Informal Classes, and this one should be fun for all concerned. I'm already scheming to bring in some unsuspecting types to pump them for info about what they've seen and done. 

These two projects are just the start, I hope. I have other schemes in mind, while, of course, being available to other writers' groups and schools for lectures. What I really need is a lecture agent, and they're impossible to score without a recent book publication. Which puts me back where I began. But watch this space for more announcements, and meanwhile remember that I get a piece of the action from the e-books and cookbooks advertised in the Amazon widgets in the right margin, and am constantly adding to my Amazon store of odd and interesting first editions, art documents, and cookbooks. Every little bit helps me get adjusted in this expensive, bewildering new country I've settled myself in.