Tag: Ray

Notes From the Shrine: Visit with Your Dad

~ johnbrandall

by Ray Wisdom

I had called the Shrine the day before to make sure there wouldn't be an issue with my visiting. The person I spoke with was lovely and gave me very detailed directions on how to get to the memory care facility.

As I was driving around the main building, I had this lightning bolt-type remembrance of visiting the exact same place when my grandpa was there. It was eerie. I rationally knew it wa =s the same place, but I guess that memory was buried pretty deep. The last time I saw him, he didn't remember who I was. He thought my mom was his wife. It was all so sad. I guess I had repressed it. 

After I was buzzed into the building, the woman at the front desk said that your dad was in B1, and as I turned to go down the hallway, your mom had just entered at the other end. When she saw me, she stopped-short, like she had seen a ghost. She recognized me immediately and was so happy. She said 'Ray, is that you? What are you doing here?' The best way I can describe her reaction was that she was both dumbfounded, with a look of both disbelief and happiness on her face. She was getting ready to leave, but offered to take me back to see your dad. 

We went into the room and your dad was watching CNBC (or one of those channels. It was the one with the guy who rolls up his sleeves and gives financial advice. Jim Cramer?) on the TV. Your mom went to his side and said 'Brian, you have a visitor'. Your dad looked at me and I said 'Carpe Diem, Mr. Randall. It's Ray.' He looked at me and said 'Ray'. 

Your mom then asked if he had just said something and I told her that he said my name. It was then that she told me about his recent issues with swallowing and speaking and how she had to call for hospice care. That he had only started verbally communicating again that day. He looked at your mom and said 'who called hospice?' She said she had. He then continued to watch TV. 

Your mom stayed for about 10 more minutes and we chatted. She relayed how hard it has been for her. How she visits most days. She started crying as she told me this and then reiterated how happy she was that I was visiting. She said I could pop by the house any time I wanted. If she wasn't there, she was probably visiting your dad. I told her that I had started writing a letter to her, but I couldn't find the words. We had a long hug and I told her that I was happy to have run into her. I let her know that she could leave and I would stay with your dad for a while.

After your mom left, I pulled up a chair and sat next to your dad. He was watching TV and would occasionally look over at me. There wasn't much that would lead me to think he recognized me. I asked if he still followed the market and he said 'everyday'. I asked if he still followed any other news but he didn't respond...


Read Ray's full account here...

Reunion

~ johnbrandall

You wanted to get the old band back together.
But we didn’t even have a band.

All we did was
sit around and drink
and talk
and smoke.
We played music
but it was music other people recorded
onto compact discs
and then sold to us.

Yeah, we’d go to venues.
There were crowds,
not drawn by us.
And there’d be bands there,
but not our band.

None of us wrote any songs.
None of us sang.
We didn’t even have any instruments...


Read the full poem and the slightly longer original version here...

Oiled Newspaper Hack for Charcoal Grilling

~ johnbrandall

Today I want to write about a “hack” I have been using to get charcoal fires started.  By hack I mean a tip, a trick, a shortcut — in the fashion of a home remedy. 

Over a decade ago, I invited my friend Ray over for dinner and he noticed I was having trouble getting my charcoal grill going.  The method I had been using was to put scrunched up newspaper in the bottom of the kettle, topping that with the smaller of two round metal grills that fit in kettle.  I would dump charcoal on the smaller grill, then eventually place the larger metal grill on top of that.  It’s the larger grill that holds whatever you might be cooking: hamburgers, chicken, bratwursts, whole onions, whole peppers, foil packs of sliced potatoes and butter. Pork steaks, carrots, asparagus, shrooms.

The problem with what I’ll call the “straight newspaper” method is that the newspaper would often burn up too quickly, not having burned long enough to have caught the charcoal, the flame wasting away too soon.  In this event I would have to awkwardly lift the bottom grate, which was a little hot and which was still holding the unburnt charcoal. Then, in a vexed state, I'd have to shove more wads of newspaper down into the bottom of the kettle.  Sometimes I went through three rounds of newspaper before the charcoal would finally catch...


Get your charcoal fire started easily with this one simple trick...

Pages from An Old Woodshed

~ johnbrandall

I've been clearing out part of the shed. One of the bays. I think of it as a future café, or perhaps even a place to sleep. I'll show ya. I'm taking certain old items—tire, rim, an old heavy plow, pure iron, the weight—and moving them into a different shed. A junk shed.

Now I'm taking my drill out there to reinforce the structure a bit. This is my playground, my school, my office, my church.


To read much more, including a new theory of the universe, continue here...

Portland

~ johnbrandall ~ Leave a comment

I.  Sitting in His Apartment.  

I have my old things, my talismen, my curios and artifacts, croutons of life dropped along the way, telling my story.  Roy does, too.  I can spot them, uncoached, in this two-bedroom place of his and Joyce's in Portland, a.k.a. Fog City, Raintown, CoffeeShopLand.  Cronos the dog is eight.  He is mellow and sweet, curled up on his pillow, waiting for the others to rise. I was there on Shenandoah in St. Louis the first weekend Roy had gotten him.  I've always thought Cronos remembered that, held an affinity for me because of it.  Or maybe he's just a sweet happy dog who can love everyone without condition or reason.  

Roy's got a few of our paintings.  A blind portrait I did of him in November 2005 (I just checked to see if the date was on the back, otherwise I wouldn't've known it).  Then there's the collaboration he and I did in his Allen apartment, a painting we dubbed "C.E. Gogh," consisting first of a sketch he did of me, with us then painting in the room scene all around it.  In that painting is a table and one of a set of four orange chairs that Roy has had forever, and which are here, having meaning to me but appearing to be underemphasized...    

Full travelogue and more photos here...

Ray & Serpent

~ johnbrandall ~ Leave a comment

Ray came by outside my window one afternoon.  We were chatting it up.  He had this big, light bulb-looking thing.

But it was actually a plant tuber.

It was long and cylindrical.  He had a package he said was associated with it that said something about When the cum stains on it turn brown.  It was African.  He was wearing it around his neck...


Full dream...