My mother’s face was horribly mauled by a German shepherd when she was a young girl. She had several painful operations but still had many scars. This didn’t keep her from being irresistible to my Tech Sarge father, who drove up to her family’s house on Roosevelt in his white T-Bird to propose to her for his best friend Jimmy, and then flipped it to his own pitch. She was a fan of Yma Sumac and Raymond Chandler, and he was a guy who hung with cholos with chain belts on their Zoot suits at bebop shows and beat the shit out of frat boys and Marines who made fun of the performers. They got married and had a few kids — including me, conceived on a ferry boat between Wainwright and McChord — settling in the pulpy air of Everett, WA. Larry wanted to abort me, but Carol was steadfast in teaching RCIA and so I survived. Eventually, for years between network airings of Wizard of Oz, there were always seasonal screenings of Jesus Christ Superstar, which my mother adored, subjecting us to each one, with her crush on Teddy Neeley, and all that beautiful music, which seemed to invigorate my own spirit, and I thrive on clips of to this day.
Hosanna, Hosanna
Hosanna in the highest
Hosanna, Hosanna
Hosanna in the highest
