The Christmas Adam Story

This year, our annual Christmas Adam party is at two places this year and I cannot help but reflect on the 24 years that have gone by since I invented the damned party! The party and I have evolved and have come a long way since the first one I threw in Colorado Springs that last winter I lived there, way back in 1987...

I had filed for divorce from my volatile husband of nine months and due to Colorado laws at the time, we had to live apart for a minimum of three months before consideration before the court. Unfortunately, I was the one who had fled my condo that horrible night and stayed with some (military and well-armed) friends for protection (and self-preservation). I had to get a court order and a restraining order just to get back into my own property but I eventually did return, only to find that the son-of-a-bitch had either burnt, pawned or destroyed just about everything in the place including family heirlooms.... but, I digress...

I was anxious for a celebration and a holiday party was definitely called for-it was also the first year I could not go home due to the uncertainty of my divorce dates. Knowing that most of my friends (who, at that time were an average of 10-15 years older than I was) had kids or grand kids due in town and would be busy Christmas Eve and Day... I chose to have a cocktail party at my condo and invited a few people over. We had a great time-wound up playing poker until way too late (or way too early)! And spent most of Christmas Eve with a severe hangover, as I recall. Again, I digress... But the event became known then as Christmas Adam (because Adam came before Eve-get it)?

By the following year, I had moved back to St. Louis and had married my husband, Brad. As we approached our first Christmas, we wanted to celebrate our happiness with our friends. That first year was a small gathering as we had eloped and many of our friends still did not know we had married so quickly after we met! (Love can and does occur at first sight!). The second year, we were in our rental house in Brentwood and the house was filled and beaming bright with food, lots of alcohol (and other weapons of mass destruction)... I know... I'm digressing AND might be incriminating myself! Then we moved to the house in Ladue and the party really had some great times! Magicians, musicians and tons of festivities... many will attest to the grand times!

There were a few years when the Christmas Adam party went dormant-when we lived in Southern Illinois and when we first moved to Florida but it has been the last three years that this party has really taken off! That first year at Sally's Backside Bar was the place to be that magical night! Redd started singing and we all joined in as we drank beer and wine and danced the night away! There was probably about 50-70 people there throughout that wonderful evening. Last year, we moved it over to Johnny McTighe's Irish Pub where the libations followed freely and we had a larger venue to accommodate the nearly 150 people that passed through its doors while Redd entertained the early evening crowd and Marc Harris entertained the late evening crowd with the bagpipers of the 23rd Highlander's piping throughout the night! I know I had a good time because many people said that I did, they seemed to have remembered having a good time and they hoped that we would do it again this year.

Well, we are really into physical and mental infliction of pain (which explains why we are married to the other!)-so here we are on the eve of another Christmas Adam and now we are taking over both places-Sally's Backside Bar will feature Redd making the holiday season bright with her voice and songs of good cheer and then upstairs the bagpipers of the 23rd Highlanders will serenade us and Marc Harris will delight us and bring us some great cheer with his fabulous music...

I hope everyone has a great time and makes it home safe and sound... Depending on when the fog in my brain from the party disappears, I will let you know... BTW... Other than the usual Bloody Mary, Mimosa or the likes-does anyone have any suggestion for hangover recovery... I got a feeling I'm gonna need it!

The Wormhole in My House

I have come to the conclusion that somewhere in this house, is-a wormhole. A volatile and vast wormhole that sucks things in-important things. This monster of a wormhole has managed to suck up the strangest of objects too! Things like: the original set of keys to my truck, an expensive diamond ring, the left shoe to my only really great pair of dress shoes; the cute black ones that dresses up any outfit. Other things too-a favorite blouse, a pen and a brand new notebook that I was sure I had left in my office supplies-have magically disappeared.

Not only have these objects disappeared (although they are merely that-objects), but this devastating wormhole has sucked all my creative juices regarding this damned story I am writing, out of my brain! So I trying to avoid it by NOT thinking about it. Inevitably though, someone will ask me, "How's the book coming?"-especially while running into everyone during the holiday parties and impromptu gatherings at the Pub. I then spend the next few hours or days fretting that I should be concentrating on writing the story- and less on partying! Usually my characters like to come and talk with me but they, too only seem to be distant shadows in my dreams-although... last night I did hear a chant as I stood before a hogans door with smoke billowing gently from behind the deer skinned entrance and to the night skies above so... perhaps there is hope on the horizon.

As Daddy would then say to me... "Other than that Mrs. Lincoln, How did you enjoy the play?". I sigh a deep sigh as I hold my hands and head up into the air to the powers that be and say, "What can ya do?! I could use a little of your help down here!" Waits for reply. "I know! I know... it's Christmas... I know… but I'm trying my best down here to do thing here so... So, thanks for listening. Amen..." I sigh another deep sigh, give one more pleading look to the heavens as I publish this and switch over to my MS Word.

If nothing happens, I might be back here... otherwise you can probably find me in my usual spot... at the Pub!

I dreamed a dream back in 2009...

In March of 2009, I spent a great deal of time trying to occupy my mind and the new found freedom the unemployment brings and was racking my brain trying to decide what in the hell could I do to occupy my mind, to allow for my creativity to 'flow' and... keep me from drinking at 11:00 in the morning while watching television!

It was one night in April, that I dreamed a foggy and shadowed dream about two couples- a modern day couple and a couple from the late 1700s and early 1800s- and they began to tell me their story! I could hear the men and the women as they all seemed to speak at me either very fast or over each other, across each other and to each other. I could not see their true images but I could hear their voices...

What I really thought was odd was though was where we were... we were in some sort rounded hut~ a Navajo hogan! I have never seen the inside of a hogan nor have I ever really traveled to the Navajo Reservation. The only person I ever recall and that I knew was of true Native American heritage, was Nick, whom I met shortly after I had moved to Colorado Springs. He died suddenly and tragically before I could ever really get to know him... I did not really pay any attention to the dream and had forgotten about it until...

In May, an ad came across the television announcing a network program called "I Am A Celebrity! Get Me Out Of Here!" and heard the name "Lou Diamond Phillips"! I have been in fantasy lustful relationships with several actors, including LDP, for many (thirty-something) years and had not heard about him nor seen any of his work for a while. I ventured out and googled his name. Across the top of the page came about 6 or 7 random publicity 'head shot' photographs of Lou Diamond; as a young man in "La Bamba" and another from "Young Guns" and yet another from "Stand and Deliver".

There was another one of him leaning his arm against a post shirtless (Phrrrrrr!) and one with his lovely wife, Yvonne (pangs 'o jealousy!). I was amazed as I studied those photos- I noting the subtle changes in his face and physique in each photograph and I was struck by two things: I had forgotten how good looking Lou Diamond was... and that life passes by quickly and photographs, stories and memories help to formulate a story- any story- whether it is a true story or... a fantasy story. It triggered me to look at photographs of my husband through the years- photos of him as a young man, as a teenager and then our married life and saw those changes in him, too. I then looked at photos of myself and saw my life change from the young wife I once was into... me today. I was amazed!

I went to sleep that night and as soon as I had finally settled my brain into sleep mode... I was "transported" out into the desert and found myself sitting on the edge of a rocky ridge, watching over a herd of sheep grazing in a meadow- not far from me. With a warming gentle breeze, I then heard someone from behind, approaching me.

I turned to see a small boy with coal black hair walking towards me. He was telling me his story; he came towards me with a devilish, handsome smile beaming across his face, and spoke at first like a child- his voice aging as he aged. By the time he was by my side, he was my age- a man approaching his fifties and retrospective of his life. He sat down next to me and continued- he told me his name... and his story. "Benjamin 'Teddy' Edwards, United States Marine Corp", he said. I fell in love with him instantly and admittedly... passionately.

He told me about his childhood, his wife, their children, his career, his life as a Navajo man and warrior but he kept insisting that it was not his story but rather his wife, Maurrey's story, that needed to be remembered and told and that through her story, his story and the story of "the early seeds" would also be told. Cryptic and confusing, to be sure, but I woke up the following morning and began my adventure of following a dream and seeing where it goes, how far will it take me and... I can only dream and hope... for now.

Since then, my "Teddy" has introduced me to several characters- including his wife Maurrey. She and I are dear friends and she does not mind when I "borrow" her husband for his point of view for my stories... or for other moments... like when my imagination tries to picture the feeling I will feel when I finally sit in the desert and watch a beautiful sunset. Teddy is with me and pointing out the beauty in everything around me. I guess, in a sense, I am having an affair with my lead character. Is that cheating? I'll have to ask Dr. Phil, if I ever get to meet him.

As for Lou Diamond Phillips... I began following him and his wife, Yvonne on Twitter later that month. I was something like #384 under Lou's Twitter "Followers" and I can't even remember on Yvonne's... I watched the show dilengently and even got my husband to watch with me. He seemed to be the kinda guy that one could probably sit down with, enjoy a pitcher of beer, throw some darts or shoot a game of pool and would walk away a great friend for a long time. He wound up winning that show and I have seen him in quite a few television shows and movies since then.

One day, late last year and in a silly mood... I tweeted Lou a funny little ditty that I can't even remember what it said (probably sexual in connotation, I am sure!). My email inbox the next day sent me an alert stating the following: "Lou Diamond Phillips is now following you on Twitter"! Since then he has sent personal reply tweets, commenting on something I have submitted or sharing a photograph of his family. He even took a picture with a twitter friend of mine (and mutual Lou Diamond Phillips fan!) with a personal note to me to raise money for autism AND sent us anniversary wishes and birthday wishes. I can't help but remember the scene in Mel Brook's Blazing Saddles where Madeline Kahn leans up against the door as Cleavon Little exits and she says: "What a nice guy!"

I hope to meet him one day and share with him how he helped inspire my fictional character... who knows, maybe if Maurrey's story actually makes it to press... he can produce, direct and star in the screen version! I can only dream a dream and follow where it goes...