The holidays are upon us

So the holiday season is upon us and with it, ruminations of seasons past.

When I was performing a great deal while still in college, I spent a lot of time on the party circuit during the holidays. It’s interesting being a performer at high falutin’ house parties. You’re not quite a guest, but you’re not quite the help either. One experience that stands out in my mind was an event an the insanely large home of the dean of the school of humanities. It was my first real contact with folks who were professional servants and it unnerved me greatly. You don’t want to believe that there would still be such a wide gulf between the classes in modern times and modern cities and I was in for quite a rude shock. I was all gussied up in my formal wear and was taking a break between sets in the solarium when I ran into an older black man in a classic butler’s tux. One that would not distinguish him as anything other than “the help”. He was very sweet to me, at first assuming that I was a guest and being all solicitous, then when he realized that I was the entertainment, his manner changed a little. His posture relaxed a little, his speech became more colloquial and conspiratorial as we talked about the folks attending the party. It was in the middle of this that an elderly white woman dripping with what were probably heirloom jewels swept in on a cloud of very expensive perfume and interrupted without apology-as if there was no one else in the room besides me and I obviously wasn’t doing anything-mock begging me to sing again. “What will it take to get you to sing something from Cats??” she pleaded, her hand bird-like on my arm, barely touching. I looked at her, then looked at my new acquaintance who had immediately snapped back into service mode, winked imperceptibly at him and said, “If you, yourself, bring me a drink and keep them coming and I’ll sing whatever you want.”

She blinked, then looked toward my new friend who had assumed the “I am here but not listening, lo, I am invisible” look on his face and was fading away to gather empty glasses. I smiled glowingly. She laughed nervously at first, then agreed and we swept back into the main room to the piano. Where she somehow miraculously produced my fresh cocktail. The rest of the evening as long as she was still able, I’d catch her eye from across the room and wave my empty glass and off she’d go…as long as I kept the tunes coming. I think she found it fun.

“Memory” never tasted so sweet, especially when I’d see the butler’s shoulders twitching with mirth.
midnight…not a sound from the pavement…

~ by missterioso on December 3, 2007.