Senior High

December 7, 2016

At Peace with Lou

Lou is dead. The poetry hound and witty, Jewish mystic I love to write about. My bestie Naomi’s 98 year-old Dad. I thought you’d want to know. Lou was a sweet-talking mensch with a hearty laugh and a blinding smile, keen on love and not afraid to sing it. In the literary haze of his final chapter, this straight-shooting minstrel became…

September 16, 2016

Lou over the ocean

I think my pal Lou is on his deathbed. What does that even mean? He sleeps most of the time and doesn’t eat much. His days of being a medical miracle are spent pondering the finish line. At 97, his gaze is distant, his kidneys are kaput and his body is shut down for business, but man-oh-man-oh-man, dude,…

July 5, 2016

Lucky Lou & the Garden of Eden

I get there and the 97 year-old, retired filtration equipment distributor and Jewish mystic Lou Levine is in the garden shade, nose deep in the Book of 101 Poems, 67 poems in. Lou smiles, serene. I am enthralled, not just because poetry and song have inspired this remarkably happy man for nearly a century, but because his darling…

December 4, 2015

Living the Dream

I threw myself at a baby in the café today. Her eyes were soft then wild, she was purely in the moment, drooling like a bulldog, high as a kite on life. I swooped her into my arms and spun her round and around, coloured lights swirling and whirling in her flashing brain… or was…

April 15, 2015

I Am Stronger than Most Men

At a polyfiber-swathed table, in the once la-di-da dining room of a still pricey home for old Jews, my best friend’s father Lou is sing sing singing out loud, to the Hebrew songs in his head. His meal-time gal pal Ethel signals for him to keep it down, but Lou’s on a roll and frankly doesn’t…

March 26, 2015

Meet Lou

We get here, and Lou is singing. His caregiver Polly is waiting for the chorus when he takes a breath, so she can feed him. His pal Ethel watches him like a hawk so he doesn’t go full throttle, piss off the other diners and make trouble for them in their once grand, now fading old-age…

March 13, 2014

Lost

I was in my head, my hood, my music, when a honking car blasted me back to the real world. I looked up to see an old woman standing on top of a manhole, in the middle of the icy street. Her lips were moving, but no words came out. The sun set her snow-white…