During the day I program and design websites. I have been doing this for over twenty years. It has been well-paid stable employment and I seem to have a knack for it. Perhaps my BA in Music from the 1980’s has helped in that being able to read, think critically and creatively about the world and things is crucial to programming and design.
Everyday there is a task that takes literally half of your brain. Move this data from here to there. Create these menus in WordPress. Batch these image files. During these times I often listen to podcasts. I dig shows out of KCRW, WWOZ and KMHD. Yesterday I was listening to Fresh Air from WHYY in Philadelphia and the show was about someone from San Francisco. Someone by the name of Alia Volz was being interviewed about her new book Home Baked.
It took until halfway through the show to realize – “wait a second! I know this person!” In the 1990’s I played with Louis Romero and his salsa band Mazacote. For a while a woman named Meredith managed the band. She was a gregarious person with flaming red hair and green eyes. She got us gigs up in wine country and a few corporate parties. Sometimes during that period I would be asked to give her daughter, who had the same flaming red hair, a ride home or to the next stop. No problem. Be safe out there kid.
Listen to the show. Alia’s mom is indeed an artist. At one point around 1995 she asked if I could store some paintings of her’s as she had just become evicted from her apartment. I agreed. The oil paintings were very large, very colorful full-figured nudes – all women. I hung these in my Bernal Heights cottage for a few months. The reaction of people who came in the cottage was worth the storage. I had no idea that Alia grew up in such an unusual situation. That was 25 years ago. How time flies. It is great to hear that Alia is doing well and living a creative life as a writer.
In the 1970s the definition of a famous person was that you had to be on Sesame Street. In 2020, my take is that to be a famous person you have to have been of Fresh Air. I must be getting old as I am starting to know a lot of famous people.