Play Misty For Me

One of my most shameful admissions consists of calling up the local country and western radio station and begging them to play an awful, awful song called "Elvira." The chorus went something like, My heart's on fire for Elvira, and there was a popular dance at the time that everyone did, much in the way of the hustle or the ma corina. It wasn't pretty, but my small group of girlfriends, my sister and I would all disguise our voices and call and call the station and ask for the song. The djs were nice, but there were only so many times a day during that summer that they could endure the song themselves so we heard it infrequently, but when we did, there was great joy and running to get our special outfits on and the dance, which we couldn't really do but improvised to the best of our ability.

In a few years, one of the group would be pregnant and another lost to drugs. They went the way of the Go Ask Alice girls, the ones snatched from childhood without warning. I could not have envisioned the future they'd have, although there were subtle signs -- for instance, the girl who got pregnant offered to have sex with the dj to get him to play our song all day and all night. I wasn't entirely sure what sex was, but it did not seem like a fair trade. The desires of children would morph into something else, something darker, but for that summer, we had a little innocence, a catchy song and dance routine, and a number we could dial all hours of the day and night where someone would pick up and at least pretend to listen.

Michelle's Spell of the Day

"There's something a little scary about funny women. Well, they're threatening. And there was a survey done one time where they asked women what they were most afraid of from men. And the women-- their response was they were most afraid of being hit or beaten or hurt from men. And they asked men what they were most afraid of from women, and they said being laughed at. " Ann Richards, former governor of Texas

Cocktail Hour

Drinking restaurant suggestion: Joe T. Garcia's in Ft. Worth, Texas

Benedictions and Maledictions

For John Ricci and his question about the name of Hank's sister --
Higgins is a nickname that Hank came up with from God knows where for Robin, his sister. Of course, she has grown to love it and now that Hank has died, most of Hank's friends still call her by that name.