“We’ve been brought here for a very short time, against our will, and we don’t know why.” I love that line. What is the point of our birth and life and death? Why are we here? What is our true purpose? These thoughts keep some of us up at night; others have never … [Read more...]
Dick and Jane
Audio: click arrow to play ~ Dick and Jane • 1955, San Jose, California ~ Jefferson Elementary was like all grammar schools: the classrooms arranged with five rows of seven metal wood-topped desks; the playground as barren and flat as a prison yard; the morning and midday recesses echoing … [Read more...]
California Mid-Century Classic
On my last marker birthday (sixty-fifth) I muddled over penning my obituary, my epitaph, or a newspaper ad. My own obituary was too weird to write. My epitaph was a no-brainer ... And since I’ve been in real estate in Sonoma forever (actually it’s now 35 years, which is about … [Read more...]
A Defining Moment
Audio: A Defining Moment * December 1953, San Jose (click arrow to listen) I don’t remember how I got there or who dropped me off, perhaps Daddy waited in a car across the street, or maybe the family I’d been living with brought me. Who knows? It didn’t really matter; I was coming to live … [Read more...]
A Billet-Doux to My Siblings, 2004
Audio: Billet-Doux (condensed version) click arrow to listen Dear Gordon (Larry) and Marian, Carleen, Liz (Betty), and Claudia, My writing began with “Queen Bee.” When I shared it with each of you, it gave us a connection we hadn’t had. I also read it to our cousin Marceline whom I’d met … [Read more...]
Positively Haight Street, 1968
Audio: (click arrow to listen) 1968 was the year Eldridge Cleaver published Soul on Ice. He and his wife Kathleen, who had the most immense head of hair I'd ever laid eyes on, banked at my teller window. It was the year of the Yippies, Black Panthers, and the SDS, the year Martin Luther King was … [Read more...]
Sweeney’s Penny Candy
On Haight and Belvedere, tightly wedged between my father’s dime store and Superba Market, was Sweeney’s. The Sweeneys were a sweet, white-haired old couple who lived in the flat above their penny candy shop. Actually, now that I think about it, Mr. Sweeney was on the crusty side, a big man, balding … [Read more...]
A Confused Heart and a White Train
October 7, 1967 • San Francisco, California On a crisp October day, my father escorted me down the carpeted aisle of Holy Name of Jesus Catholic Church, our parish in the Sunset. I looked like a fairy princess, dressed in the white wedding dress my stepsister wore when she married. It fit me like … [Read more...]
Bee Sting and a Dead Roly-Poly
1955, San Jose, California ~ I read whatever was in front of me. I read all four sides of the milk carton and the Cheerios box and the C&H container. I read the editor’s notes and publication dates and fine print in the front of True Detective and Reader’s Digest and Cornet or whatever Mom … [Read more...]
A Chicken Named Blackie
1943 • Sonora, Tuolumne County, California ~ Our family lived at 104 Green Street, a white two-story house right in the center of town that rented for $35 a month, and where I would be born in five years. A wide porch ran on three sides. The back portion was enclosed … [Read more...]
Awaiting a Grandson
I wrote this to my son Matt (who taught me about bandages, patience, and love) on his thirty-third birthday (1-14-2003) and who was awaiting the birth of his first child, a boy. That child, who is now nearly as tall as me—who can clean a fish, shoot a basket, and draw not only a cow … [Read more...]
In Search of Funny
Someone asked me about humor, and how do you learn to be funny. I said I don’t think you can learn to be funny. Either you are, or you aren’t. I told her I thought humor is often closely related to pain, that it arises as a reaction to suffering like a coping mechanism, that sometimes it’s the only … [Read more...]
A Dream Story
Many of my dreams, the ones I remember, are of me trying to get somewhere, usually on some odd form of transportation, not knowing how to get there, and often with people following me who think I actually know where I'm going. In one I'm riding a horse, leading the way; in another I'm in an English … [Read more...]
“Let’s Take a Trip Down Whittier Blvd!”
1961 - 1966 • La Habra High School ~ Four years of high school blended together, being neither the low nor high point of my life. The second tallest girl my freshman year at La Habra High, I tripped up and down the long halls between classes praying to be invisible, hoping no one would look at … [Read more...]
Epilogue to Behind These Doors
Revelations and Reckonings ~ My parents were like black and white, like oil and water, like sin and prayer. Daddy, not one to boil over, married a kettle of emotions. If he could have loosened his grip and if Mom hadn’t completely unraveled, my childhood might have been different. But it was … [Read more...]
Sam: A Dog Story
It was the worst day of his life, and I could hear the despair in his voice. Matt was calling from the emergency animal hospital in Sacramento. My son and his wife were on their way to the Sierras for a camping weekend. Pulling alongside on Highway 80, a woman frantically signaled them to pull … [Read more...]
Bless This Mess
I’m hard-wired for formal prayer. I find myself reciting the Our Father when an earthquake hits, and oftentimes at night as I go to sleep. "How weird,” I think, stopping in the middle, but then a Hail Mary (a woman about whom I hold equally … [Read more...]
The Shape I’m In
This house was one I often drew as a child, and other than simple stick figures, my only attempt at art. An illustrator turned my drawing into the cover for Behind These Doors: a red house with a peaked roof, a door, a window, and five flowers—surrounded by a tree, some grass, and a sunny blue sky. … [Read more...]
Book Launch @ Readers’
Passages from Behind These Doors: A Family Memoir ~ I posted on Facebook that my book launch Thursday night was a "Life Event." It absolutely was. I felt held, seen, heard, and loved. It was joyous and my heart was filled to the brim. It could very well be the high point of all this (and you know … [Read more...]
Sin and Prayer
My parents were like black and white, oil and water, sin and prayer. My father, not one to boil over, married a kettle of emotions. If he could’ve loosened his grip and if my mother hadn’t completely unraveled, perhaps my childhood would have been different. But it was what it was. Look, we all have … [Read more...]
My Friend Kim Heddy
Kim joined our office as an agent in 1994. As it turned out we had a lot in common: we both loved real estate, ice cream, and dark chocolate. In 2002 she became a partner in my real estate practice: she took over showing property to my clients, which meant I no longer got lost wandering around town … [Read more...]
Behind These Doors: Prologue
Prologue Audio (click arrow to play): My brother Larry was under the illusion that our mother was a good mother, but he had a different childhood than the rest of us. My sisters were convinced otherwise: Carleen complained Mom was thoughtless and self-centered, Betty resented her for … [Read more...]
Reincarnation
Elizabeth Ann Duchi Dec 3, 1939 - Oct 8, 2004 Sixty-four years ago my middle sister was born: Elizabeth Ann "Betty/Liz" Clemens. She was married forty-six years, had four children, and was the funniest person I knew. A year ago she developed a wracking cough. Eight months ago she was diagnosed … [Read more...]
Ten Years Have Slipped By
My Sister Liz Yesterday I found out my sister is dying. I know, thousands of people die every day—but they're not my sister. She's had this constant wracking cough for three months and we finally got her to go to a doctor. The first one said it was allergies and sent her home with nasal spray. When … [Read more...]
Unleashing the Flying Monkeys
Writing a memoir is one thing, having others read it is another; it's akin to being a nude model for the first time in front of an art class. But standing naked in front of strangers (or worse yet, in front of family, friends, and everyone in town) has nothing to do with me or what I look like, it’s … [Read more...]