Near the Kirk Douglas theater, in Culver City, a stone's thrown away from the Sony lot, there's a elementary school. 🏫 At precisely 10:24 am, Pacific time, three teachers were trying to line up twenty students or so, to take their photograph. I could have said picture, but photograph is more eternal than a simple picture.
"Picture this!" someone says and then describes what *he/she/they/them* want you to see. And it is never life changing . But no one says "photograph this" because that is serious business; a photograph will stand the test of time and mark that moment forevermore.
Many years from now, those children will look at that photograph and will be unlikely to recall the names of their classmates. My elementary school photograph is framed; it hangs on my hallway; my partner smiles every time she walks by and sometimes mocks me by saying "good morning, Karla Maria" or "good evening, Karla Maria" to the girl I love when I was 8 years old. She says the name loudly so that I can hear it over my acoustic guitar.
My thespian partner is Canadian; I'm convinced Canadians are all extraterrestrials; only golden retrievers are nicer and after years and years I come to find out my yellow fur coated golden retriever are sometimes called Canadian golden retrievers. It makes sense.
It's remarkable to me how many dots in my lifeline connected in these crossing roads in Culver City. The Sony lot is where they once made films, today they focus on making movies. They had a different name then; Columbia Pictures. He who has the gold makes the rules, I venture, so gone is the beautiful lady holding a torch and I will let you tell me what is the image that Sony Pictures chose to inspire those elementary school children, because I certainly can't recall.
A film is a sequence of pictures, frames, lined up together and it was Kirk Douglas who gave birth to the film that would change my life. For many years, he tried to get it made but couldn't arrange financing; when he became too old to play the main character, he gave the screenplay to his son, Michael Douglas. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest won a bucket load of oscars, including best picture - they call everything pictures here in La La Land, it is a word power play by the head of studios to keep those pesty artists grounded. By grounded, I mean well paid; it's easier to control people who work for cash.
I walked into a theater in Brazil and all the dots connected in my mind: fashion, music, photograph, lighting, cobblestone and street lights; a kaleidoscope of things I loved strung together to tell the story of my mother.
At lunch, Ray smiled at me and asked me what I was thinking. It is what Canadians do when Brazilians stop talking.
"I'm reminiscing" I said.
"And when is it that you are not reminiscing?" She asked.
"When I'm thinking of you." I should have said, but I fumbled the moment and took something from her plate instead.
** seriously; if the worst that happens to you today is that someone uses the wrong pronoun for you, count your blessings.