TMaita's Open Salon Blog

An Open Letter To Neil Young

Sun, 7 Jun 2009 16:06:15 -0400

Dear Neil

It’s Sunday evening, and my husband and I are sitting on the couch in front of the television. I’m watching a show about Rommel, and my husband is reading The Rolling Stone. He just read to me about the release of your long awaited Archives, and started playing a trailer for the DVD on his computer.

He muted the television--- I was really only half watching Rommel as he and his defeated forces were fleeing Africa, and I began listening to the trailer. As I did, I was flooded with memories of my childhood—my adolescence really, and I began to cry, and I quickly stepped out to the backyard for a moment of reflection. It was then that I finally decided to write you this letter, to finally tell you before it’s too late, why I was flooded with such emotion.

When I was 13, I listened to my sister’s copy of Harvest. I guess this was in 1974. While the whole of my neighborhood in Castro Valley was listening to Ten Years After and Led Zeppelin, I was shut up in my bedroom, playing Harvest over and over again, and I was off and running. It was not long before I got a copy of everything that you had recorded previously, and started playing the guitar, learning your songs. I was particularly fond of “The Last Trip To Tulsa”. I would sit there and bang that song out, feeling that you were my only muse. And you were Neil. You were indeed someone in my life who I clung to, who I felt would understand my very painful feelings. It seemed so natural that I would project all of my desperate needs on to you.

My family life was disintegrating. Suddenly, my mother of 50 had turned into a caricature of Mrs. Robinson, and my dear father, who would die when I was 15, was becoming unglued. Our house was a battle zone; every new day brought an emotionally wrenching situation, and my only escape was music. I would go into my bedroom and play your records, over and over again. I bought each new record as they were released, learned all of the lyrics, tried to play them on my guitar, and soothed myself with the idea that at least there was something for me to hang on to. Listening to your songs, digesting each word, somehow gave me a kind of hope---certainly it comforted me in ways that I am extremely grateful to you for.

I’ll always remember a favor that a family friend did for me. He was with your label at the time and has been a long time family friend. When I was 14, I called him and begged him to do something, honestly I don’t remember what. I don’t know what I could have wanted, to meet you? I don’t really recall. What I did receive was an autographed picture that I still own, and it reads: “Toni, fly, fly, fly, Neil Young.” When I got this, well, how would you expect a 14-year-old girl to behave? I was elated.

Over the years, I followed you, bought your new releases, and went to your concerts. I saw you on my 17^th birthday at the Boarding House in San Francisco. We came for 2 of those performances. What a great way to spend my birthday. I also saw you at the Cow Palace when you recorded “Rust Never Sleeps”. That was one hell of a show. I’ve had great opportunities to see you, experience how you have evolved, how you have stayed the same, changed, yet never really changed at all.

I can’t tell you how many of your songs are my favorite songs. I often tell people that I believe that “Like A Hurricane” is the best rock song that I have ever heard. I still crank that song up to a painful volume and soar with you, never being set back down on earth until the very last chord.

Anyway Neil, I just needed for you to know right now, while I have the nerve to write this letter, that you helped me breathe when I was a kid. You offered me a lifeline, and you never even knew it. You helped a sad and frightened girl connect with something when it seemed that there was no one and nothing to connect to. You gave that to me, and when I listen to you now, still, my heart feels connected to you in a way that perhaps only few would understand.

Thank you Neil, for everything, always.

“In Treatment” from a psychotherapist’s perspective

Wed, 27 May 2009 16:05:30 -0400

I’ve become a huge fan of HBO’s phenomenal series “In Treatment”. There are a few reasons for this. First, it is so well written and craftfully acted---take John Mahoney’s recent performance as the tormented CEO “Walter”. In the midst of treatment, Walter comes face to face with his “real self”, and begins sobbing uncontrollably. He has come into contact with the grief that he feels over the choices that he felt emotionally compelled to make since childhood. Paul walks over and places one hand on his shoulder, and Walter grabs onto Paul’s leg and continues to sob---he reaches out for connection and comfort. This was a phenomenal and vulnerable moment, and one that moved me to tears. This was an Emmy winning performance by Mahoney.

Another reason for my rapt interest in this series is the character “Paul”, exquisitely played by Gabriel Byrne. As a practicing psychotherapist, I see myself in Paul, and have struggled at times with therapeutic neutrality and boundaries. Paul has broken these sacred vows on more than one occasion. His love/countertransference for Laura, allowing Alex to bring his espresso machine into his office, taking April to chemotherapy, and his dual relationship with Gina are all vivid examples of Paul’s own vulnerabilities and very human needs and feelings. I like Paul, a lot. I like the fact that he is so invested in his patient’s wellness, that he sometimes loses sight of what he can and cannot have an effect upon.

I’ve had several cases where I’ve been confronted with these kinds of feelings. Years ago, I had a male client who I was quite sexually attracted to. I recall looking forward to his visits, and I felt that he was somehow so fragile and sensitive. Not only did I have the urge to screw him, but I wanted to mother him too. I’m not sure whether I ever discussed these feelings in supervision, but I knew that a need within me was being touched at the time, and that it had nothing to do with this patient or any kind of “love” for him. I had to step back and take a look at it, rein these feelings in, and finally work them through.

There was also the case of the brother of a Hall of Fame baseball star that I was treating. It took everything in my power to not “pry” for information about said baseball star, to not ask for more than what the patient offered.

And I have a current case—a woman who I find so charismatic, funny, and talented, that I have to stop myself from chatting with her about things that have nothing to do with the reasons for her seeking treatment.

Paul has questioned himself and his effectiveness as a therapist, and it’s true, there is a certain level of frustration and feelings of helplessness that can occur as a therapist witnesses a patient making bad choice after bad choice. All the interpretation in the world is sometimes not enough to help a person who is so entrenched in such patterns of behavior and thinking---a development of defenses and coping skills crafted over a lifetime. There is a temptation to step in, to want to give advice or offer pat interpretations to steer your patient in a direction of true change. Unfortunately, this advice would only fall on deaf ears—as Paul discovered once or twice.

My recent sessions with a 14 year-old girl with anxiety disorder speak very loudly to this conundrum. I suffered from anxiety disorder when I was a teenager, and it is traumatizing to have these overwhelming feelings; feelings that become secrets out of fear that people will think you’re abnormal or “weird”. As I sat back and listened to her tell me about her problems, I choked up---I shed a few tears as I told her how well I understood what she was feeling, and how I had been through the very same thing. I wanted to find a way to take all of her pain and worry away from her, rather than simply sending her packing to a psychiatrist for therapeutic medications. I felt her pain vis a vis my own personal suffering, but I could not save her from what she is going through. I can only walk beside her and offer her support, acceptance, and solid treatment options.

Becoming a skilled therapist is a life’s work—not something that can be given you in graduate school. A therapist continues to evolve as they encounter each new case, and as they face their own personal issues. Paul’s crisis of faith and personal isolation in Season 2 will no doubt create a stronger, even more empathetic therapist. We’ll see I hope.

So Season 2 of In Treatment is now complete. April is recovering from cancer and leaving treatment for now, Mia is slowly coming to terms with her fear of intimacy, Oliver has a true friend in Paul, Walter is showing great courage to continue this in-depth therapy at 68 years-old, and Gina and Paul will part ways again—for now anyway. Let’s hope that we all get more of Dianne Weist as Gina.

In my tvland fantasy, all of Paul’s patients are still in treatment with him, continuing the path to self-discovery and true change, and Paul is going out on a few dates!

A Memorial Day ride of a lifetime

Tue, 26 May 2009 19:05:49 -0400

Every year during Memorial Day weekend, there is a steady stream of activity in the skies over my house. One by one, they pass by. First, the B-17, and we cheer and applaud with excitement. We’re awestruck as this lumbering ghost ship passes overhead. We can see the turret where a veteran of WWII operated a machine gun, blasting the enemy buzzing past. Next comes the B-24, then the B-25. We hoot and holler, jumping up and down as though the pilots and passengers can see and hear us as they pass by.

After several years of watching this spectacle, we decided to take a ride ourselves, so we drove out to the local municipal airport, and boarded that B-17 for the ride of our lives, There were 8 other passengers and 2 pilots. Everyone was feeling stoked about this once in a lifetime experience.

It was 9:00AM. There were excited faces, some young, some old, some veterans, and some are daughters. On the tarmac, I saw the living legacy of our veterans. There’s the B-17, a B-24 and 25, and there’s a P-51, all used in active duty during WWII. There is a sense of great pride among those gathered here on this Memorial Day.

We boarded the B-17, and I instantly noted the odor of machinery and grease. I had never realized this, and why would I, but the seats are on the floor. You have to sit on a cushion, and the seat belt is attached to the floor of the plane. I mused about what possible good this could be to anyone in the midst of real trouble.

On either side there are 2 windows with machine guns sticking out of the plexi-glass. My husband takes a photo of me with my arms wrapped around one of them. I’m play strafe the Nazi, with an enormous grin on my face, doing my best to make machine gun noises, but I sounded terribly lame.

We passed though the rear section of the aircraft, and walked to the middle of the plane, where I sat with my husband and an elderly gentleman. He served in the Korean War, and this is his 3rd trip in one of these iconic planes. He had ridden on the B-24 and B-25 in previous years.

Greg and the Korean vet are sitting on the floor on one of those cushions, but I get to sit on an office chair where the radio operator used to sit. The old radio is still there, but inoperable. There are old dials and switches, old tubes. I wanted to play with them, but suddenly became apprehensive. Maybe I shouldn’t touch them, I thought to myself irrationally.

I strapped myself into my swiveling office chair with that burlap seat belt, but I was having a hell of a time figuring out how to lock it, but it didn't matter. I was too excited to care. I looked up and there was an open hatch directly above me. A built in sunroof!

The plane started to move down the runway, but we stopped at the end. It was a “cold” take-off, so the pilots had to spend about 10 minutes warming up the 4 engines. One at a time, the propellers started. I could see them from my little window where I sat. They ran the engines full blast for a few minutes, and then we started to move again, but faster this time. Before I knew it, we were lifting off the ground.

I quickly unbuckled my burlap belt and stood up. (They had told us we could stand up as soon as we were off the ground) I immediately poked my head out of the hatch and looked out behind. The Livermore Valley glistened in the morning sun and through patches of dewy mist. The wind was whipping through my hair, and I suddenly felt like a happy dog on a joy ride in her masters car, head poking out the window, tongue happily hanging out of my mouth; colors and movement everywhere!

We flew north at about 2000 feet for about 15 minutes, and I was transfixed, standing next to one of the machine guns gazing out the window. I saw familiar sights, even my own home as we passed over my town, but what was even more astonishing to me was what I felt.

As we lumbered through the sky over Contra Costa County, I felt a great wave of emotion. I soon recognized that what I was feeling was a combination of pride and admiration for our fathers and mothers who lived through a definitive time in history and I also felt a great sense of loss. On average, 1000 WWII vets die each day. In a few years, this generation will be completely lost to us.

So in tribute to my father, who was a Staff Sargeant in the Army Air Corp, and who was stationed all over Europe, and to my mother, who was a WAC at 20 years old and drove officers to and fro in a Jeep, I salute you, I love you , and I miss you.

Amateur Strip Night in Creve Coeur Illinois

Mon, 30 Mar 2009 00:03:42 -0400

I guess that I have a “bucket list”, though it has changed and evolved over time. These days I dream of traveling to Sicily to meet my “people”, of finally getting back stage at a Neil Young concert, of having a one night stand with James Purefoy, and of continuing a tattoo that I got in 1996. The artist left an open stem trailing away from a colorful orchid on my left upper thigh, figuring that I would want to add more flowers at some point. Perhaps.

One of the things that was NOT on my radar was stripping at a “gentleman’s club”. No, bearing all at a strip club in Creve Coeur, Illinois on amateur night was never on my to do list. Yet, for some heretofore-unbeknownst reason I found myself dressed in a much too tight animal print “dress” wearing way too high, high-heeled shoes, and swinging around a strippers pole on a Tuesday night in July of 2002.

Maybe it was a dare that I made with myself, or perhaps it was that new breast augmentation that I was so proud of, or maybe, just maybe it was about a 40-year-old woman who still thought that she looked pretty hot, but who was starting to face the tyranny of middle age. Hell, maybe I just did it for the rush and for the attention.

Why would a girl from San Francisco travel all the way to Creve Coeur Illinois to do a strip tease you ask? Creve Coeur? Where is this humble little town? Well, it’s right across the Illinois River next to that bosom of the heartland, Peoria.

It happened that my husband’s mother lived in Peoria, and we traveled there once or twice a year to visit her at her retirement home. Of course, she wasn’t always my mother-in-law. Hubby was married previously to someone for 20 years---the “true” daughter-in-law, and I only started my Peoria pilgrimage a few years before mil’s death. These details may be irrelevant, but I always felt that perhaps mother-in-law saw me as suspect, as sloppy seconds. She treated me coolly, and kept me at a distance for the most part.

There wasn’t too much to do in Peoria, although there was a gambling riverboat parked on the Illinois where I enjoyed playing a little blackjack and sipping on watered down vodka tonics. Then there was the time that I met Dan Fogelberg’s mother. She and mother-in-law played bridge together, and Mrs. F. attended mother-in-law’s funeral. Perhaps this shouldn’t count as a highlight, I mean after all….

What we did get a bang out of was visiting local strip clubs. Once upon a time, many of our travels included visiting each town’s “tittie bar”. I’m not exactly sure what the impetus of these visits were, except that there was the “we might get turned-on” factor, and want to go back to the hotel and, well, you know. There was even the occasional fantasy that we might bring one of these girls back with us. The very thought today sends a shiver down my spine, but at the time, there was something mesmerizing about a naked dancing girl making “contact” with me.

But I digress. I had been toying with the idea of doing a “strip” when I turned 40. I was in great shape, and could still pull it off. This was merely a fantasy, you understand, but it peripherally explains why I found myself on the stage that night with drunken mid-western men throwing one-dollar bills at me.

We had visited Big Al’s in Peoria, and Club Cabaret in Creve Coeur on one of our previous visits---we were at Club Cabaret on their amateur strip night, and I cavalierly vowed to return there one day for my big hot moment of naked wonder.

I really was joking, truly I was. I never intended to visit that little adult store with all of the stripper-wear. It was a wonderland of easily shed dresses and acrylic heeled shoes that were so high, you should have to sign a waiver to purchase them. I didn’t buy the shoes---at least I knew better than that.

It was decided. That evening after we kissed mother-in-law goodnight, we would head back over the bridge to Creve Coeur where I would surely win the amateur strip contest. Never mind that I can’t “strip” dance. Never mind that I have never had a hand on one of those shiny strippers poles, though I’d seen it done numerous times. In fact, I fancied myself like a stripper that I had seen at the world famous Mitchell Brothers in San Francisco. She had stripped to Pink Floyd’s “Us and Them”---slinking across the stage and rolling around on the floor like a wounded sidewinder. If she could do it, then surely I could.

The music. I had to select the right music with a slow enough tempo, but I was drawing a blank. I toyed with the idea of dancing to “Let Me Entertain You”, like Natalie Wood did in the classic film “Gypsy”. No, too kitschy. Better stay away from that. I thought of stripping to the song “Smooth”, that was on Carlos Santana’s phenomenal “Supernatural”. I mean, if there was a song that needed stripping to, that was the song. Fear set in. I knew that I couldn’t dance well enough to do that song justice. Better to leave that for Pink Floyd chick.

Having exhausted my possibilities, I asked the music guy to select something “slow and bluesy” for me. I had hoped that he had a recording of Stevie Ray Vaughan’s “Riviera Paradise”, but I was disappointed when he didn’t even know who Vaughan was. Okay, then go with the way too long blues number that I had never even heard before. Yep, that ought to do the trick.

My husband sat “ringside”, and I headed backstage to gather with the other lucky contestants and get instructions, the order of appearance, etc. I found the dressing room where I changed into my tigress outfit, checked my hair and make-up, and started waiting for my name to be called. I paced around, checking on my husband periodically. He kept asking me if I wanted a drink. “No, I really don’t”, I nervously muttered back to him. Most people have a hard time believing that I did this stone cold sober. Not a drink or a tranquilizer did pass these soon to be quivering lips.

Finally, my reckoning was upon me. There were 5 other girls, and I was second to the last. The girl who had taken her turn before me was just about finished. She was about 5’3” tall, and weighed in at about 150 pounds---though this is a guestimate. She walked out on the stage with supreme confidence, and I had heard her saying how important this was to her. She HAD to win, because she wanted to be employed at Club Cabaret, and naturally she could use the $150.00 prize money.

She danced up a storm. I have never seen anyone “boogie down” like that portly young girl. There was raucous applause for this soon to be Club Cabaret star, but I wasn’t sunk yet!

Secretly I thought that I ought to win. Wasn’t I the most refined? Wasn’t I the most physically attractive? Weren’t my new boobs just incredible? Bet you would never guess my age…….

My music started, and I walked toward the stage, slowly, deliberately. I have a secret, and you’ll never find out what it is, was my modus operandi. I moved stealthily toward the object of my desire, the phallic shiny pole. I reached out my arm to grab hold, and slowly swung around this maypole. I swung around and around---knowing I would never be able to inch myself gracefully up or down this apparatus. Hmmm. What can I do next? The music was slow and unfamiliar, so I gazed out to the audience, and began wandering around the stage dipping and grinding, slowly removing my cape, then my gloves, and finally, my second skin.

“Oh my god, I’m naked”, I thought to myself as strange men gazed upon me. I moved closer to the edge of the stage to try some of the “moves” that I had seen performed by other strippers. Slowly to the floor I shimmied, and tried to bestow upon the patrons what I thought that they wanted. In turn, these “gentlemen” handed me one-dollar bills, though my generous and biased husband tossed me a fiver.

I awkwardly rose from my prone position musing, “geez this song is slow and long. This is ridiculous.” I continued to clumsily saunter around the stage, hoping that I hadn’t made too much of a fool of myself, hoping that it would all be over soon, wishing that I had stripped to the Beatles “Twist and Shout”. At least it would have been a lively 2 minutes of burlesque.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the music ended. I stood there, some applause thrust upon me. A patron then queried me, “I’ll bet those breasts are real. Are they?” I cheekily grinned back and said, “Yeah, they’re real”. “Too bad the poor schmuck won’t ever get the chance to find out”, I coyly grinned and mused as I hurried backstage to find my street clothes and to finally reunite with my happy husband.

“I can’t believe that I did it!” I said, as I sat back down with him and awaited the news of the evening’s winner. After a short wait, it was announced---the 5’3” and portly, boogieing fool had won the hearts and minds---okay, not their minds, some other part of the anatomy. I had lost, and while I felt a moment of disappointment and insecurity, I knew that I was never going to be crowned the winner on this night. I knew that they knew that my destiny lay elsewhere; that I was an interloper in Creve Coeur Illinois.

I was satisfied. I had done something off-the-wall and completely out of my comfort zone. It had been a true physical and mental high, and this would be something that I could and would recall fondly and with a certain fervor in the retelling.

And I did have my $8.00 in tips. Hey everybody, drinks are on me!

Shooting Spree in Oakland - 4 officers and a suspect dead

Sat, 21 Mar 2009 21:03:18 -0400

Violence is not unusual in Oakland, but today's violence is just another grim reminder that when people are desperate or feeling threatened, they will make the most fatal of choices.

Apparently, 4 police officers were gunned down, and there are conflicting news reports stating that they are all either dead or critically wounded. In any case, they were taken to Highland Hospital, where the media and interested parties are gathering and awaiting a news conference scheduled for 7:00 PM.

One of the suspects is confirmed dead.

It began with the fatal shooting of two officers during a routine traffic stop near 73rd and Hillside Streets, around 1:15 PM on Saturday. A chase ensued, with more officers joining in the chase and manhunt. Apparently the suspect barricaded themselves in a house, and consequently shot two more cops before it was over.

I live just through the tunnel---the Caldecott Tunnel, and I visit Oakland weekly---well, not 73rd and Hillside. I visit a different part of Oakland, where I can buy a delicious steamed latte, and hot toasted bagel with cream cheese, and casually sit at one of the sidewalk tables, reading my EastBay Express. That's the only part of Oakland that I really care to spend much time in these days.

Parts of Oakland ARE scary, and when you hear stories like this, it just makes it that much more disappointing that people are still living in poverty, still subsisting on crime, still lacking resources, still living as if they have no promise, no option--except to live a stereotyped kind of life.