DJ TIME-ON THE AIR
Funny for her to get sentimental about a memory of a memory.
She knew the "sha-la-las" and "shing-a-ling-a-ling" referred to the Oldies-Oldies songs on Oldies 103. The 50's Do-Wop that they'd drop from their format entirely in the new century.
As an only child, she was the daughter of a mother whose musical taste was simple; she had four songs in her repertoire. American songs had first emigrated to her island on newly invented phonograph records of the twenties. 30 years later, crooners were still singing "Button Up Your Overcoat" on the Victrola. The war planes flying overhead during WWII, found her singing "Don't Sit Under The Apple Tree", while she herself ate nispheras and other "exotic" fruits that only grew in tropical zones like Florida and California. Having come to America, still optimistic at 33, her mother had expected streets paved with gold, or at the very least, the Reader's Digest version of life. Doris Day sang "Que Sera Sera" and she echoed the sentiment. She knew about the early Beatles, the group that was a hit in Europe, before they came to America and "got crazy". She'd sing the closest thing to a lullabye to her baby, "Listen, Do-Wah-Do, Do you Want To Know A Secret?" and pour out all her grief and sorrow to her little girl. Teaching her a few "face" words in Portuguese, Lingua, Nariz, Olhos, Boca, Cara. The secret was she wanted to be back in Portugal.
Her father's favorite singer was Judy Collins. But that was all hearsay. "He had died when she was young" (a phrase she heard herself saying so often that she thought she should put it to music). He left behind no records of his own.
She didn't get a stereo of her own until after he died. It was a radio, PLUS a record player, PLUS a tape deck to record off of the previous two. She dated her musical life from the point she could tape her favorite songs off the radio and borrow records from the library. That and her walkman meant she could listen to her tape of Judy Collins asking them to send in the clowns a million times without ever understanding what it was about. But logging it in her memory banks for later translation.
There were commercials on television about these songs she heard on Oldies 103, during the Burns and Allen Show, during the Danny Thomas Show, during Leave it to Beaver and I Dream of Jeannie. Hits of the 50's, Solid Gold of the 60's, spliced into new songs-so you couldn't tell which notes belonged to which songs. The ultimate mix-tape.
And then there was a commercial about The Carpenters. From the way the announcer talked about them, you could tell there was tragedy. Were they a couple? Was it a murder-suicide? Did he die young like her father? The songs were so beautiful, and she NEVER heard them on the radio-were they banned? (Was the tragedy as bad as Charles Manson?) Or just forgotten? She snuck a check from her mother's secret hiding place and sent $19.95 plus shipping and handling for a two record or cassette set, featuring the Carpenters. She chose cassettes because they were easier to hide.
She brought them on the road trip to Quabbin Reservoir, she brought them to San Jose. She listened to them instead of listening to the grown-ups talk. She was a teenager anyway, a decade or two off.
When she found out the true story, that she had been listening to the Patron Saint of Anorexics, she got into the habit of not eating whenever their songs came on. It fit right in with her own lifestyle. She could go for 4 days without eating, and even then, she had stopped because of a mental block, not because she was hungry.
Somehow, the radio began playing Carpenter songs whenever they were in a diner.
"Aren't you gonna eat? You just said you were starving!"
"Um, no. I'm not hungry anymore," staring at the luscious hamburger on her plate.
"Is she finished?" asked the waitress.
"I guess. Don't you want to wrap it up?"
Karen wouldn't want you to. SHE wouldn't eat a hamburger.
"Um, no thank you. I'm done,"
The combination of Catholic School teaching the virtues of suffering and the holy voice of Karen would confuse her for decades.
She never starved herself down to her ideal weight, even when she stopped eating. So she figured she might as well treat food like other people did. But she'd stop everytime she heard Karen's voice coming over the loudspeakers. Karen would want you to enjoy everything this life had to offer.
Nothing tastes as good as thin.
Thin tastes like death.
Food=Life=Sensual Pleasures=Music=Sex=Life (Good and Bad)
She was learning from a ghost to remember the old music fondly. A memory once removed. Remembering herself, remembering Karen remembering the Do-Wop from the 50's.
"Those old memories/ still sound so good to me . . . "
"Aren't you gonna eat your hamburger?"
"I think I'll save it for later,"
The Carpenters, featuring Karen Carpenter,
Yesterday Once More