So many people, so many memories

I am still haunted by the story of a woman who lay her head on her stricken brother's chest as the HIV virus was taking his life, comforting him at the end, listening to the softening beat of his heart until it faded and stopped. I hear her crying in the stillness of the hospital room, tears of regret for us all.

I see community activists from hell taking on the establishment in unique and surprising ways, one protesting at a City Council session by riding his horse into the meeting; another lowering his pants to moon the panelists; a woman engaging in a physical fight with a mayor, rolling around on the floor like muskrats at play to the stunned amusement of a large crowd.

I think of the waitress Alice at the Redwood, as skinny as a chopstick and as efficient as a U-boat commander, remembering what the regulars drank, silently slicing through the crowds to bring each his favorite. And the paunchy little racetrack tout Sideways Sidney on a phone behind the bar, placing a bet and losing with the regularity of a metronome.

And there was a rare interview with Angelyne, the ageless face on the billboards, red lips puckered to the world, celebrating herself in the timeless manner of a woman creating her own fame, oblivious to the joke she had become, never revealing who was paying the bills.

I see her in juxtaposition to the large guy in a gorilla suit who sold kazoos along Fairfax Avenue, jumping out at startled passersby and demanding they buy a kazoo; and the beach-side lawyer in Venice peddling legal advice from behind a wooden box he used as a desk; and the hot-dog salesman who campaigned for City Council from his mobile stand; and Dean Martin dying of cancer, drinking alone at La Famiglia; Ed Asner holding court at the Redwood one night; Wayne Rogers, surrounded by adoring women fans, on another.

Names, faces, words.

They all mattered to me, the clowns and the victims, those who gave and those who took; those who demanded attention and those who allowed me with reluctance into their private pain and compelling fears.

I remember them today as I write this last column, and I remember you, and how grateful I am to have had such an audience. You have touched me in more ways than you can ever imagine. I look forward to meeting you again, at a different time, in a different place. Adios, ciao, au revoir, auf Wiedersehen.

And, yes, goodbye.

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almtz13@aol.com