The Beginnings - Part 157: A HERSHEY'S KISS

“A mystic bond of brotherhood makes all men ONE.”
-Thomas Carlyle

The Beginnings – Part 157:  A HERSHEY’S KISS

December 7, 1983

I had a “déjà vu” while at work today.   I was randomly speaking to one of my high-school girlfriends, Elisa, as a customer.   Ironically, I had spoken to Clayton Case (another high-school chum) last week.  Clayton told me he was working in the Trucking business and had a child with another on the way.   I also spoke to Billy Schuman’s girlfriend who happened to be calling about Donna Schuman’s telephone account.   Billy and Donna Schuman were local neighbors in the late 1960’s when we lived at 1447 16^th Avenue in Oakland, California.   Gee whiz!  I remember playing with Donna and Billy when I was a mere five years old.  The memory was seriously like a “déjà vu” that I never would have recollected otherwise.

When I arrived home today I had a phone message from Bill Helbush.   I returned his call.  He persuaded me into driving out to Concord to see him.   We ate at the CHINESE GARDENS restaurant.
Bill said, “I want you to mark December 17^thon your calendar.”
I asked “Why?”
“It’s because I got tickets for us to the Theater to see CLOUD 9.”

I knew the show was about relationships and now I am excited about seeing it.

Caryl Churchill’s CLOUD NINE is about relationships -- between men and women, men and men, women and women.  It is about sex, work, mothers, Africa, power, children, grandmothers, politics, money, Queen Victoria and sex. It unlocks the imagination, liberates the mind, and leaves you weak with laughter.

The entire first act may be a crash course in 1880 sociology, but it never forgets to be farcical entertainment. For all its dark undercurrent, it makes no serious demands on the audience. It does not take itself seriously, and its truths are evident enough without unnecessary footnotes to hold up the fun. In fact, the whole first act shines the clarifying light of imaginative comedy on hypocrisy. Cleverly used clichés get sharpened and broadened with fresh definition throughout Act I, which takes its zany place somewhere in an antic Africa.

In Victorian Africa actually, where Clive imposes his ideals on his family and the natives. Betty, Clive's wife, does not value herself as a woman. Betty is played by a man because she wants to be what men want her to be. In a similar way Joshua, the black servant, doesn't value himself as a black and is thus played by a white man because he wants to be what whites want him to be. Clive tries to impose traditional male behavior on his son, Edward, who is played by a woman (any guesses on this one), a boy who loves to play with his sister Victoria -- and her dolls. Clive struggles throughout the act to maintain the world he wants to see -- a faithful wife, a manly son.

After our dinner outing I ended up spending the night at Bill’s house.   I slept on the bottom bunk.  Bill spoke to me about the idea of our going to Yosemite’s Yellowstone National Park together next summer.  He literally ‘got off’ a couple of times.   I didn’t—which was fine because I was still filled with pleasure.   I showered and we both slept very well.   I left Bill’s house at approximately 7AM and arrived at my work desk a bit earlier than usual.   I was thinking about the events of last night and realized how I was touched by how Bill bought me a HERSHEY’s kiss.   He must really like me.   I bought him a Strawberry Shake after dinner and we both shared it.   How endearing of something so simple…I thought, a HERSHEY’s kiss.

“I am not laughing at you.   But you should NOT say the greatest romance of your life.   You should say the first romance of your life.  You will always be loved, and you will always be in love with LOVE.”
-Oscar Wilde
THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY