25 September 2004 Today is my late brother’s birthday. Keith Sherman died at age 43 of a brain aneurysm. He lived in Houston. I loved him very much and I miss him. Another brother, my sister’s husband, John Bell, died this year on September 10th in Richmond, California. I am flying alone to Oakland on October 9th for a farewell memorial on the 10th in my sister Kay’s back yard. My sister Sunny Lynn is flying in from West Palm Beach on the same day. Kay’s children from her previous marriage, Hank and Lisa, will be there, along with Sunny’s son Taylor, my sons Frank and Vic. John’s and Kay’s children, Rinzai, Tzena and Greymuira, will be there, of course, along with my nephews Noel John and Cohen Bell, Rinzai’s and Jacque’s talented sons. And, too, my ballerina niece Lancia, Tzena’s daughter. I wrote a rough draft of a poem for John, which you can read at the end of this journal. It has little meaning for anyone but John and me and those who knew and loved him. On September 17th, a Friday, Charlotte drove us to Abilene for the annual West Texas Celebrity Dove Classic to raise money for Disability Resources, Inc. (DRI). We stayed, as usual, at the Ambassador Suites, drove out to the beautiful hunting lodge owned by Dr. Norman Dozier. Chuck Yeager, as usual, was the first to greet us, and then Director Billy Brant ushered us inside where I signed the waiver and beneath my picture on the programs for the hunters who pay to hunt with the celebrities. General Chuck Yeager is still fit at 84, and so is his former wingman, Bud Anderson. The celebrities attending this year wee all old friends, and included besides Bud Anderson and Chuck Yeager, T.J. Klay, a singer/songwriter, Jim Partee, a nationally acclaimed wildlife artist, actor, wood sculptor and boatbuilder, John Di Santi (Johnny D), former defensive lineman for the Detroit Lions, Dave Lutz (a gentle giant and crack shot), Steve Kanaly, not only an actor, but a fine watercolorist, and my dear friend, Tommy Overstreet, singer, songwriter and record producer. Tommy came up to our room and played a new song he had just recorded in Nashville for his latest album. He put the CD into my laptop and we listened raptly. I’ve never heard T.O. sing better. The song was very beautiful, the words very touching. All of the celebrities donate items for auction to raise money for DRI, and my contribution of books went for $275.00. The surprise was that the auctioneer, Tommy Taylor, was the final bidder on the four volumes, TEXAS DUST, ABILENE GUN DOWN, the anthologies, THE FUNERAL OF TANNER MOODY and MYSTERIES OF THE OZARKS. I spent most of Saturday afternoon, before the hunt watching Jim Partee draw a wood duck in pen and ink and Steve Kanaly paint a watercolor scene of a pond on the ranch property. Last year, I had commented on the painting he had put up for auction and when he showed me the one he donated this year, he told me, “You said you liked paintings that you could walk into, and I thought of that when I painted this one.” It was a place in the Sierras where Steve goes to fish. And, you could walk through the open gates, down the road, to the stream. He has a fine touch and a great eye. The one he painted that day and Jimmy’s pen-and-ink both brought big bucks at the auction that night. The sunset on Friday night was spectacular. It was all black and white, no color, but rays of the sun splayed out across the sky in radiant gradations of gray. On Saturday afternoon as I sat on a camp stool on the DRI property, “the bird farm”, I watched the sky play with cloud formations that wound slowly into arabesques and pirouettes in a slow scrawl that constantly changed all the shapes. And the clouds converged on the western horizon until the final brilliant blast of sunset that struck every color in the rainbow. Those skies…they haunt me still. This Friday, Charlotte is driving us to Houston where I’ll see Christopher Vogler at the Carl G. Jung Institute. As many of you know, I’ve been hawking his book, THE WRITER’S JOURNEY, for years, given away copies to writer friends, to my children and my relatives, recommended it and spoken about it at writer’s conferences. Vogler will speak Friday night on mythic structure in movies and conduct an all day workshop on Saturday at the institute. Thanks to Paula Yost, a memoir writer and coach, I am able to attend. Her husband Tom just had an operation and she must stay with him, so generously gave me her ticket. And, finally, here is the poem, in rough draft and not in final form, that I wrote just after I learned of my beloved brother-in-law John Bell’s death at 73. POEM FOR JOHN BELL You black-maned lion of intellect, Who prowled the prairies of Nebraska, Conquered Italy in your red Spider, Rescued my sister from her sepulcher in Omaha, I recall your mother falling from the sky, Leaving you a wandering orphan until you became a sire. You bookbinder and arcane mathematician, John, You opened the doors of perception in Mill Valley, Grew magic in mushrooms, grew morels in the mind, And became the poems you wrote as the poems became The intricate parts of cells and sinew and wine. Like some ancient alchemist, you brewed ideas, Forged entire ideologies and wrestled Van Tassel Polemics into logic and logarithms with cunning care As you mastered Zen in the shadow of Alan Watts, Becoming the mystery of the koan even as you became Both question and answer, and finally, the koan itself. And steamed espresso through your Monterey laboratory Where the world beat a path to your door in leather sandals, where Pat Foster sang Woody Guthrie’s talking blues and the songs of all those roads we traveled. I feel your bearded spirit in my bones and in my heart, Sweet John, gaze upon your wise countenance in rapture Born of your life and the brilliant shining of your soul. Your laughter rings in my ears, threads my olden soul, softens my tears. I feel your strong arms around me even now As I bid farewell to a great friend and brother, Your strong hug like that of a loving bear’s, Your kindness lingering in the darkness of your absence, radiating a light that lights my way As I follow in your sandaled footsteps, brother, Through the deserted streets of Berkley and beyond. Jory Sherman 9/10/04