Grace's favorite animal videos

San Francisco Schools Music Festival

Today Grace performed in the SF Schools Music Festival. It was a privelege to be selected to play in this all-City band. She played her clarinet in the Festival Band, and played the following pieces: Silver Scepter, Irish Tune from County Derry (Danny Boy), and I Want To Be Happy.

I Kissed a Girl: Katy Perry & Ellen DeGeneres

I Was There: Indian Wells Tennis Tournament

I'm up in the stands...you just can't see me, but I'm there, sitting next to Nancy and Jim at our annual tournament marathon. It's three days of playing at Nancy's club in the morning, attending the tournament with all the greats all afternoon...actually 6 hours of watching tennis on 6 courts; having a martini by the pool around 6ish, and delicious dinners every night to top it off. 80 degrees in Palm Springs. Oh, by the way, Nancy and I beat Patty and Jeannie 6-3. 6-2.

fun from grace and phern:

Lesbian Nation

Imagine my surprise when, as I was reading the latest issue of The New Yorker, March 2, 2009, I came across an article titled, "Lesbian Nation", by Ariel Levy, an out lesbian staff writer. The article is subtitled, "Why gay women took to the road." It's a spirited article about a small group of lesbian separatists from the 70's who called themselves the Van Dykes, and who traveled around the country living on women's/wimmen's/womyn's land. The link to the article above is a synopsis, not fully available online, unless you register for the reading or purchase it from The New Yorker. The above photo is from The Lesbian Tide magazine from the 70's. This cover commemorates the 1st West Coast Lesbian Conference, which I attended at UCLA in 1973. The right on women from San Francisco inspired me to move here.

I don't know what's going on in New York lately, but someone at both The New Yorker and The New York Times is fascinated with the subject of lesbians taking to the land and living on their own. On January 30, 2009 the New York Times published a piece called My Sister's Keeper about old dykes who live communally. Here's how it opens:

"They called it a lesbian paradise, the pioneering women who made their way to St. Augustine, Fla., in the 1970s to live together in cottages on the beach. Finding one another in the fever of the gay rights and women’s liberation movements, they built a matriarchal community, where no men were allowed, where even a male infant brought by visitors was cause for debate." This article is published in the Fashion and Style section of the Times.

In honor of this recent surge in interest in lesbian life in the 70's, my coming-of-age decade, I made a reading list of relevant lesbian literature; both written at the time and about the times:

Lesbian-Feminism and the 70's

"...is that you, darling?": DIAL M FOR MURDER

As you are swept into the clever plotting of a murder by a husband played brilliantly by Ray Milland, you cannot grasp why anyone, even a betrayed husband, might want to kill Grace Kelly. Good thing that cell phones weren't around in the 50's. If so, Grace Kelly would never have had to leave her bed, to answer that potentially fatal phone call in the living room. The lighting in this film is practically another character...it should have gotten an Oscar. No matter how often you view this well-plotted thriller, you still want to yell, "Look out Grace...there's a murderer behind you!". Hitchcock makes you want to help her...what a rescue fantasy! Grace Kelly is wonderfully cast as good girl, and you pay no attention to the little matter of her extra-marital affair.

I just read "Spellbound by Beauty: Alfred Hitchcock and his Leading Ladies" With Grace Kelly, Hitchcock felt he had molded the young actress into his ideal woman: elegant, with a cool, understated sexuality. When she left Hollywood to get married, he resented her leaving and never spoke to her again. Every aspect of her appearance in his films was designed and monitored by Hitchcock in order to create his fantasy woman.

It's so rare today to see a film where every word and scene is so cleverly plotted. In this one you see the brilliant doing and wonderful undoing of a murder. Rent it! Watch it again...and again.