In Memoriam

This past year was shaping up as a pretty thin year for deaths that struck close to home. Until a couple of months ago it just would have been the celebrities at the bottom I had the pleasure of knowing or just admiring.

However when my friend and former girlfriend Leslie Dennis (October 5) passed rather suddenly, the year went sour. We hadn’t been together for a long time – she was the first relatively serious relationship after my divorce – but we stayed in touch and got together for a coffee on occasion. I think the last time I saw Leslie was a couple of years ago when her brother had had a terrible brain bleed and we drove down to see him in rehab. But we spoke/texted often and she chimed in with comments on the former blog. For the past decade or so she was with an extremely lucky guy who is now understanding what he had.

Leslie had been a killer real estate agent but burned out a few years ago which is understandable given the hellish nature of that occupation. To her credit she reinvented herself as a dog walker which was perfect for a woman who had three of them living with her when we dated. Better, she had just become a grandmother which brought a lot of joy. And she was anticipating the wedding of her son. Lots of naches and well-earned after a marriage that was best described as inappropriate. 

However ‘LD’ had terrible anxiety and when her father David passed at the end of August, it obliterated her wellness equilibrium and her cortisol levels spiked to eight times normal. I knew this because she called me from the hospital just two weeks after her father’s funeral. She told me she had a bad case of Cushing’s Syndrome but that the doctors had a handle on it. I offered to visit but she said her face had blown up. That was the last we spoke. She went downhill very fast and I have to question the kind of care she got because people have come through this. Before I knew it I had heard they put her on life support and as I was boarding a plane to Italy I got a note from that same brother that she was gone.

This is the first time I had experienced something like this and it knocked me for a loop. Had a little cry too, as I looked at all the text messages saved over the years. Yes, I have had losses. Even though we were no longer married in the decade prior to her passing, Lisa was in my life for better or worse. But we saw the end coming and although we said what had to be said she will never be gone because my children still work her material. Leslie died quick and the loss was sharp. I can’t say too much other than she was a great mother to her kids and that her work on them was paying dividends. I know she was there for her mother through some difficult times too. Her father, with whom she had some unresolved issues, might have taken her with him. After he passed Leslie said she was cool. Hmmm. 

Leslie was always happy with simple pleasures – a Leaf game, a coffee, a decent dinner. I feel awful for the years she was robbed of, and the fun third act of which she was so deserving. 

Maybe if I wasn’t so gunshy back then… because she was a champ. Gonna miss her.

******

My business ran into some interesting people over the decades, one of whom was Helen Manning (December 4) who had the unique ability to turn chicken shit into chicken salad. Back when I was wholesaling DVDs, I met up with this slightly batty Englishwoman who was making a killing at Chapters/Indigo running their budget CD bins. With a personality straight out of Dickens, Helen had found a loophole in the music publishing protocols and imported overstock CDs from the UK in quantities of less than 250 units per title which exempted her from paying the royalties in Canada! This was impressive and she continued as a kind of Fagin character for many years eventually hustling third party gray market stuff on Amazon. She had a particular set of skills to quote Liam Neeson.

She closed up the business after her two children proved somewhat incapable of running it. A third child was special needs. But I liked her vibe and for the past couple of years we spoke and had a few lunches to discuss some ideas for her final act now that she had hit 80. Maybe an autobiography, maybe a TikTok feed as a chirpy old English yente. We fought over U.S. politics often and we had spoken a couple of weeks ago on a Wednesday. On Thursday she fell, possibly hitting her head, and died from the trauma. That was it. One day Helen’s all piss and vinegar, the next she’s full of formaldehyde. 

What made things worse was her sad little funeral attended by a handful of old duffers. It was zoomed for me and, hopefully, a few others. But I wish I hadn’t attended after her husband muddled through some history without an ounce of emotion. Nor did I need to see two ungrateful children manage a mumbled minute each, pretty much ignoring the fact that their mother, with a severely disabled daughter who was draining if she was an only child, still managed to give them everything they needed in life.

She deserved a better sendoff and a better legacy. I’m gonna miss her too.

NOTABLY ABSENT We kept a list in the office of the people that were the worst to do business with and David Himelfarb (November 5) was always near the top of the chart for just one DVD release with The Kids In The Hall where the lads were the least challenging aspect next Himelfarb. But this was decades ago and because of David my son got to meet Mike Myers way back when and as time wore on David was a guy that always provided some entertainment when you ran into him. But his crazy was no match for dementia and now a true Toronto character is no more. We lost the music icons Sly Stone (June 9) and Brian Wilson (June 11) this past year but though Brian did make contributions in the five plus decades since he was a consistent member of The Beach Lads, Stone had been MIA for over a half-century. You couldn’t say that about ‘Mark and Howard’ who never stopped entertaining America even though they hadn’t had a hit since the 60s.

For those of you who don’t know, Mark Volman (September 5) and Howard Kaylan were the most identifiable members of The Turtles, the band with a little hit called Happy Together which was the soundtrack of my Bar Mitzvah season way back in 1967. And before I became a rock critic I fondly remember a cold 1974 night at the old El Mocambo where a good ten of us got in and saw Mark and Howard as their altschlock egos Flo & Eddie. Here were two former pop stars taking the piss out of rock in its most serious era and even though their stoner humor was often silly – who can forget the Flying Zanzini Brothers! – they could intersperse their shtick with Eleanore, She’d Rather Be With Me and several other massive 60s hits. And years later when they came to town I could, in my professional capacity, hang with these legends. Great, funny self-deprecating guys, Mark and Howard continued touring for decades until Howard’s health wouldn’t permit. The last few years on the Happy Together Tour Mark was singing with Ron Dante from The Archies. I wanted to see him one last time last summer and I didn’t. The only good news is that there are Turtles clips all over Youtube and if you really want to get into it my friends at Shout Factory made a movie years ago called My Dinner With Jimi which chronicles one crazy night with The Turtles in London in 1967. Thank you for the good times Mark…

Thirty years ago I was hired to write an infomercial selling a 60s hit package with Bobby Sherman (June 24) hosting. I spent a few days with the man and he was as perfect a gentleman as was his perfect hair. He had left the business and was working for the LAPD in emergency services I believe but there wasn’t a bitter or brittle bone to him. He was managed by one Ward Sylvester who later treated us to a rare concert by his other clients… Davy, Mickey, Mike and Peter.

Yeah…I got the legendary goalie Eddie Giacomin (September 14) to sign a hockey card for me at a card show many years ago, telling him about one game in particular at Maple Leaf Gardens at the peak of the Rangers dominance in the 1971-72 season. He was generous to me and to everyone who watched him play back in the day. There was no greater ovation in hockey history than the one that greeted Giacomin back to the ‘Gahden’ after he was traded in 1975. Perhaps I wasted too much time on the Rangers, and their grip on me is slipping with age but I look back and see that these farm boys played with a passion that was wildly disproportionate to the dough they made. Their stories should continue to inspire on and off the ice…

I never met Robert Redford (September 16) but his passing was the definitive end to the era of matinee idols. In my last newsletter to our customers I talked about a smaller Redford effort The Great Waldo Pepper, perhaps the last when he used the squared jawed charm that won over a whole nation…

Finally, my favorite movie is the bittersweet romcom Annie Hall and this past year saw the passing of the great Tony Roberts (Feb. 7) and the incredible Diane Keaton (October 11), without whom the film would never have been remotely as good. When I watch it in the future it will be more bitter than sweet…

In another loud loss, I have met a lot of rock stars over the years, most of whom are forgotten but I won’t forget going backstage at Maple Leaf Gardens in 1976 with a couple of friends and hanging with the legendary Rick Derringer (May 26) who was opening for Boston. Yeah, Hang On Sloopy has a whole new meaning at this age. And a mention of the one and only Ozzy Osbourne (July 22) who once gave me a terrific, honest interview and was lucky enough to see his own Celebration Of Life.

Again, when you think of someone, call them. You don’t need more regrets. Have a terrific holiday and a Happy New Year!