Summer weather returned to Portland as a storm of violence burst over Israel. Sunday afternoon Mich picked me up and we missed the turn a few times before finally making it to the Multnomah Arts Center for Lee’s memorial.
At one end of the banquet hall was a stage where a jazz quintet was setting up. Photos were projected onto a screen and there was a row of tables heaped with Italian food along one wall. I wheeled over to get some food before the rush. I’ve been cutting back on carbs to help my foot heal better, but I allowed myself two pillows of ravioli and filled the rest of my plate with salad and meatballs the size of tennis balls.
No sooner had I sat down when someone pointed out that some tables across the room were heaped with a mountain of his t-shirts, plus a few crates of records. We were encouraged to help ourselves to some keepsakes. I scooted over immediately; I’ve inherited my father’s inability to resist a crate of LPs. I pulled out two Pharaoh Sanders albums and one by Jackie McLean, then wheeled back to eat. The band started up and sounded terrific.
An elderly couple asked if they could sit next to me; they had known Lee from the convention center, where he’d worked events for the last few years. The woman was tiny and wizened; she told me she’s just celebrated her 90th birthday. Lee had been 70. I’m 50. Jasmine had only made it to 40. It’s morbid but I’m unable to resist making these comparisons, any more than I could resist wheeling over to grab a few more records, once I’d decided enough people had taken their share. Lee Morgan, shot dead in Slug’s Saloon at age 33. Albert Ayler, found dead in the East River aged 36. Lee never had lost his Brooklyn accent.
The place was filling up, and as I wolfed down my meatballs I looked around to see if there were any single women. There were not, but I did spot The Silver Fox, who used to host Museum After Hours down at the art museum. Every Wednesday our Grand Ballroom would feature live jazz music. I used to swing by after my shift but it was basically a glorified pickup scene for divorcees. You’d see the same sharks every week, circling as Linda Hornbuckle (2014, age 59) or Paul deLay (2007, age 55) wailed in the background. They’d stopped holding the event years before but Lee had never stopped complaining to me about it as if I had been the one who had canceled it. Sometimes I would tell him I’d heard rumors of it coming back, just to get him excited.
His friend Whitney, who had organized everything, got up on stage and sang a song of mourning in Hebrew. I didn’t bother trying to stop my tears. When she finished she passed around a microphone so people could share reminiscences. I didn’t really have any good stories, and it felt pointless to repeat the same things everyone else had already said; that Lee loved music and food, that he was constantly kvetching about Portland’s lack of good pizza, its dearth of bagels. I tried to imagine the pat phrases I will be reduced to when my time comes. “He sure did draw a lot. And always with the foot problems.”
Lee’s African drum group got up and drummed, a wild rhythmic salvo to accompany Lee on his journey, to carry on his heartbeat. Explosions rocking Gaza, boots stomping the desert. Mich drove me home and I put on The Albert Ayler Trio’s recording of Ghosts, recorded in 1965, when Lee was 12 years old. I lay in bed and let its chaos scramble around inside my head, scouring it clean with breathtaking fury.
