Last Friday night ended pretty well, but it started perfectly:
Generously poured wine and
an array of delicious hors d’oeuvres
munched standing
while visiting with old friends and comrades
in the spacious, well-appointed kitchen
of the big, pretty home where I’m welcome like family.
First you feel silly for even considering not coming.
Then you just feel good, and at home, and well cared for -
- Why yes, thank you, I think I will have another.
Then you feel your whole stupid week melt away
and you remember:
This is a celebration.
Among other things, we were celebrating the Denver premiere of
William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe, an excellent independent film made by family of friends of my friends, and showing through this weekend at Starz Film Centre here. One of the filmmakers was at our little pre-party, yukking it up with me, The Handsome Man and my buddy KC about dive bars, bad jokes and New York City. (Well, me and KC were yukking it up, anyway. The director, like Handsome, was actually pretty reserved.)
Within our little crew, the plan was to go see the film where it was premiering at Chez Artiste Theatre, stay for the Q&A with the filmmaker and her sister, and then hit the town to celebrate KC’s birthday.
The movie was fantastic, and I’ve recommended it highly to everybody I know. If you don’t recall, Kunstler was an important civil rights attorney, famous for defending high-profile cases. He was also a dad, though, and the film does a really sensitive and touching job of documenting Kunstler’s accomplishments while exploring what it meant to be his offspring.
A note to any filmmakers: Denver will apparently get all up in your business during a talkback. I was surprised by how bluntly personal were some of the questions to the young auteur, but she handled herself adeptly enough.
I had a personal question, too, but I didn’t ask it. I thought it was overly personal, maybe off topic, and I didn’t know quite how to put it. A recurring theme in the movie was the daughters’ sense of difference from their father - sometimes wonder, sometimes disapproval, sometimes criticism. I wanted to know, What are the moments when you have felt most strongly or inescapably, “I am William Kunstler’s daughter.” I also wanted to know if there were any parts of the movie that she or the other sister present thought their dad wouldn’t agree with their telling of.
Mostly though, I just wanted to applaud her for making such a powerful tribute to her father. A film of this scope is no small project. The making of it must have been rife with challenging moments of analysis and introspection. And now the results stand as a work of art, apart now from either of them, as a record of a man’s achievements and of his daughters’ love for him. Whatever unresolved feelings the filmmakers might profess for their father, this film represents an incredible labor of love, and that’s kind of painfully beautiful to me. Really moving. I want to clap right now thinking about it. Good show.
And then it was time for partying! Handsome graciously was serving as designated driver, so the birthday girl had ridden with us, and the world was our oyster. Being KC, she declared she wanted to end the night at JJ’s Nightclub on East Colfax.
JJ’s is the preferred spot among local, retirement age African-Americans who enjoy a little R&B and dancing with with their well-priced Seven and Sevens. Perfectly harmless, but an unlikely choice for most Denver white girls turning 36. JJ’s is about one mile from my house, and I like it alright, as I’m both African-American and inclined to dance, and did I mention it’s a mile from my house. Handsome likes it alright because he doesn’t like to pay more than $3 for a beer, and he is not opposed to dancing, and internally he is a 60-year old man. KC likes it a lot because she’s just that cosmopolitan and gets along with everybody. Plus, to KC, your small-minded comfort zone is your problem, not hers. And at the end of the day, JJ’s is low-key, plays good music and doesn’t have anything poppin off when you’re just trying to get your drink and/or dance on. What’s not to like?
At the same time, we were rolling that night with a white foursome comprised of KC’s two female coworkers and their fellas (one boyfriend, one husband). One of the couples lives in the straight-up suburbs. I know many a resident of metropolitan Denver is frightened at just the mention of East Colfax, Denver's historic avenue infamous for prostitution, crime and the urban poor. You add the promise of liquor to the equation, and guarantee a majority of black folks, and some of your friends are going to be frantic for a way to politely decline.
“You call the shots, dude,” I told KC. “You’re the birthday girl.” However, I suggested, we might want to ease her friends into the idea of JJ’s. Maybe talk it up while we start off at some place a little more familiar.
But when we took it to the full group, between the aged and the married and the aged married, we couldn’t think of a single “familiar” place we were excited about going to. (With no restrictions. On a Friday night. It was a little sad.) JJ’s almost won by default right then, but instead we decided to go to The Funky Buddha Lounge on Lincoln Ave.
I hadn't ever been there before. Or if I had been, it was with those hard-drinking friends I used to lose evenings with, and as of last Friday, I didn’t have any recollection of it. I’ll say this about the place: the more I drank, the more I enjoyed it.
That's not an endorsement.
It got points for having a comfy seven-person booth near the bar, and I liked the idea of a heated rooftop patio for dancing. (Right?) But the music they were playing wasn’t great, and the crowd was a little young and naked and heavily-fragranced for my tastes. And the drinks were not cheap. For the purposes of boozing, I appreciate cheap drinks.
So, once we’d gotten a little liquor into everybody, we hopped back in the car and Handsome drove us east in The Black Ru to JJ’s.
By this point, I was liking our extended crew aplenty. Wry girl from last month’s art walk, bet. Funny girl laughing at all my jokes, bet. Husky-voiced boyfriend who proclaimed early, “Everybody is racist, there’s no point denying it,” awesome. Mild-mannered husband who was nonetheless relentlessly game, great.
We got to JJ’s, and it was hopping! Classic R&B pumping from the sound system, DJ on hand for requests. A bar loaded with middle-aged ladies and gentlemen enjoying a cocktail. Tables with well-dressed couples, talking closely. At least one table of neatly pressed granddads playing some board game or card game. A dance floor crowded with thick-waisted, graying-haired enthusiasts.
There was a long, empty table situated conveniently between the bar, the dj and the dance pavilion, just waiting for us. Joe went and bought a round of drinks - which you can do casually, even on a budget, at JJ’s. KC cornered the DJ and started laying out playlists. I watched everybody else -- our suburban friends as well as the patrons who were there when we arrived -- try not to stare openly at "the other".
Then, like magic or an injection, everybody relaxed. Those folks went back to what they had been doing before - dancing, drinking talking - and we went back to what we’d been doing before - dancing, drinking, talking. Then, after a little while, we started doing it together. The whole bar seemed to like KC’s selection of songs, and a bunch of us thronged the dance floor as one. Even the mild-mannered husband who supposedly “doesn’t dance” was up on the floor and clearly enjoying himself. His wife was dancing with two ladies and a man we didn’t know.
I chatted up the barmaid (who said she liked my hair, which was my hair, and “down”). I introduced myself to a lady who looked familiar and turned out to be my old Sunday School teacher from Holy Redeemer! (Denver.) Together, she and I got up on the dance floor and did some group dance I don’t know and had never heard of, but yep, danced to regardless. I made friends with the DJ, a powerful presence of a sista, who might have been wearing a yellow turban and matching long robes, but maybe I’m misremembering.
Damn, we had a good time!
I completely didn’t notice when a message came over the sound system saying that a blue Subaru parked in the lot had been hit by another patron’s car. And I hardly cared when it turned out that it was a
black Subaru that had been hit, and, uh, ours. Like the good men they are, Handsome and the cap-wearing boyfriend went out to deal with it. Like the good folks they are, the owner and the bouncer at the club had witnessed it all, and the departing patron had stopped and waited to give her insurance to us. Handsome and the dutiful boyfriend collected the driver’s information, with the owner and bouncer offering helpful suggestions.
I did my part, too: I told the DJ that ours was the car that had been hit (the DJ made some sympathetic noises), and asked if she would please play my husband’s favorite jam when he got back in, but please to wait until he returned, because right now he was outside dealing with the car, and if he heard his song happening inside, it would just add insult to injury. She agreed to help me out.
“You two make a beautiful couple,” she told me. As I thanked her, she leaned in closer, to confide, “
I like white guys, too.”
Surprised, and then tickled, I didn’t bother to inform her that The Handsome Man is Latino.
Handsome returned shortly, pleased that the damage was not major and the incident had all been handled in such a civilized fashion. (The last time our parked car was hit, in the parking lot of Whole Foods, the perpetrator denied he was responsible, then lied to his insurance company saying that
we had hit
him, which was totally preposterous and contradictory to eyewitness testimony and videotape evidence. It worked out eventually to our satisfaction, but was very disappointing vis a vis our faith in humankind.)
Just as soon as Handsome had finished briefing me, the opening strains of his song came over the system.
“You wanna dance about it?” I quipped, taking his hand and leading him to the floor.
“Did you request this song?” he asked me with a smile.
“What do you think?” I asked coyly.
The night was getting late, and the dance floor was nearly empty. We danced together, while I serenaded him and he serenaded me. I could see the tension melting off of his face and his shoulders. The DJ’s voice came on and called us out by name: “...this one’s for you!” Oh, how Handsome grinned at me!
There were only a couple more dances before the bar was closing and the night was over. We thanked our fine hosts on the way out, hugged our new friends goodbye in the parking lot, and drove home a happy, tipsy KC.
On the way back to our house, as is my wont, I gabbed to Handsome about our night -- the pre-party, the movie, the filmmaker, the coworkers, their husbands, the bar, the nightclub, our smashed car door, KC, getting older. Then, spent and satisfied, I sat back and smiled to myself. Something “bad” had happened to us, something that certainly could have derailed our good time for the night. But to the extent that it even registered in the context of our fun time, secure world and blessed lives, what did we do?
We danced through it.
I have a funny inkling of a hope that it is within me to feel that powerful all the time.
