book excerpt

Excerpt from India with Backpack and a Prayer

by
jennifer brookins

“Dear Jennifer,

I received your letter so full of love. You are so important and loving for me that I cannot mention it. What you are doing and have done for Guru is more than sufficient. I am very much pleased that you are coming here. I anxiously await the both of you. One line in your letter impressed me very much. I love to read it again and again,
Mye tuhanu bhot pyar tey yaad karde han.”
At the bottom of his letter, Baba Ji added,
“Main vi tuhanu bahut pyar te yaad karda han, main tuhanu udeek raha han.”
Translation: I also love you very much, remember you, and am waiting for you.


I have no idea what Baba Ji meant when he wrote, “what you are doing and have done for Guru.” His letter reflects a loving heart for one so undeserving. He is the Beautiful Father loving his daughter.

Baba Ji invited us to be his guests on December 26 for his Bhandara Birthday Celebration at Dera Tarn Taran. It is fifteen minutes from the Pakistan border and a short distance from the Himalayas. Finally, I’m going to India, and today we depart on British Airlines. In a few days Dera Tarn Taran will be teeming with people. We cannot miss it. Our friend Mike will drive us to the airport. My suitcase is packed with wool leggings for cold Punjabi winters. I am so looking forward to this trip I can hardly breathe. I’ll believe it when I’m strapped in my seat. Doug, on the other hand, is his usual calm, collected self. The weather forecast is awful. I’m more than a little concerned about this.


We arrive at the Philadelphia airport only to be told they are experiencing storms all over Europe. Great, just great. They say the runways in Germany, France, and England are iced over and our flight is grounded. Oh please, these people have got to be kidding. Doug calls Baba Ji in India to explain our dilemma. The airline suggests we take a flight out of Philadelphia tonight that lands in Paris. Typical French reasoning suggests that it’s not too dangerous to slide a plane onto the Paris Airport runway during a snowstorm, but c’est la vie, sliding out to India is a firm no. So why worry when we’ll have five days to shop and enjoy Paris until the storm passes. This gives them enough time to get out their blow dryers and clear the runways along with our missing Baba Ji’s birthday celebration. This can’t be happening. If we agree to this, we’ll arrive in India long after it’s over. I know the weather is treacherous, but there has got to be a way. This man can be really maddening at times. Doug explains his concern to Baba Ji over a bad telephone connection. He’s worried we won’t arrive in time for his birthday celebration. Silence prevails at the other end of the line. After an excruciatingly long pause, Doug says tomorrow afternoon there is only one flight available out of Philadelphia to Detroit that connects to Switzerland that connects to Delhi. Okay, what’s the catch? We have to fly coach from Philly to Detroit. This is a concern because of his cervical spine issue. The seats are so close together his legs will be pushed into his esophagus. Anyway, he tries to make a case to Baba Ji that he can’t fly coach since he’s paid for non-refundable business class tickets. By this time, I’m so nervous I bolt to the women’s restroom to find an empty stall. I sit here a few minutes in an effort to focus on simran, a mantra of five holy names given to me at the time of initiation. My mind is going ballistic. I finally calm down, close my eyes and begin to focus on Maharaj Ji’s beautiful face. I slowly repeat the five holy names, pull myself together, and pray that this night ends on the upside. When Doug sees me walking towards him, he puts his hand over the telephone and whispers, “Where were you? I can’t hear Baba Ji for the static.” Suddenly the line is okay. Like the parting of the Red Sea, Baba Ji’s answer is crystal clear,
“Ehh chhoti kurbani ha, ki tusi mere janamdin di party te nai rehna chahunde ho.”
Translation: It’s a small sacrifice. Don’t you want to be at my birthday party?
This makes Doug laugh. He quickly answers,

“Nothing will keep us away. We will be with you on your birthday.”
As luck would have it, someone is with Baba Ji to translate our conversation.

An Excerpt from India with a Backpack and Prayer available in paperback and Kindle 

My big Broadway break

by
tharon ann

I’m in New York trying hard to find work in the theatre, and coming up against a brick wall wherever I go because my Hollywood credits mean zilch in this town. So what’s the first job I get? I finally get a chance to perform comedy on a DuPont Show of the Month starring Art Carney, Walter Matthau, Frank Gorshin, Jonathan Winters, and yours truly playing the female lead. But the most difficult job is to survive working with some of the best funnymen in the business, each attempting to upstage the other – especially during breaks. We rehearse in old lofts, anywhere the studio can find that’s cheap. Laughter is what keeps me going. he most unpredictable comic to work with is Art Carney – scary too, because he forgets his lines, yet he’s so right for this part the producers cast him anyway. The director can easily cover for him by
writing his dialog on cue cards, or anything with a surface including the ceiling, on the underside of an actor’s hand including my own, on a chair cushion, on a butt, not mine, anywhere and everywhere. How great was he in The Honeymooners with Jackie Gleason.
I’m crazy about Walter Matthau. During our weeklong rehearsal period, each day I look forward to having lunch together, just taking a break from it all. We eat at a diner around the corner from where we rehearse on the Lower East Side. He describes in detail the struggles he’s faced in his life; gambling in particular, almost destroyed him. As I listen to Walter, my thoughts go to all the people in my professional and personal life who’ve suffered through drinking, gambling and drugs. Addiction is no respecter of persons. People only see the glitter of show business; so far, I’ve never met a genuinely happy person. As for me, happy and sad aren’t issues. I don’t analyze my life. I’m in the flow of it trying my best to hang on. To be cast in quality shows, and tutored by some of the best comedy actors in the business is happiness enough for now – that, and paying the rent. Finally after so long a time, I’m beginning to luck out. But you never know, up one day, down the next, here today, gone tomorrow – that’s show biz. People are clueless when they say actors who perform dramatic parts have a more difficult task than those who perform comedy; the truth is quite the opposite. Great comics usually make great dramatic actors if they get a halfway decent director to reign them in. The personal lives of most comics are riddled with sadness.
OK. So I am just an understudy to the understudies but so what? Come on. This is my big break. It’s 1963 and I’m actually sitting in a real dressing room in a real Broadway theatre, in a real Broadway show. One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest stars Kirk Douglas as Randall Patrick Murphy and Gene Wilder as Billy Bibbitt at the Cord Theatre. Being called at the last minute to replace an actor who was just run over by a bus is my worst nightmare, but this job pays the rent with enough left over for acting and dance classes. May these understudies live forever. We share a dressing room many flights up. Am I in heaven or what. Whoo! Whoo! If an actor is lucky enough to perform at the Cherry Lane Theatre, it’s as close to Broadway as it gets. Many great playwrights and directors came out of this small theatre in Greenwich Village, along with industry people who cover new plays and scout for talent. I’ve just been cast in a new off Broadway play, The Dutchman to open soon at the Cherry Lane.The producers are quite savvy in their bold decision to showcase new actors, directors and playwrights like Harold Pinter. I love to sit in the wings and watch other plays in rehearsal. Down the road I’d like to direct, but for now this is where I’ve always wanted to be. It’s not the money because off Broadway only pays scale, at least for me. It’s belonging to something grand, something bigger than life. I’m judged by what I produce, not where I was born or what I look like, and surely not for the size of my boobs. I lack self-confidence, except in performance when I’m no longer me. My one and only psychological epiphany, the result of visiting a psychiatrist for two years, is that I don’t need one. I always feel more comfortable being someone else, someone outside myself. Truth is, I have enough ego to make up for my low self esteem, words coined by my psychiatrist to keep me the
The Dutchman is a two character play written by Le Roi Jones a.k.a. Amiri Baraka, a central figure in the Black Arts movement, and stars Robert Hooks and me. The fact that we improvise some of the dialogue he wrote may account for his uptightness most of the time. It’s not unusual for actors and directors to improvise in rehearsal as the text doesn’t always translate into the performance of it. We improvise the script to make the dialogue flow in a more realistic way. Many professional writers and directors encourage this method as a means of character development. Bobby and I work well together. His easygoing nature, coupled with a good sense of humor makes him fun to work with. I’m probably the only actress in New York he hasn’t hit on. Our relationship is strictly professional. “Bobby the Babe Magnet” describes him to a T. I’ll miss him when the play completes its run.
Tonight’s opening of The Dutchman is electric with anticipation from the producers on down. We get rave reviews. I’ve hit the gravy train for sure, as it is the first play of its genre to be presented on stage. A psychotic white girl uses black, racist street language and provocative body moves, to seduce a middle class black student on the subway. He, on the other hand, tries to contain himself and avoid being killed by her.
This is an incendiary two character play and the reviews reflect it. The Village Voice has awarded The Dutchman an Obie for being the best new play in 1964. I receive the World Theatre award for best actress in this same play. Well go damn figure me winning that. My career in New York has finally given birth. The role of Lulu is the most challenging part I’ve ever tackled.
Not long after opening night, the famous director Elia Kazan drops by the Cherry Lane to check out my performance. He is one of the most sought after directors in both theatre and film, having to his redit such films as On the Waterfront, East of Eden, A Streetcar Named Desire, Viva Zapata and Splendor in the Grass along with founding the Actor’s Studio with Cheryl Crawford and Robert Lewis in 1947. Oddly enough, I learned the technique of method acting when I was five years old. Early in life, I discovered how to dive within and create imaginary characters to camouflaged myself – a ploy to keep from stuttering. At the same age I began to read body language. Had I known Kazan was in the house, my usual panic attacks would have accelerated to the point of informing the producers I had a brain tumor and couldn’t go on. My new understudy would have dropped dead, because much of what Bobby and I do is improvise off each other. Two weeks later after much back and forth between the Cherry Lane management, my agent and Elia Kazan, the two of us begin work. We rehearse eight hours a day in a loft on the Lower East Side, before the first dress and light rehearsal with the original cast members at the Lincoln Center. After the Fall, a play written by Arthur Miller, and directed by Kazan, is based upon the life of his deceased ex-wife, Marilyn Monroe. I’m being rehearsed to replace Barbara Loden in the lead role of Maggie, four performances a week, while still performing The Dutchman at the Cherry Lane.
Do I have what it takes? That is the question. I reassure myself Kazan would never have chosen me had he not seen a spark of something. Still, there are so many talented actresses in this town including Barbara’s understudy, Faye Dunaway. Why me and not her? What does he see in me? I find this rehearsal period unsettling, and plagued with doubts I won’t do justice to Kazan, or to the memory of Marilyn. I’ve done so much research on her life, on her temperament – still, I’m unable to find her center, that defining motivation in her life that colored her. On top of all this, I’m wiped out from rehearsing eight hours each day for After the Fall, then performing The Dutchman at night plus matinees on Saturday and Sunday. I’m insecure about everything. One day when I’m beating up on myself as usual, I realize these are the very feelings Marilyn Monroe lived with her entire life. There was the movie star Marilyn, a persona she contrived in order to achieve the maximum desired results her fame demanded. In addition was the neurotic Marilyn whose insecurity never allowed her to triumph over her childhood, her marriages, her career, anything of importance. When Marilyn didn’t get her way, she forced those around her to prove themselves by their acceptance of her unprofessional habits, specifically her chronic lateness on the set that so often held up costly productions for long periods of time. She fell in love with men she considered better and smarter than her. All this, and so much more was Marilyn Monroe.
Diving within the character is always the first step in preparation for a role. This type development equates to understanding what drives that individual. Every human being wants something. To this day, the abuse I experienced in early childhood colors everything I do. I’ve protected my personal demons for so long a time, that to peel off layers at this juncture is akin to being skinned alive. Still, this is the process I follow with Kazan in the development of Maggie. Each day at the end of rehearsal, I feel depressed. The greater my depression, the happier Kazan is with my performance because he’s getting results. In rehearsal today, Kazan gives me an uncharacteristic pat on the back. In the same breath he urges me to join the Actor’s Studio without delay. He thinks I have a great future on the Broadway stage as well as film, and makes a point of saying he has plans for me in the future whatever that means. I’ve learned to take what people say in show business with a grain of salt. Another thing I’ve discovered about Kazan, is that whatever he says is always measured for the affect it will have on my performance, otherwise known as “the means justifies the end” result. He urges me to utilize my own life experience to breathe life into Maggie. He surprised me the other day when he confided one of the reasons he cast me in this role, was that I have the same vulnerability and sense of loss Marilyn had. Doesn’t sound like much of a compliment but at least now, finally, I’ve something to work with. I have my own sense of unworthiness, of going through life feeling unwanted. Now that my personal fears have come forward, I’m as miserable as Kazan is thrilled over my discovery. There is a coldness about him that only looks to the end result. It is to that end he can be ruthless. I’ve blocked out so much of my life. Working with Kazan forces me to remember things long forgotten. I’m not sure it’s worth it. After rehearsal each day, I go to a neighborhood bar for a couple of martinis, then walk the rest of the way home wondering where the joy is. At the end of a day, the only words that come to mind are, “Maybe tomorrow will be better.”

~an excerpt from Tharon Ann

An excerpt from “India with Backpack and a Prayer”

by

“Before entering we take off our shoes, find a spot in the back and sit cross legged Indian style, men to the left, women to the right. Satsang is held in this room each morning and evening. The floor is made from polished buffalo dung and covered with some type of matting. Overhead, there’s a tin roof with tarpaulin sides anchored with rope to keep wind and rain from coming in. I see small birds huddled together on top of tenting posts. Once again, I hear a crescendo of shabds*. Everyone looks in the direction of Baba Ji who now walks inside on a red carpet assisted by sevadars on each arm. It is impossible to put this moment into words. The sudden silence is deafening in the presence of this great Saint. He walks with some difficulty up the steps to the dais where he sits Indian style. Various sangats have sent tiered birthday cakes, now lit up to be shared with everyone.

Once again, the room is alive with shabds, more importantly the beautiful radiant face of Baba Kehar Singh Maharaj, who gently motions the crowd to quieten down. In silence, several times his head slowly turns from one side of the room to the other. He is giving darshan to each of us. An Indian lady leans over, taps me on the shoulder and points at two Indian men waving their hands in our direction. They motion for us to follow them to the dais where Baba Ji sits with a white shawl around his shoulders. He is looking for us. Doug protests when they lead him to the stage where Paramjit Singh, Achok Pabbi, and several others are seated. He gestures for Doug to sit beside him. I’m invited to sit with his family in front. Indians love to celebrate when it comes to Baba Ji. It is hard to describe the sense of joy within the walls of this spiritual community. I just know how grateful I feel to be in his company. Once the festivities are over, Baba Ji sends word for us to visit with him in his personal quarters. We walk up the steps, remove our shoes, and wait outside his door.

A young man who tends to his personal needs smiles as he motions for us to come in. Baba Ji is sitting behind a desk with a wicker basket of oranges to give as prashad, a space heater to warm his legs, and stacks of letters in need of reply.

He has arranged for Dr. Sharma, an expert in human physiology and spinal manipulation, to give Doug daily acupressure treatments during our stay. In one corner of the room is a chair he redesigned to massage his arm and leg joints. Baba Ji is full of life even after 20 hour work days, advanced age, and poor health. I am so happy to be with him again. What can I say that he doesn’t already know? He glances over at me, smiles and says,

‘Jado mai Jennifer nu vekhada ha, tan main vekhada ha ki chup hai ate ikalata hai.’

Translation: When I look at Jennifer all I see is silence and loneliness.As we get up to leave, Baba Ji gives us prashad. We stand before him, fold our hands and offer our gratitude for his love. He suggests we rest tomorrow from jet lag. Much has been planned, including the famous Golden Temple in Amritsar. He is so proud of India’s history; more importantly his predecessors on this spiritual path. I sit quietly, lost in his darshan, as Baba Ji and Doug speak together as old friends.”

I’M MAD AT GOD, THELMA OR WHATEVER YOUR NAME IS

by

The climate in Little Rock gets worse by the day. Christian preachers don’t let colored people in their churches, and the few that do make them sit in roped off sections in the back where no one can see them. If God knows everything, then he knows how fed up I am right now. He could have stopped all this hate between whites and coloreds. He didn’t. He could have stopped our soldiers from being killed in the war. He didn’t. So I made a deal with him: if he doesn’t bother me, then I won’t pester him anymore. It’s not right to call myself a Christian when I’m mad at him half the time.
All my life I’ve tried to love Jesus same as Mama did, but I don’t and I’m not proud of myself for it. I feel so let down these days wondering why someone like him isn’t around here now. If God gave people a teacher back then, why can’t he give me one now? But when I say things like that, people look at me with that “shut up” look on their face, then comes ten quotes from the New Testament. Why should I believe them when they can’t give me one good reason for claiming Christian whites are better than Christian negroes. If Jesus wasn’t a racist, why are they? I have serious questions no one can answer outside of the usual stock answer, “Little lady, just read your Bible every day, have faith, and everything will work out.” Well, maybe that answer is enough for some people but not for me.
And another thing, how come every question I ask always ends with them saying I’m sitting in judgment. Is wanting to know the truth same as judging others? I’d like to believe they know what they’re talking about, but when I heard some preacher cheated on his wife at the drive-in last Saturday, and him with his hand in some girl’s blouse, his tongue halfway to Memphis down her throat, and breaking the same ten commandments he preaches on Sundays, I thought to myself, “What’s the Gospel done for him?” I know all Christians aren’t like this but it’s enough to turn me off. I ask the same question over and over: what’s the point in bring- ing someone to Jesus and getting them baptized, when you don’t let coloreds in your church? Another time, I asked the same minister why God bothered to make me in the first place. I asked him where I lived before I was born, where I’ll go when I die, and what kind of God makes war? He just looked at me like I didn’t have my head screwed on tight. I should have asked him what he does on Saturday nights. I’m fed up asking questions no one can answer, like where my grandpa went when he died, like who decides what’s to be born an animal, or a blade of grass, or a human being. Another thing, where do my thoughts go when I die? Where’d my old dog Laddie go when he got hit by a car and died? We buried him out back. I can’t stop wondering about things like this. The Christian Science people are sincere, but they can’t answer my questions either. I only go to church because it makes Aunt Lowee happy.

Excerpt from Tharon Ann

I love Lucy, but what ever happened to Lucille Ball?

by
https://bitly.com/jbrookins

Here I am back in Hollywood with practical experience under my belt. Working with seasoned character actors this past summer has given me a newly discovered confidence. I’m beginning to get parts in little theaters around Hollywood, a good showcase for agents, producers and directors to scout for new talent. One morning, I get a call from my agent who tells me that last week, Lucille Ball sent someone to check me out in a play I’m in called Blue Denim. Apparently, she wants me to join the new repertory company she’s assembling at Desilu Studios. What a break! Just imagine. Lucille Ball wants to meet me.
On the day of my appointment, I’m more than a little nervous about meeting her as I vividly recall the Lucy of my childhood. A week never passed that I didn’t watch I love Lucy on our newly acquired television set Uncle Zack won in a poker game. I remember spending the first week just trying to figure out how people could move and talk inside that little box. Meeting a memory in the flesh is no small thing. Waiting here, my thoughts retrogress to the time when Joan Crawford, Aunt Lowee’s pet red hen, sat on Uncle Zack’s shoulder and never missed an episode of I Love Lucy. That hen was Lucille Ball’s biggest fan. I’d love to tell her about Joan Crawford but she’d think I’m stupid, that I’m making up such a crazy story.
I’m so nervous waiting here outside her dressing room for my interview, hives are starting to break out on my face. I try reading Daily Variety to calm my nerves. It’s hard to believe I’m about to meet Lucille Ball … my Lucy. Suddenly, I hear a loud, strident voice coming from her dressing room. I’ve no idea what my expectations are but this couldn’t be Lucy screaming. I’m trying hard to convince myself that no way is this shrill voice coming from the Lucy of my childhood. I’m startled to hear a rough voice scream, “Well, don’t stand there like a bump on a log. Get in here!”
Is she talking to me? She must be, there’s no one here but me. I cautiously walk into her dressing room and stare, not knowing what to say or what not to say. I didn’t ask to be here; she invited me. I begin to go back and forth with myself, thinking that surely this voice belongs to someone wearing a Lucy mask. No such luck. She cuts right to the chase, beginning her pitch in a hard voice, that if I sign the contract with Desilu, I’ll get more theatre experience. The carrot she’s dangling is the promise of putting her repertory actors in the many sitcoms she and Desi are grinding out at Desilu. This is no big turn on for me, even though she’s already hand picked and signed up quite a few actors. I’m loyal to my heroines but this one is going down fast. My trusting nature, or whatever naivety is left in me, has its heels put to the fire with this encounter. I watch her ultra red lips moving against a mop of freshly dyed fire red hair, eye lashes I could trip on, and realize she isn’t the wonderful Lucy I remember and loved.
Once reality sets in, clearly her offer will knock out future opportunities that might come my way. Fact of the matter, binding myself to a long term contract, for an iffy project that only pays scale, doesn’t make sense. She is promising the moon but does she think I just got off a banana boat? Truth is, I don’t like her. Sensing my hesitation, she begins to rant about my agent who either was, or, I suspect, still is her agent. She looks directly in my eyes and screams, “You’re so damn stupid, you don’t understand he doesn’t want you involved in our project because his commission would be shit! I know him like the back of my hand.”
I’m stunned she talks like this to someone she doesn’t even know. The Lucy I loved would never say “shit.” After this tirade, she dismisses me stating with utmost confidence, “Think about it and get back to me!” To insure her word is the last spoken, she screams, “Soon!
I leave her office fast as my legs will take me, thinking all the while that it will be a cold day in hell when I ever get back to her, as I take deep breaths of fresh air, and chew seven throat lozenges at once; I’m trying hard to overcome my devastation at losing the Lucy of my childhood. It’s hard facing the truth when a dream is shattered, the realization that someone I thought one way is quite the opposite. I call my agent from a pay phone to let him know I’d rather have my hooters shot out of cannon than sign a contract with someone I don’t trust! If I sign with Desilu, I’ll be stuck there forever. I’m startled to hear a rough voice scream, “Well, don’t stand there like a bump on a log. Get in here!”
Is she talking to me? She must be, there’s no one here but me. I cautiously walk into her dressing room and stare, not knowing what to say or what not to say. I didn’t ask to be here; she invited me. I begin to go back and forth with myself, thinking that surely this voice belongs to someone wearing a Lucy mask. No such luck. She cuts right to the chase, beginning her pitch in a hard voice, that if I sign the contract with Desilu, I’ll get more theatre experience. The carrot she’s dangling is the promise of putting her repertory actors in the many sitcoms she and Desi are grinding out at Desilu. This is no big turn on for me, even though she’s already hand picked and signed up quite a few actors. I’m loyal to my heroines but this one is going down fast. My trusting nature, or whatever naivety is left in me, has its heels put to the fire with this encounter. I watch her ultra red lips moving against a mop of freshly dyed fire red hair, eye lashes I could trip on, and realize she isn’t the wonderful Lucy I remember and loved.
Once reality sets in, clearly her offer will knock out future opportunities that might come my way. Fact of the matter, binding myself to a long term contract, for an iffy project that only pays scale, doesn’t make sense. She is promising the moon but does she think I just got off a banana boat? Truth is, I don’t like her. Sensing my hesitation, she begins to rant about my agent who either was, or, I suspect, still is her agent. She looks directly in my eyes and screams, “You’re so damn stupid, you don’t understand he doesn’t want you involved in our project because his commission would be shit! I know him like the back of my hand.”
I’m stunned she talks like this to someone she doesn’t even know. The Lucy I loved would never say “shit.” After this tirade, she dismisses me stating with utmost confidence, “Think about it and get back to me!” To insure her word is the last spoken, she screams, “Soon!
I leave her office fast as my legs will take me, thinking all the while that it will be a cold day in hell when I ever get back to her, as I take deep breaths of fresh air, and chew seven throat lozenges at once; I’m trying hard to overcome my devastation at losing the Lucy of my childhood. It’s hard facing the truth when a dream is shattered, the realization that someone I thought one way is quite the opposite. I call my agent from a pay phone to let him know I’d rather have my hooters shot out of cannon than sign a contract with someone I don’t trust! If I sign with Desilu, I’ll be stuck there forever. Lucille Ball is a great comedienne. I’ll give her that. I love Lucy ran from 1951 – 1957, one of the most watched shows on television. This afternoon, she spoke to me at length about how hard she worked getting to the top, how she saved her money from every paycheck, and how she never stopped trying to better herself. I take my hat off to her for that. I admire her grit because she’s married to someone who can’t keep his pants up. Maybe loving him made her so hard.
Once I recover from the shock of losing my childhood sweetheart, I drive straight home, crawl into bed with my clothes on, pull the covers up over my head and cry.

An excerpt from Tharon Ann

GOOD MORNING INDIA

by

We are early. No matter. It feels good to breathe in fresh morning air. This ancient land has the most unusual mix of sounds one can possibly imagine. Morning satsang begins each day at 9:30 a.m., then again at 6:00 p.m. Everyone takes off their shoes before entering the Bhandara Hall and sits in rows, men to the left, women to the right. I’m greeted by Indian women, old and young, who signal me to come sit with them, especially Sadna with a smile and laughter so rare she could do toothpaste commercials if she lived in the U.S.
Once again Indian women cluster around me asking every imaginable question via mime, since they don’t speak English, and my grasp of Punjabi is hopeless. Doug puts on his shoes and patiently waits. As Jasbir pulls me away, he tells them in Punjabi that Rome wasn’t built in a day. Quite the contrary. We’re more like old friends getting reacquainted … hard to explain.
We walk upstairs to his quarters, take off our shoes and place them outside his door. Baba Ji sits without turban, a white knitted cap pulled down that touches his white beard glistening against honey colored skin. He wears a blue vest, white leggings, and white kurta*. His dark eyes scan our faces as he blesses us in ways that human language cannot describe. I continue to gaze into his eyes as he gives us darshan, an Indian word meaning the blessings received from a Mystic who glances lovingly at someone. He summons Parveen to bring tea. Sitting in the presence of a Mystic is no small thing. Wonder and awe best describes how I feel. I can hardly spea

An excerpt from India with a Backpack and Prayer

Show Biz Here I Come

by
Jennifer Brookins author

An excerpt from Tharon Ann

The telephone rings. It’s my agent. I have an interview at 1:00 this afternoon with Jerry Wald, an important producer at Twentieth Century Fox. This is a huge break, and hard to believe it’s happening to me. I put on my best outfit and drive to Twentieth. When I enter his suite two other men are present who right away get down to business, and check me out like I’m the lox and bagels they just ordered from Cantors. They dissect me from head to toe as though I’m not here. Slowly, the conversation segues onto the subject of my name, that it doesn’t meet the standards of other great show business names. Jerry W. says in a thick accent, “Tharon Ann? It’s got no pizzazz!” Who ever heard of a name like that? You listening? I named Jennifer Jones … see the rhythm? You gotta have a three syllable first name and a one syllable last name.” I’m standing here, a cadaver in the midst of an autopsy, watching my birth name fly out the window. The only sound that comes out of my mouth is, “Yes sir, that’s fine.” The young girl once named Tharon Ann, someone I began life with, is dead. I’m suddenly frightened. I want to resurrect her … why did I cave in? … why did I allow him to change my name? Tharon was my father’s name; it’s all I have left of him. Then again, what’s in a name? So what if my ambition caved to a loudmouth star maker. So what. I’ll bury Tharon Ann once and for all. I’m not her anymore. Don’t I have my foot in the door of a major movie studio? This is what counts. I sign a contract with Jerry Wald for his upcoming film, Mardi Gras, starring Pat Boone, Tommy Sands, Christine Carrere, Gary Crosby, Dick Sergeant, Sherrie North, Fred Clark, Barry Chase and me. From this point forward, everyday I drive to Twentieth for wardrobe, hair, makeup, schedules, meeting with various cast members, and rehearsing the musical sequences with a choreographer. Jerry Wald parades me around Twentieth and introduces me like I’m his new toy poodle. Who minds being a poodle? I don’t. Woof! Woof! I’m in heaven.


I have an important interview today. Jerry W. makes a point of telling me to wear the yellow dress from Mardi Gras. He urges me to be very polite to one of the two most influential women in Holly-wood, Hedda Hopper. Louella Parsons and Hedda have gossip columns. They make and break careers with a word, wielding their long, vengeful, sword-like tongues. In 1958, they own this town. People around here treat them like the second coming. We walk over to the set where Hedda, as famous for the hats she wears as her scathing tongue, holds court. Jerry W. bows low and kisses up to her,
“Hedda, love of my life, I’d like you to meet another little lady who loves hats.”


The only hat I like is my old baseball cap, but today I’m wearing a pale yellow cloche style to match my dress. He continues,
“She’s going to be in Mardi Gras. This one has the makings of a star.” Unimpressed, Hedda gives me a quick glance, just enough for me to look into her unyielding steel-blue eyes. For a brief moment, if ever a pissant froze to death inside a popsicle, it’s me standing here right now. She hates me. In an attempt to salvage the moment, I grab hold of my composure, and strain to harness enough sunshine to send a Kodak smile to this powerful woman wearing a hat reminiscent of a rooster chasing a barnyard hen. In a calculated move, Hedda slowly turns her head in my direction, and gives me an icy look that clearly represents her instant opinion of me, which is: “Drop dead you little bitch!”


In silence, I recite the alphabet ten times in wait for sound to come out of her draconian lips. She whispers in the vicinity of where I’m standing, “How nice.” Her head does a three quarter turn, as she summarily dismisses me with a flip of her hand.
Someone once told me I’m too direct with people, that it makes them uneasy. After my lackluster introduction to the Queen of Hollywood I pretend to be dead, and stand there like someone waiting at a red light who dies two seconds before it turns green. Jerry and Hedda continue to plot about exclusive dirt he’ll give her, only if she will not print something he doesn’t want made public. This town specializes in the game of tit for tat. It’s easy pretending to like a person when they pretend to like me, but hard even being cordial to someone who hates me right off the bat. When he’s finished his arm-twisting, brown-nosing chat with Hedda, on we go to our next stop which is the makeup department. As we walk along he tells me how many stars he’s made, pausing long enough for me to acknowledge the double entendre. Once there, he introduces me to a well known man who is polite and eager to please – rare in this town. Everyone has an agenda. What you see ain’t necessarily so. No one around here can point fingers if they’re completely honest.


He takes one look at me and says, “Now little lady, wait here for a moment. I’ll whip up a custom eye shadow that will be perfect for you.”


After his last remark, my introspective, philosophical thoughts
jump headfirst out the window. I need the wait for my ego to orbit back to earth. I’m just being honest when I say, “I’m so in awe when I think of me.”
When anyone in Hollywood uses the expression, “I’m just being honest,” it’s usually right after they’ve insulted the crap out of someone and I’m just being honest.


My Oakie Grandparents and them Cherokee Indians from Childhood

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“I could jus squeeze the bejesus out of my Oakie grandparents cuz that’s how much I love’um. They live in a big magic house with hidin places to play in. Grandpa got day dreamin room with windows to look out at the mountains, watchin sunsets, playin gin rummy’n keepin a look out for who’s comin to visit. Ever night he explains how things was in Oklahoma back in the good ole days when it was wild’n wooly’n how he moved his family to Ada to build a post office for them Cherokees so they got mail. He says they weren’t nothin for miles on end cept’n a handful’a Oakies round about. Grandpa says they don’t like white people none’n that’s how come he learnt to talk Indian. He gonna teach me too if I make good grades. Grandpa says I make him crazy askin so many questions. He built a log cabin back’a the store. Sometimes I dream bout that little creek behind grandpa’s log cabin’n the water mill Grammy used for grindin corn for the Cherokees. I wish I was there in the evenin with grandpa spinnin yarns bout Ned Christy, the famous Cherokee bandit. I cry when he says white people caught up with Ned’n killed him. What’s wrong with white folks? Grandpa says kids back then made they own fun playin in the woods’n chewin rabbit tobacco growin wild. After sayin that, grandpa looks in my direction’n laughs sayin I oughtn’t to look for it cuz it’s called nicotine. Them Cherokees was always invitin him’n the family to all day stomp-dances’n barbecues. When I asked grandpa how he went from livin on a Cherokee reservation to now, he says he moved west with all them other hell raisin Oakies’n that’s how he landed in East Los Angles. Them Mexicans reminded him of Oklahoma, that’n the property bein so cheap’n all.
Grandpa says he believes in the American dream, that if folks not afraid to put in a hard day’s work, they can be anythin they wanna be. He says his sister, my great Aunt Alice, lives alone in the log cabin her great granddaddy built high up in the Ozark Mountains. Grandpa says Alice never married’n to hear him tell it, it lucky for mankind she didn’t. She grows her own vegetables, hunts for possum, makes her own moonshine, chops kindling for cold winters’n can kill a rat three yards away with one spit a tobacco. Whenever the G-Men Revenuers is brave enough to travel on foot the long ways up the mountain to her log cabin, she pulls out the welcome mat’n plugs they ass fulla buckshot. When Grammy hears me say “ass,” she bout to have a kanipshun fit. Grandpa jumps in real fast, explainin that I only said it on accounta I heard him sayin it. Anyways, he convinced Grammy we meant it in the donkey way. Anyways, when Alice run outta supplies, she rides her ol’ horse bareback down the thick, back woods to the nearest town where she’s well known in these parts. Mountain folks protect they own specially where them Revenuers is concerned. Grandpa reckons Alice been makin shine for the neighbors too. He says she can get a government check cuz’a her old age’n all, but she downright burrs up, refusin anythin smackin’a charity. Aunt Alice don’t believe in state aid’n she is quick to say it. Grandpa says she’s stubborn as a jackass, but it’s not good to get riled up cuz’a her temper’n in all. He paid good money for her a radio but she won’t use it none cuz theys no electric. One day when me’n him are workin the cards playin gin rummy’n him spinnin yarns, he looks up at me’n sayin, “You jus like Alice. Botha y’all made outta piss’n vinegar!” Grammy don’t preciate him usin swears to describe me, but I take it good like a compliment.
Grandpa found his self a way of gettin round usin swears in front of Grammy. He says, “Government’s a bunch of SOBs (that would be sons of bitches) they ought’ a stay out folks GD, (that would be goddamn,) business!” Grandpa says swearins an art form’n damnation to hell fire, he ain’t stoppin for any woman! (til Grammy walks into the room)
When he was young, Grandpa belonged to a literary society but nothin ever came of the short stories he wrote, him explainin he had too many mouths to feed to fiddle round spinnin yarns. I love it when he reads his own poetry but I cry when he reads Mr. Robert Frost out loud cuz I know in my heart, it’s his way’a sayin he’s leavin soon. I caint hardly stand thinkin bout it.
The woods are lovely dark and deep
But I have promises to keep And miles to go before I sleep
And miles to go before I sleep”

An excerpt from Tharon Ann

GOOD MORNING INDIA

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young girl

A little Punjabi girl with long black hair and denim coveralls, triggered this feeling of déjà vu:


“The year is almost over; I’ve hardly had time to fly my kite or make a party dress for my magic skin doll. And, doncha know the roof on my tree house still has a big hole in it. Why is it that everything I love goes away, but what I can’t stand hangs around forever? I think I’ll go to Willard’s Drugstore, and have a cherry phosphate. Sitting at the counter helps me figure out stuff.”


© jb

TITTIES, TOENAILS and BOYFRIENDS

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An excerpt from Tharon Ann


“Titties, toenails and boyfriends is all girls talk about. Yuk! I’m invited to a bunking party at horrible Kate Eldred’s house down the street. I told Aunt Lucille I don’t like sleep-overs cuz all girls talk about is titties, toenails and boyfriends, oh, and what size stupid brassier they wear. Best put a gun to my head than make me wear one of those stupid girly things. Another thing, I jus as soon eat dirt than paint my toenails red. I swear! Whenever Kate talks bout boys, her left eye twitches. First I thought she was goin blind til I figured out she was boy-crazy. Anyways, Aunt Lucille says I’m goin whether I want to or not.
This is the worst night I ever spent on earth. Theys six girls exactly like horrible Kate’n all they do is talk my brains out bout titties, toenails, and boyfriends. When I bring up the subject of baseball, they jus look at me weird-like. Next thing y’know they askin me what size brassier I wear – so I hike my t-shirt over my head’n yell out, “Look at these babies! Mosquito bites don’t need’um I’m thinkin folks say titties when they already wear brassiers, but if they don’t – they come right out’n say bosoms … or mosquito bites.
One girl says they gots titty creams that makes’um sprout like corn stalks. I already know this from an ad I saw in a funny book that says if a person rubs titty cream on they chest ever night, in no time that person will grow big ones. I’m thinking it’d be a whole lot easier to jus cut pictures of titties outta Aunt Lucille’s magazine’n glue um to my chest. But then I’d miss the bonus part; a real good exercise that comes in the mail with the titty cream. I’m supposed to stand in front of a long mirror, stretch out my hands to the side’n bend my arms back’n forth to my chest, repeatin ten times, “I must, I must, I must develop my bust.” or somethin like that. Anyways, the company who makes this stuff wants one dollar’n fifty cents plus stamps. I can sure see me askin Aunt Lowee for that kinda money, jus so I can grow titties. Ha! Ha! Anyways, I got more important stuff to do than think bout stupid stuff like titties, toenails and boyfriends. Who wants’um anyway? Bet yur bottom dollar not me! m thinking to build myself a tree house at the end of summer when I go back home to Little Rock. I’m gonna sit up there all day til school starts, drinkin lemonade’n shootin peas outta my sling shot at boys when they pass by. Grandpa Leo says I cud probly wup’um all if I got a mind to – which is good to know in case one of them tries to pull somethin. I think all this talk about titties, toenails, and boyfriends is makin boys more horrible than usual. YUK! YUK! YUK!
Mister God, please make Kate Eldred’s titties grow so big she got to be pushed through the door. I’m ashamed to talk like this but I hate her guts.”

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