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Betty G. Birney's avatar

I can't tell you how much I love your memoir writing and essays - and miss you when I do! As you know, I'm living in Manhattan now, but you triggered memories for me - I know the exact view from your roof you described. Suddenly I was back in L.A. And then a long-lost memory. When I was very newly arrived in L.A., over 40 years ago, a friend (with a baby) whom I knew from St. Louis, persuaded me to take a vegetarian cooking class from her doctor's wife at their house, somewhere up around the Greek. Did everybody with a baby go to Dr. Fleiss - and adore him - at that time? His wife was very earth-mother and we just sat in her kitchen and probably talked more than we cooked. I don't have the recipes any more but afterwards we'd sit in the dining room (with the parrot) and eat what we'd made and chat. The classes were on a weeknight and once Dr. Fleiss came in with their kids (5 or so, including you know who; she was still a kid). It was a life so different from my life - I had a good job at Disney but was only starting to make real friends. I haven't thought about that class in many years, so thanks for that. I do still think of my dear friend who brought me to the class - she's long been MIA, lost to mental illness and drugs. I still think about her and the group of people, including me, who did everything we could, but she's been lost to us all for years. Sorry, didn't want to end on a sad note. But that's what happens when you take a stroll down memory lane. Maybe I'll see if I do still have those recipes. Thank you, Kerry!

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Kerry Madden-Lunsford's avatar

I love this so much, Betty. Let’s gather next I’m in New York to visit my sister💚💚💚

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Companion loaf's avatar

Futon generation! Yes, I can relate to all this. And Dr Fleiss was our pediatrician too. Miss that old office.

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Betty G. Birney's avatar

Let's get together! Anne Paul was just here and we had such a wonderful day!

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Tracy Owens's avatar

Oh, this is so beautiful and brings back so much! My first husband and Dylan and I used to sleep in one bed in those Soviet-looking married student housing apartments on Sutherland, and we threw dirty laundry between the bed and the wall. One day Dylan rolled off the bed, when she was learning to roll, but it was into the laundry! Before that, the place we brought her home to, we lived on those big brick apartments on Sutherland, Huntington Place, and we had cinderblock shelves in the living room, next to the stairwell. We had a baby swing in the middle of the room. Dylan's dad was at work (we both worked at McKay), and my dad came and got me and Dylan for the day, because I was too nervous to be with the baby alone. There was some dust-up among a married couple with issues who lived above us. I guess someone knocked into the wall in the stairwell, and the cinderblocks came down and crushed the baby swing! My dad (who is exactly like your dad) kept standing in the room repeating "The baby would have been killed! The baby would have been killed!" I heard my husband's car and ran out to say "My dad is going to freak out on you, and you're just going to have to let him!" Twenty years of my dad freaking out on him took a toll :)

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Kerry Madden-Lunsford's avatar

Parallel lives, parallel lives - oh my gosh. Yes, our fathers are cut from the same cloth. Big love, Tracy, and thank you for such a great conversation at Union Ave💚💚💚Flannery slept between us on the futon always 💚

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Tracy Owens's avatar

Oh, and Dylan is named after Dylan Thomas, because I had just bought his poems on cassette in Atlanta when I found out I was pregnant.

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Bob Byrd's avatar

My grandmother was Memaw. Friends had Granny, Nana, Grandma, Gramma but you are the first Bop Bop I've known, and I love it. I love it when you walk down memory lane and let me stroll with you. I slept on a futon for six months when the roof caved in on my bed (I was living in a WWII era garage apartment).

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Kerry Madden-Lunsford's avatar

Oh Bob - we were the futon generation 💚💚💚

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Amy Spalding's avatar

Ugh this is so good. Thank you for your words, Kerry, always.

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Kerry Madden-Lunsford's avatar

Thank you, Amy - see you this weekend or for coffee next week? Love xo

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Amy Spalding's avatar

Yes I'll text!

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Deborah Wiles's avatar

I love this, and you. Rest all you can. Rest is good. 💜🙋‍♀️🎉 📖

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Kerry Madden-Lunsford's avatar

Love you, dearest Debbie xo Yes, rest is good. xo PS I did a 2005 book tour in 2025, and it's just too much. xo :)

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Deborah Wiles's avatar

It's all too much right now… and I hear you!

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