I didn’t come up with
the book title on my own. My dear friend Dwight Mikkelsen just sort of uttered it one evening while we were sitting
in the plastic chairs having a cigarette. Well, I wasn’t having a cigarette. He was. He smokes, and he smokes
too much, and I wish he’d quit. But that’s another story…
Anyway, I was telling Dwight about the conversations Karlene and I were having in the two white plastic
chairs that adorned my meager backyard and he was listening to me with great interest. That’s the thing I really
love about Dwight. He always listens with great interest. As if everything I say is profoundly enlightening. Which it’s
not. Obviously. But that’s how Dwight is. He has a way of making one feel special…
But again, I digress.
So, I had just finished telling Dwight about these amazing
conversations with Karlene in the plastic chairs in my backyard, and he was sitting there smoking and listening to me
with great interest, and then suddenly he chuckled in this raspy way he does from smoking too much and he leaned back in his
chair and said, “Ahhhhh, yesssss, Patricia…your legends of the plastic chairs.”
And there it was.
We were silent for a moment.
Then we looked at each other.
Then we both said at the exact same time, “Hey, that would
make a great title for the book!”
And
so it was.
And I thank him for that.
Dwight Mikkelsen and I go way back. We first met at band camp when I was 15 and he was 18. I was a music
student and he was a camp counselor. I remember the first time I laid eyes on him, he was strolling across the campground
with these giant confident strides, his long blond hair lifting up behind him with each step, this funny little smirk on his
face that said, I know something you don't know. He was glorious.
We became friends at band camp (mostly because I followed him around like a little puppy). And we remained
friends back home in Visalia until I turned 18 and he turned 21 and he left town to pursue a college education and a musical
career in Los Angeles. Then we became pen pals (the old-fashioned way with paper and pens and envelopes and such), and
he would write to me from the road while touring with his band. (Dwight had joined a pop-rock band by then, playing the trumpet
– which he did quite well.)
We
stopped being pen pals when I was 22 and he was 25 because he got married and started a family and I had stuff of my own going
on. But I never forgot about my old friend Dwight. Then one day when I was 46 and he was 49, I was cleaning out a drawer and
I came across one of his old letters. I started wondering what my old friend had been up to for the past thirty years so
I walked over to my computer and Googled his name, thinking that with a name as unique as Dwight Mikkelsen, surely there would
be at least one hit.
Well, what a pleasant surprise! Turns
out there were hundreds of hits linked to his name! My old friend Dwight had been busy all those years, becoming quite a formidable
music copyist, and more importantly, a composer! And his work was all over the place! From scoring films, to orchestrating
for the likes of Quincy Jones and Whitney Houston, to penning the theme song for the Howard Stern show…Dwight’s
music was everywhere. I was so excited I immediately sent him an email, and then overnight, we picked up right where
we had left off all those years before – the friendship was renewed again as pen pals, only this time electronically
(thank heavens!).
It took another four years, until
I was 50 and he was 53, before we had the opportunity to meet up in person again. I was so delighted to see that my old friend
Dwight still had that confident stride, and that long hair, and that ubiquitous smirk. These days we don't get to visit
in person very often, because he’s busy filling up the world with his wonderful music and I still have my own stuff
going on, but I never forget about my old friend Dwight. I plan on being friends with him forever, one way or another.
To learn more about Dwight Mikkelsen, visit: http://noteslinger.com
Listen to his music at: Dwight’s MySpace Page
