Thursday, December 02, 2004
I just learned from my best friend Mary
that my beloved high school art teacher
passed away.
Mr. Jeffrey Daum was an art teacher in the
Pine Bush Central School system, in upstate New York.
I only recently (November 22, 2004) spoke of him on this blog
as a teacher who influenced me in my youth.
Youth.
Yeah, I was a class A pain-in-the-ass,
that’s for certain.
No bargain for any teacher.
But Mr. Daum had a way of seeing past the bullshit,
and thus, teaching the person inside.
He was clever, but never haughty-
He was imaginative, but not arrogant-
He had an openness about him-
Like whatever he had already learned,
was not going to stop him from learning new things,
even from students.
He was a tad odd,
but this was (to me) an endearing quality.
He took us all on a “field trip” to MoMA
in NYC.
Opening doors to dreams...
He used to wear this silver necklace with a “tit” pendant .
So, the optical illusion was that he had 3 “tits”.
Mr. Daum was a treasure, alright.
He let us listen to music in class-
As long as we “behaved” ourselves...
We listened to:
Black Sabbath, The Mad Dogs and Englishmen LP, Led Zeppelin, Alice Cooper, Janis Joplin...
One day he turned us on to a tune he liked:
A Van Morrison tune called
Blue Money.
The beginning of that song had me wound up for days.
I will always remember him.
I wish I could have told him what a gem he truly was.
Instead, I’ll do it here:
Thank-you, Jeffrey Daum-
For being a great teacher...
This ones' for you:
Do-do-you-do, n'-do-do-you-do
n' do-do-do-you do, n' do-do-do-you-do
n' do-do
Photographer smile
Take a break for a while
Take a rest, do your very best
Take five, honey
Five, honey
Search in your bag
Light up a fag
Think it's a drag, but you're so glad
To be alive, honey
Alive, honey
Say, when this is all over
You'll be in clover
We'll go out and spend
All a your (blue money)
Blue money (blue money)
Do-do-you-do, n'-do-do-you-do
n' do-do-do-you do, n' do-do-do-you-do
n' do-do
Alright, (do-do) do-it
Blue Money
-Van Morrison
Till next time... ‘Mela
9:46 PM
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Photo: Michio Yves Ueda
