Blossom and Spring Rain...

(That's Mom in the rain, in Lyon! Pictures of me soon...I only JUST figured out how to do this...duh!)
I have many odd obsessions: plants, although I have luck with only the heartiest; old lamps with glass shades, you don't have to worry about the fabric yellowing; the flatware, dishes, glasses, and napkins MUST match when I eat or I go crazy, the serving pieces can vary, and if I can't find a matching piece of cutlery I take the odd pieces to save face in front of my guests. Guests that ostensibly don't care! In terms of glassware, white wine MUST be in a wine glass, but unless I am drinking red at the dinner table it can go into a tumbler. All other beverages MUST go in a tumbler, except a set of oversized, low based flutes, which I prefer for orange juice. A coffee cup...must ONLY be used for coffee! Trashpicking, an honored Philadelphia tradition, even a friend's mother on Rittenhouse did it, is another obsession. And well, there are many others but I will end my list here. These are things that people might not - generally, care a whit for - but the other thing I adore that other people might not care for is rain. More specifically, I hate when people complain about the rain. The rain to me has always been so cleansing. We have had much rain this May, and people complain about...it all the time. Either they do not have a proper rain coat - I thank the GODS I found the ideal one seven years ago and am pleased to say Banana Republic has yet to let me down - or they do not connect rain with cleansing, and rain with spring, with the beginning of life after the pall of winter. My mother frequently starts a grey-cast day with a disgruntled, "Rain today." I feel sorry for people who do not love the rain. I wish to take a walk with them under an umbrella.
Rain, furthermore is the best mood setter. I think it is the most elegant music. I have had many fond memories of rain as it makes glissandos on an awning, sipping wine overlooking Umbria, gently reverbating on the clay tiles of a Swiss hostel, whispering onto the leaves of a tree in Central Park, the sight of mom laughing underneath a rainy, laughy umbrella in Lyon, the drops glistening briefly before drowning into a summery, sun-shower Lake of Zurich, sipping wine on Walnut Street, the beats it delivers against the windows of a little apartment at 160th and Broadway as I read, wrote, or sat with the window open, next to my doomed ivy plants, drinking coffee, and rain goes so well with music! Ironically, when I was once in London it only rained once, and for only fifteen minutes. I was the most disappointed student-tourist in London.
I remember a warm spring day where my father cleaned his van (it was the 80s, okay?) and we had planned a picnic meal in the backyard after I "helped" Daddy. Mom and Daddy wanted to cancel it until I suggested we eat in the van with the sliding door open and the rain pouring down outside.
Then the Spring I was coming out. It was the first wave of that journey, I was in high school and a gay friend recommended Tori Amos. He recommended her as a coming out album, not as a rain accompaniment. Now of course, I can't stand her, except for that album Boys For Pele which I listened to on repeat for the better part of a Spring Break. A Spring Break stained with the blood of a friend who killed himself; shot himself. After the funeral it rained; to me a God I then believed in was extinguishing the fires of hell for his tormented soul. Another Spring where music and rain came together so perfectly was the spring when my father was dying. I came to then embrace the rain, I needed to amplify its silent, murmuring soundtrack against the soulful voice of Billie Holiday whose pain and strength complimented both the sad times as well as the precipitation. I cannot, actually, listen to a Billie Holiday album in full, at one time, her songs so are linked to the last of my father's springs.
Yet, I finally think I have found my perfect rain soundtrack. One that sings the best things to me (not only French, as she does) but an intimate chanteuse whose voice was once described as barely being able to reach the second storey of a dollhouse. Blossom Dearie, her real name, (1924 to 2009) just passed away in the beginning of February. Her voice, truly, is a delicate strain of singing. Her voice is as delicate as a glass of champagne, little bubbles floating to the top amidst swells of gentle mucis. While the other singers I mentioned above, Billie and Tori, complement the rain in their strength, their bold oddness, their passion and power Blossom complements the rain by a voice that with each word wants to touch your soul. She is, or sad to say she was, primarily known as a cabaret performer. Therefore, her voice also lends itself to her comedic songs, such as "I'm Hip," "I Want to Be Bad," and a few others. Her comedic songs however are not what lend themselves to Spring rain. It is her love songs. As so many classic, songbook pieces are love songs they often speak of Spring, "It Might As Well Be Spring," is a superfluous, iconic example, but I am not being so...naive as to name only that. In "I Walk A Little Faster", she breaks your heart by singing, "Thinking you'll be there, I walk a little faster." She doesn't sing about Spring, per se; however, the tempo, the slow beat, her delicate fingers falling onto the piano, as she sings "searching for a face I can't divine as yet," conjures up images of someone walking in the rain. Their umbrella is overhead, open. They see someone perhaps smile in their direction, the umbrella'd walker sees this and hopes that he or she is the "love around the corner." So they "walk a little faster," but it's not them. In her own life she married once, an accomplished jazz musician, but tragically the Belgian-born jazzman died not long after their marriage. You can hear her pain, but her sadness speaks of having known, and lost love.
I have heard the song before, but with Blossom's cover of this sad, yet hopeful song it makes you truly sympathize with, and understand the plight of a single person. A single person who knows that looking won't help, but not looking won't help either. In the song her voice is as delicate as those champagne bubbles; a glissando of uncertainty and melancholy hope that "love is around the corner." "Thinking you'll be there, I walk a little faster."
Blosson Dearie was never an overtly famous singer. She was a very private, yet not unfriendly person from what I have learned. I am torn about her legacy, because while I do not want her memory exploited, I do not want her to be largely ignored or forgotten. But, listening to her now, as the rain beats down against the window panes, as Sugar stands with her nose pointed into the rain, not sure to venture outside or crawl into bed, I have decided that Blossom Dearie is something I will share only with people as sympathetic as I am. Namely people that love the sound of the rain, tapping on a dollhouse roof.