Perhaps it was the way Maggie flipped her hair back with a whisk of her hand while she played her instrument. All in one motion she would swipe the hair away from her face and strum her guitar without missing a beat. In my foolish girl heart, I longed to be like Maggie--carefree and indifferent to consequences. When I look back at my formative years, I guess Maggie shaped the woman that I became even if I wear my mother's stubborn chin and sensibilities with equally stubborn pride. Of course, I only saw Maggie's life through lopsided glasses. I didn't know about her daily struggles and the man that she lost to a war that to this day still seems senseless.

When I return to the 70's, I feel the world spinning out of control the way it must have done when Maggie was recovering from an alcoholic binge, so I anchor myself in the present moment. Today, my eyes focus on the realities of Maggie's situation. My schoolgirl naivete disappeared after the birth of my second child. Now, I see that the duality played out around my mother's conservative do-what-we-must to pay the bills worn around her neck like a glossy string of pearls and Maggie's bohemian stance accompanied by shredded bell bottoms and racy halter tops merge into one being. As I recover from my own mistakes and my artistic failures, I realize just how difficult it must have been for Maggie to follow her cherished dream of rock music stardom.

She certainly looked the part, a Janis Joplin type with chops as equally as impressive of the late blues singer, but appearances are deceiving. In any case, Janis died at an early age, while Maggie seemed to exist in an emotional wasteland for several years watching her dreams shrivel into nothingness on the desert floor of alcoholism.

But why focus on the later days when Maggie crashed on our couch lost in an alcoholic stupor? She didn't know which way the wind was blowing or the location of her children who had been taken into custody by the State of California. In the early days when Maggie was barely out of her teens, she worked with some of San Francisco's hottest musicians, recording in state-of-the-art studios and performing at various festivals or so she told us. And it's true that we acquired her first newly minted single sporting a carefree, wind in her hair photograph of Maggie holding an acoustic guitar. I was five at the time so I didn't understand when the press compared her to Joni Mitchell and other folkies of that era. Her songs were labeled, "youthful and reaping vitality of the psychedelic movement."

A few years later, Maggie told us stories about how she hung out with Lou Reed of the Velvet Underground, Bob Dylan and Jim Morrison. Those were Maggie's glory days and something from a past era. In 1970, her husband Paul had been sent off to fight the war in Vietnam because he couldn't just burn his draft card like the rest of his friends.

And in any case wanting to experience free love, Maggie did her share of getting naked with the natives as she worded it in secret confessions to my mother who in turn blushed. Maggie watched my mother stirring chocolate chip cookie batter with disdain. My mother warned Maggie of certain consequences to her actions, but Maggie, not believing in the birth control pill or moderation of anything she considered pleasurable, threw caution to the wind. A year later, Maggie gave birth to her first love child and the second one followed the following year.

I never could understand what my mother, Clarisa and Maggie had in common besides bonding over a bottle of wine they stole from the head sister at their Catholic boarding school. While it certainly was acceptable to be complicit during her schoolgirl days, Clarisa later developed a no-nonsense approach to life. She married the boy next door, literally and became the wife of a man that would eventually become a family doctor. She developed a taste for floral wall paper and sheets to match. She voted for Richard Nixon and was stunned when the Watergate scandal emerged on the news. She just didn't see that one coming, but perhaps due in part because she wasn't as politically-aware as her good friend, Maggie or as outwardly subversive.

In short, I found Clarisa to be a stick in the mud. She reminded me too much of the TV character, Mrs. Brady, a woman I deplore to this day. And yet, it was my mother's practical advise that helped me sail through my adolescence with few problems even if my attention was drawn to Maggie's rock n' roll lifestyle.

Hearing the latest album by Lou Reed fed my soul more so than watching ridiculous situation comedies on the tube. Sure the Brady kids dressed in mod fashion in their later years, but their lives were absolutely banal even to my 12-year old eyes. Blonde and popular, I wasn't, nor was I caught up in the black is beautiful scenario either. I had no idea that Chicanas such as myself even had an identity other than being described as passionate brunettes. The terms ethnic and people of color had not appeared in my world yet.

When I was 13-years old and coming of age, my mother threw a party of Maggie's 30th birthday. This was the only time my mother and I visited Maggie at her run-down apartment. I would probably use the word squalor now to describe the ghetto in which Maggie chose to reside with her two small children, but she managed to provide a bohemian chic quality to her digs. We showed up at the door, my mother carrying vegetarian enchiladas she had baked especially for the occasion and me sporting a birthday cake graced with a large yellow smiley face.

Maggie had just crawled out of bed where she had been making love with a shaggy male poet. She didn't seem to happy to see us, but invited us into her abode just the same. We set the food out on a board that was supported by two discarded milk crates. Maggie lit incense instead of candles. She sat crossed legged with her flowing Indian skirt tucked under her and a wrinkled tie-dye that had seen better days covered the remainder of her body.

In the background we could hear a Jethro Tull record spinning on a second-hand stereo that Maggie picked up at Goodwill. Maggie belted down a beer and spoke complete nonsense while her poet lover stuffed his face with my mother's enchiladas, trying to compliment my mother in broken Spanish. Meanwhile, the record ended, but I was the only one that seemed to notice so I rose from the linoleum floor and flipped the record. Swirling flute hung in the air while Maggie's nonsensical words punctuated each musical phrase. The atmosphere grew tense.

I could tell my mother was nervous, especially with the strange man in our presence. She asked about the whereabouts of Maggie's children. Maggie told us that she left them with the neighbor lady the previous night. We learned that she had a regular habit of dumping her children off to anyone who would take them for the evening. Obviously they were cramping her style. She rationalized that her studio apartment was too small and didn't allow her the privacy that she required. But as soon as she landed a recording contract, she and her children could move into a real house and she sarcastically added, live the American dream. After all, isn't that what everybody wants?

By this time, Maggie had already experienced widowhood and the demise of her music career. She had taken to the bottle, but remained optimistic that she would make a musical comeback. She had written new songs and hooked up with a guitarist. But she felt saddled by her children that she gave birth while her husband was away at war. The signs were already present that she wasn't much of a mother to her children even though she tried to dress the part, show up at PTA meetings and fed them organic granola.

A year later, the welfare office took custody of Maggie's children. Maggie also lost her apartment so she camped out on our couch. At first, I enjoyed having the rock singer around and my friends were impressed with her colorful stories of playing music at the same festivals as Jimi Hendrix and Bob Dylan. But this was old news from the past; Maggie knew her stories were long past their expiration date. I lacked the awareness to see that Maggie was just going through the motions. Her soul had left her body many years prior. Her ambitions were not merely on hold, they were suffering from rigor mortis.

The alcohol only prolonged the reality from taking hold. Sure Maggie could sing the blues, but she could also live them to such extremes that no record company would go within inches of her talent, especially after seeing so many young musicians die from drug overdose and suicides. They didn't want a musical Sylvia Plath on their hands. What receives good press doesn't always bring lasting success to the recording industry. Dead people can sing, but they can't write new material.

Of course none of those suave record reps had the guts to tell Maggie the truth. So she kept at it, recording one demo tape after the another and dutifully sending them off. She told me, in her whisky voice that some day she would win the lottery, meaning she would land that big recording contract, move into her own home and retrieve her two children from the foster homes where they languished. But Maggie's vocals and her inspiration went dry. Her aspirations sunk to the bottom of one bottle while the next one waiting in the wings.

My parents had divorced so my mother took a job as a receptionist for an Ayurvedic doctor that had relocated to the Bay area. While my mother was discovering Shiva and Shakti, Maggie took up permanent residence in our home. Clarisa' attempts to get Maggie to join AA failed and she was at her wit's end trying to figure out a game plan for the lapsed rock n' roller. Eventually, Maggie complied with the State by visiting a rehab center so she could sober up and retrieve her children. It was at this time that she began performing her music on the street.

I recall passing by her as I walked home from school each day. She stood on the street, looking haggard wearing her old bell bottoms and halter tops from a past era, belting out blues tunes to hippies, uninterested businessmen and teens such as myself. Although she boasted that she raked in the money, I came to the conclusion that she only earned barely enough to feed herself. How would she ever convince the government that she could support her children as a street performer?

Eventually, she graduated to performing in coffee houses where she shared the stage with poets and performance artists. She took a job as a waitress on the side and was able to rent an apartment in Oakland. It was at this point that Maggie disappeared from our lives. I had almost forgotten Maggie until recently, when I picked up a newspaper and saw an obituary notice. She had returned to the bottle and was killed in an automobile accident. Well, at least it wasn't suicide, I thought. My thoughts however, weren't reassuring.

As I drive to Maggie's funeral, I have no idea what to expect. Did she make new friends over the years? Did she find a way to reunite with her children? Do I want to know the answers to these questions? I know that Maggie grew old quickly. I know that her carefree days were replaced with the misery of addiction and the guilt of not being able to raise her children. I know that she never did properly grieve the loss of her husband or the loss of her musical dream? What seems romantic to a young adult, hitting the road like Jack Kerouac or hanging out with rock stars back in the glory days hardly pales to the consequences one pays for living a life fast and loose.

Yet, Maggie was no hypocrite. She walked her talk, in fact, ran it. She held her visions as long as possible, never disbelieving that she would land that recording contract and get what was due to her.

No one would ever deny that she had talent, but not everyone succeeds not even with sheer will and persistence. When I read that persistence is what it takes to succeed in self-help books, I laugh. What a terrible guilt-trip to lay on other human beings--really, no one has the answers. Maggie wasn't lazy, but life failed her.

As I approach the cemetery, I notice a small crowd gathering around a grave. A 30ish long-haired man sporting a tie-dye strums on an acoustic guitar accompanied by a 30ish woman wearing a flowing skirt and Indian-style blouse that resembles Maggie. I feel like an uninvited guest crashing a party yet, I park my car and stroll over to the small crowd. I hope to learn what happened to Maggie during her lost years. I hope for a happy ending, knowing I won't get one. I want Maggie to embrace me and tell me that I am jaded; that dreams do come true. But after going through my own divorce, losing custody of my children and the demise of my career as a painter, I feel like my life crashed along with Maggie on the day of her fatal accident.

Yet, I am still breathing so there must be a way for me to piece my life together. Perhaps, Maggie will share her secret of success with me even if it alluded her. In death she transcended and she will start over as someone else. She'll never give up trying even if she sings the blues from her grave. Maybe then, someone will take notice.

copyright 2005