Aug. 2: Starfish and coffee
This note is actually about Kim, a girl I went to high school with. Kim
was sort of a hippie. I say sort of because I didn't know her very well
and never really talked to her in high school. She self-identified as a
hippie and she listened to Janis Joplin while a lot of girls her age
were listening to New Kids on the Block. I met her mother once and I
called her "Janis" just because I heard she was a big Joplin fan too. I
liked Kim but she intimidated me a little. Her street name (if there is
such a thing as street names in middle class southwest Calgary) was
Whisper, aka The Little Purple Hippie.
I was friends with Kim through my best friend, Jason, who was friends with everyone. Once Jason and me were driving in my car and Prince's album Sign O The Times was in the tapedeck. On comes Starfish and Coffee and Prince sings these words:
It was 7:45 we were all in line
2 greet the teacher Miss Cathleen
First was Kevin, then came Lucy, third in line was me
All of us were ordinary compared to Cynthia Rose
She always stood at the back of the line
A smile beneath her nose
Her favorite number was 20 and every single day
If U asked her what she had 4 breakfast
This is what she’d say
Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam
Butterscotch clouds, a tangerine
And a side order of ham
If U set your mind free, baby
Maybe you’d understand
Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam
"That song reminds me of Kim," I said.
"Mm," said Jason.
Something else seemed needed to be said. I didn't want Jason to think I was making fun of his friend, so I plunged on: "Just because her favourite number is 20 and she wears mismatched socks and she eats starfish for lunch. I think it's a song about a person who has the courage to just be herself no matter what and that's what I think of Kim."
"Could we stop at McDonald's?" Jason asked. "I'm hungry."
-
Kim was in my car a few times. Once she and her then boyfriend were in the backseat and we were going for pizza at Pizza Bank in Calgary, which is the best pizza in the world. Kim was telling me she thinks it's sexist that girls aren't supposed to belch out loud but it's funny when guys do it. She said she believed in God but not in religion and she didn't hate me for the rigid fundamentalist Christianity I espoused at the time. She told me that she had a medallion at home that showed the Virgin Mary holding the baby Jesus. "I will give it to you," she said. "I think it would be happier in your possession than in mine."
-
Get this... the real life Cynthia Rose was, apparently, autistic. The song is based on something that happened to one of his bandmates when she was in school. There was a mentally handicapped kid and I guess the temptation was there to make fun of that person and then they were able to set their mind free and just embrace them.
I think that Kim would have approved of this when she was in high school. I bet she approves of it now.
-
There were retarded kids at St. Gerard's Elementary School. (I use the term 'retarded' because that's how we referred to people like that back in the early 80s - "people with intellectual disabilities" would not become the in vogue term for at least another three decades.) I am ashamed to admit that I used to make fun of those kids. To my credit, I made fun of them not out of hate (or its first cousin, fear) but out of ignorance. I thought the kids in the special education class were just trying to be funny.
One dinnertime conversation with my father changed the whole thing. For me, anyway. The kids at school still made fun of the retards even when goody goody two shoes Shteevie urged them not to.
-
What motivated the kids to make fun of the retarded ones? Fear, I'd say. Fear of becoming that way or fear of siring children that are born that way. Our mockery is a perverted form of prayer - we are telling the gods (or our genes) that we are so appalled by person X's appearance/mindset/disability and we absolutely don't want that in our bloodline. It is an ugly form of wish fulfillment. "Stupid retard" is the same thing as rubbing the genie's lamp.
-
Starfish and Coffee was never a big hit for Prince but it touched enough emotional cords to accomplish a few things. It's one of the few songs Prince sang when he was the guest on Muppets Tonight. There's a photography studio called Starfish and Coffee and even a blog by a science educator that borrowed the name. It's a cool title. I don't why. It just is.
-
The rumour mill tells me that Prince was thinking of making a children's album and that Starfish and Coffee was a candidate for said album. The project was aborted (how many parents would buy a children's album by the guy who, not three years earlier, had penned Darling Nikki?) Even so, I'll say that Starfish and Coffee is a delightful song and it has a nice message and it makes me think of the Little Purple Hippie, who I have not seen since high school but I know she's out there somewhere and I wish her well.
I think Cynthia Rose does too.
Prince and Cynthia Rose - together at last
I was friends with Kim through my best friend, Jason, who was friends with everyone. Once Jason and me were driving in my car and Prince's album Sign O The Times was in the tapedeck. On comes Starfish and Coffee and Prince sings these words:
It was 7:45 we were all in line
2 greet the teacher Miss Cathleen
First was Kevin, then came Lucy, third in line was me
All of us were ordinary compared to Cynthia Rose
She always stood at the back of the line
A smile beneath her nose
Her favorite number was 20 and every single day
If U asked her what she had 4 breakfast
This is what she’d say
Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam
Butterscotch clouds, a tangerine
And a side order of ham
If U set your mind free, baby
Maybe you’d understand
Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam
"That song reminds me of Kim," I said.
"Mm," said Jason.
Something else seemed needed to be said. I didn't want Jason to think I was making fun of his friend, so I plunged on: "Just because her favourite number is 20 and she wears mismatched socks and she eats starfish for lunch. I think it's a song about a person who has the courage to just be herself no matter what and that's what I think of Kim."
"Could we stop at McDonald's?" Jason asked. "I'm hungry."
-
Kim was in my car a few times. Once she and her then boyfriend were in the backseat and we were going for pizza at Pizza Bank in Calgary, which is the best pizza in the world. Kim was telling me she thinks it's sexist that girls aren't supposed to belch out loud but it's funny when guys do it. She said she believed in God but not in religion and she didn't hate me for the rigid fundamentalist Christianity I espoused at the time. She told me that she had a medallion at home that showed the Virgin Mary holding the baby Jesus. "I will give it to you," she said. "I think it would be happier in your possession than in mine."
-
Get this... the real life Cynthia Rose was, apparently, autistic. The song is based on something that happened to one of his bandmates when she was in school. There was a mentally handicapped kid and I guess the temptation was there to make fun of that person and then they were able to set their mind free and just embrace them.
I think that Kim would have approved of this when she was in high school. I bet she approves of it now.
-
There were retarded kids at St. Gerard's Elementary School. (I use the term 'retarded' because that's how we referred to people like that back in the early 80s - "people with intellectual disabilities" would not become the in vogue term for at least another three decades.) I am ashamed to admit that I used to make fun of those kids. To my credit, I made fun of them not out of hate (or its first cousin, fear) but out of ignorance. I thought the kids in the special education class were just trying to be funny.
One dinnertime conversation with my father changed the whole thing. For me, anyway. The kids at school still made fun of the retards even when goody goody two shoes Shteevie urged them not to.
-
What motivated the kids to make fun of the retarded ones? Fear, I'd say. Fear of becoming that way or fear of siring children that are born that way. Our mockery is a perverted form of prayer - we are telling the gods (or our genes) that we are so appalled by person X's appearance/mindset/disability and we absolutely don't want that in our bloodline. It is an ugly form of wish fulfillment. "Stupid retard" is the same thing as rubbing the genie's lamp.
-
Starfish and Coffee was never a big hit for Prince but it touched enough emotional cords to accomplish a few things. It's one of the few songs Prince sang when he was the guest on Muppets Tonight. There's a photography studio called Starfish and Coffee and even a blog by a science educator that borrowed the name. It's a cool title. I don't why. It just is.
-
The rumour mill tells me that Prince was thinking of making a children's album and that Starfish and Coffee was a candidate for said album. The project was aborted (how many parents would buy a children's album by the guy who, not three years earlier, had penned Darling Nikki?) Even so, I'll say that Starfish and Coffee is a delightful song and it has a nice message and it makes me think of the Little Purple Hippie, who I have not seen since high school but I know she's out there somewhere and I wish her well.
I think Cynthia Rose does too.
Prince and Cynthia Rose - together at last
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