Spiral Stairs and Their Origin

I rang the doorbell of Sherman's two-story Georgian home in West Covina. He answered. "That's the Dynasty theme. I love it!" I said.

"Guess again." He said. "It's Masterpiece Theater." I blushed like a sun-dried tomato. We sat on his mock-70's couch our fashionable shoes resting on a soft, white, new shag rug. We had mock turtle soup and afterwards Celestial Seasonings Great Spirit ginger tea in mis-matched cups. Raw sugar packets in a cut-crystal bowl. Sherman explained how, after being fired by Jay Ward, he was quite destitute. Finally he saw an ad on a bus bench in the Flintridge-La Canada area: "Become an Interior Designer." He took the course and soon had a thriving business.

"Well," I said, "You can certainly see your touch in this home. It's lively, fresh, whimsical and has good qi."

"Thanks," Sherman said, munching on a Milano.

"I love the spiral staircase.'

"Well," he said, "quite a necessity in two-story homes. You see, horses can walk up stairs, but they can't walk down. If you put in regular stairs you are going to end up with a bunch of horses standing around the second floor. Besides, spiral staircases are very Suddenly Last Summer."

"That was an elevator." I explained.

"I'm not going to put in a spiral elevator."

"I love suspence movies with cage elevators;" I said, "even Last Tango as I recall, but wasn't there a suspense movie with Julie Harris that involved a spiral staircase?"

"That was Jackie Bisset." Sherman said, rolling his eyes. I forget he was in the business.
I thanked Sherman for part II of the interview as he walked me to the door. As I crossed the lawn to my waiting car I could have sworn I heard a dog barking in his back yard.

The WABAC Machine

As we learned in our last episode, Sherman has grown up and has a thriving interior design business in West Covina. He also does consulting for Sherman Williams whose sentence "There's nothing black and white about green." is worthy of Soseki.

I recently met Shermie at the SFMOMA. I was sitting outside enjoying beef stew that came with tooth-breaking garlic toasts. A young man about 35 came up to me and said "You must be Bryce Digdug." Sherman's voice had finally changed! It was very deep. He still has the big nerdy glasses — very Edith Head. He informed me that Mr. Peabody couldn't attend because of "pressing family business" (perhaps the birth of 10 nieces?) but I suspect Sherman may be estranged from his dogfather.

We both spoke of how we admire Freida Kahlo who has a really big shew at the museum. In the gift store they had Freida mints, rulers, badminton sets, shower curtains, Rubric's cubes, ice cube trays, book ends, bird whistles, chess sets, battery packs, opera capes, fondue sets, journals, playing cards, coloring books, recipe books, car wax, Mylar balloons, cereal, rings, row boats, and car stereos. Sherman commented that the shuttlecock is somehow very Spanish. "It looks like a mantilla." We conducted a long coversation about the mantilla. I said they are a good disguise. Women are supposed to wear one and dress in all black when visiting the pope unless they are Catholic royalty in which case they have the Privilège du blanc. Jackie should have pushed the envelope and assumed the Privilège du blanc. Ironically, white trash like Laura Bush do not have the Privilège du blanc. Can't you just see her in a mantilla? She wore one just last week at the pope's vulgar right-wing garden party.