Tommy Kirby – So full of life, love and pure imagination, that he deserves his own special place where we can connect with him – here, meow and always.
A couple of days ago as my wife and I were cleaning… I ran across the keys to Tom’s old apartment. He gave us a copy when we visited him several years ago so we would remember we were always welcome. We had such a good time with him visiting all the sites of New York. He was a gracious host. CJ proposed to me on that visit.. Tommy took the picture capturing that moment.
There have been so many important moments in my life.. And Tom was a part of most of them. He did my hair and makeup for my senior prom, we moved him to Austin. We moved him back from Austin to Dallas, he showed me how to really decorate a Christmas tree… And actually gave me my 1st tree in my 1st apartment, he was there at my 1st wedding, he gave me decorating ideas for my first house, he held my child as an infant, he encouraged me after my divorce, he encouraged me as I came out of the closet myself… He took the picture of CJ’s marriage proposal to me and celebrated the moment with us, he played piano at the home we live in now… And there are countless moments in between. There was laughing.. So so much laughter. There were tears from both sides. There was admiration of are… And so many evenings listening to him play the piano. So so many cherished memories.
New memories may be postponed until another time… But I can and will continue to honor my friend in my life.
Tommy… I hope you know how much you continue to be loved.
Tom’s Mother made a gorgeous flower arrangement for Tom’s birthday and put it in a vase Tom sent her with flowers in it 20 years ago for her birthday.
She sent this photo of it to me and said it would be okay if I posted it on his site.
As a teenager, Tommy taught her to do flower arranging.
Isn’t this arrangement gorgeous! I have no doubt in my mind that Tommy would be extremely proud of his mother for creating this beautiful arrangement for his birthday. It’s deeply touching that they both taught each other many things in life, and that she is carrying on what she learned from Tom about flower arranging. Beautiful!
I see them both in this beautiful arrangement, and their love for each other.
As a birthday tribute to Tommy we thought you might enjoy more entertainment from him. This is a part 2 to the last video. In this we get to see his humor and music flowing out of him. Where else would you get to hear “Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire” peppered with “The Price is Right Theme”, “All in the Family Theme” and rousing a cappella rendition of “Hark the Herald Angels Sing”, where even a dog joins in!
We hope this brings you joy and laughter on Tommy’s birthday.
I have been thinking about Tommy’s upcoming birthday a lot. I wanted to celebrate it in some way, wondering what he would want me to do for him. I have been missing his laugh. It’s one of my favorite laughs in the whole world. It’s just so freaking genuine. He had a variety of laughs, and I loved them all, but the one that brought a smile to my face in this very moment is him BUSTING out. It’s the BEST! Pure joy!
I believe what Tommy would want for his birthday is for everyone to be able to laugh with pure joy. My gut tells me he’d want me to do really truly stupid stuff just to make him laugh and to make everyone else laugh. I think it’d be easiest for me to make him laugh though because I always felt free to be a total goofball around him. I can imagine him now telling me to go for it and write totally insane stuff, but at the same time I feel all sentimental and not quite up to being a TOTAL goofball on his page yet.
BUT, I do know of a way Tommy can be his true, hilarious, yet genuine and sincere self to all of you…. if you use your imagination a little.
Tommy LOVES Joan Crawford & the movie Mommie Dearest. I say that in present tense because I almost feel like he’s up above urging me to say this in the present tense.
If you’ve ever heard Tommy imitating or performing Joan Crawford, picture his face, his expressions, his smile, his goofy laugh, and his sincerity and love within that laughter, and while thinking of all that, watch this video of Joan Crawford going to the door to accept her award on Oscars night. The speech starts after a minute into the video.
No doubt in my mind that Tommy would love to give this speech to all of you right now for his birthday, and of course he would do it in his own one-of-a-kind Tommy style – Hilarious, but also sincere, and with love. XO
He knew every one of her line’s in The Alamo scene in the movie “Pee Wee’s Big Adventure”. Tommy’s imitation of Jan Hook’s accent in that scene was hilarious. He would exaggerate the accent even more, so that when she said “paint and glaze”, for example, he really stretched out the word “glaaaaaze”. He used to lower his voice more too as he said that word. Watch this scene and just imagine Tommy’s voice doing all of Jan Hooks’ lines. He particularly loved to say “Well, buenas dias!” in a more exaggerated accent too.
Hopefully it brings you a laugh or warm inner smile today.
While bringing up Tommy’s love of Jan Hooks, I also have to mention her performances as one of “The Sweeney Sisters” on Saturday Night Live (which YouTube doesn’t have). Tommy LOVED The Sweeney Sisters! Does anyone else remember him singing, “Clang clang clang went the trolley… Ding ding ding went the bells…”
Speaking of bells, I’ll end this with beautiful bells, since Tommy had such a passion for the sound of big, beautiful cathedral bells.
Every time a bell rings, think of Tommy running over to listen to every ding. 🙂
I woke up to the song “The Tide is High” playing in my mind this morning and I instantly felt like it was a sign from Tommy. We used to sing / play that song together in the early years, and I remember us laughing together while we changed lyrics.
Blondie – The Tide is High:
There was another Blondie song that he seemed to love more than “The Tide is High” though. It was called 11:59. I had never heard 11:59 before he kept talking about, so I finally listened to it and learned the lyrics so I could sing it with him because he loved it so much.
I remember over the years if people were singing along to “The Tide is High” or any other Blondie song, Tommy would sometimes ask them, “Do you know 11:59?” It was always kind of disappointing to him that people didn’t know it, because he loved it so much.
I’m watching “It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown” on TV, the annual tradition, and thinking of Tommy. XO
One of Tommy’s favorite parts he used to imitate just came on TV as I started to write:
“If we shape the eyes like this, and the nose like this, and the mouth like this…” – said by Violet, while drawing a pumpkin on the back of Charlie Brown’s head, using his head as a model for a pumpkin.
Sometimes over the years, while drawing or writing something, Tommy would quote that line. Or, if we were describing something on the phone, we might give up on describing it and just say that line.
I remember Tommy wore a ghost costume once with holes cut out all over it, like the one in this show.
Here’s the music he loved, and many of us love too:
Tommy + Halloween = Magic. So many Halloween memories of Tommy! Feel free to share any. I will still try to write more when I can. I know I’m not alone when I say…
The last few nights this song has been popping into my head. I hadn’t heard it for many years, so I had to look it up to listen to it because I feel such a strong connection to Tommy through this song. It was one of our songs from our dance club days – a song that goes best with late night listening. We used to listen to it in the car or in his bedroom. One of us had the 12″ record, so we listened to all the versions.
When I listened to it again tonight it felt so different to me this time. The song used to feel very dreamy to us, like a magical sort of lullaby. But, tonight… hearing it without Tommy… it felt very… very sad. Suddenly many of the lyrics applied to Tommy, and I felt like I was sending this song out into the universe to him. I imagined the song reaching high up to him, and I felt like ET standing there on the edge of the cliff with his Speak & Spell when he was trying to “phone home”, hoping to be heard.
Even the sounds of bells at the end of this song sounded like they were calling out to Tommy:
Tommy, I know I’m not the only one trying to “phone home” to you. Many songs have been popping into my head that I haven’t thought of in years and I keep thinking it’s because of you.
I hadn’t been able to post anything lately, but I will be picking it up again. I hope everyone else is doing okay. We’re all trying to be positive and keep Tommy’s sense of humor going, and we will keep that up as best as we can, but we’re also all feeling a huge sense of loss, and the pain that goes along with that. It’s still hard for me to believe, even though the reality of it has hit me many times. I’m sure anyone who has ever loved Tommy or appreciated his sense of humor or his unique, full-of-life spirit will understand the range of emotions that comes with such a loss.
I’m sure Tommy would want me to end this on a happy note, so I sat here a while trying to find something and it finally came to me. Samson the Cat. Samson was always looking out the front door window whenever we arrived. It was very sweet the way Samson liked to keep an eye on things. He seemed to have a wise, sweet spirit. He was the first cat I ever got to know pretty well, since I grew up with dogs. Because of this, I learned Samson’s meow as THE cat meow. Tommy used to imitate Samson’s meow & I started doing it too.
Many years later, I was visiting my husband’s sister and we were talking about cats, then she and I started meowing for some reason. When I meowed, she said “That’s a Siamese!!” I said, “It is? It’s the meow I really know – my friend Tommy’s cat, Samson… and he was a Siamese! I never made the connection that Siamese cats had a different kind of meow!”
So, Samson set the standard for me. His meow is the meow I know well, and I can still hear both Samson, and Tommy meowing like Samson, in my head. Tommy has said “Meow” in many ways over the years, but the “Meow” I know best, is the Samson “Meow”.
I grew up with Tommy and we lived across the street from one another. My mom and I were talking about all the great memories we had of Tommy! She talked about a time Tommy came over and asked to borrow a stick of butter. She thinks he was probably 4th or 5th grade. Anyway, my mom asked him what he was baking. She assumed it would be cookies or something like that. Nope, he said he was making Cornish game hens. I will be honest here, I have never made Cornish game hens and my mom has not either. He was so talented and a joy to be around.
