Remembering Zend
by writer, singer-songwriter and actor/director Tom Gallant, 2016.
I met Robert Zend through my sister Catherine. She had been working with him at CBC Ideas and was full of enthusiasm for this wonderful man named "Zend." I had to meet him she insisted. Such introductions are fraught with difficulty. What if I didn't like him? How could he live up to her praise?
I needn't have worried. Within five minutes of meeting Zend, I was smitten. Looking back, it is difficult to put my finger on why. Was he handsome? Not really. Not until he smiled. Then, he was beautiful. But it was his way of seeing things that became like a drug that I had to have. Spending time with Zend was the perfect antidote to all of the ills of the world. He was a teacher who didn't teach, a mentor who didn't ment. (He'd like that little joke.) To sit with him in a coffee shop and watch him building bonfires in the ashtray (smoking was omnipresent in those days) and talk was more fun than going to the circus. There was no idea that he wouldn't consider, no expression of creativity that wasn't of interest to him. He was always, every breathing moment, the definition of a true artist. There was never a mind more open. I used to go to his house and share breakfast, a concoction he built from a couple of different cereals, some wheat germ, molasses, honey and milk. It was an acquired taste. One morning a police officer came to the door. Zend invited him in, made him a breakfast and we three sat at the table. Zend had an astonishing number of unpaid parking tickets and the officer was there to discuss the issue. |
The bill was just shy of a thousand dollars. Zend allowed as how he just couldn't afford it. The officer, who obviously liked Zend, had a proposal.
"You could go to jail." he said.
"When?"
"Well, if you went in on Friday afternoon, you could get out on Sunday morning."
Zend pondered for a moment.
"Could I bring my tape recorder?"
"Well", said the officer, "that's not usual, but perhaps."
They shook hands, the officer left, and Zend was full of enthusiasm for the documentary he was going to make about the Don Jail.
That's Zend. He was always turning everything into art. Toilet paper rolls became tubular poems. His sense of wonder and profound curiosity never abated. He was a good piano player, a great poet, a unique and clever novelist, maker of films and documentaries. He counted among his friends some of the greatest artists in the world. And it was friendship that was his greatest genius. He had a way of appreciating his friends, without direct praise, but with the way he looked at you, laughed at your jokes, stayed present in your life. He made you feel that you were more than you ever thought you could be just by sharing his genius with you so openly, with such abundant good will.
Laughter. I could always make Zend laugh, and there were times when we laughed so hard and for so long, our faces streaming tears, that an observer would have thought us mad. The opposite was true. We were sane, vividly alive, and dancing with all the gods. He had the most wonderful laugh. I can honestly say that I have never found another soul to share what we shared when things got funny, and with Zend, things were almost always funny.
That an artist whose work was so acute, whose vision so unique and challenging could bring forth memories such as those I share here is a tribute to his great heart and humanity. There were many times when we sat seriously in his office, working at translating Nicolette, discussing the structure of Oāb, figuring out what I should do with the second act of my new play. It's not that he didn't have a serious side. He did. But even his serious side was somehow funny.
I once said that Robert could invite God and the Devil to dinner and they'd both end up enjoying themselves, and share a taxi back to eternity, laughing all the way. I miss him. His place in my heart cannot be filled.
"You could go to jail." he said.
"When?"
"Well, if you went in on Friday afternoon, you could get out on Sunday morning."
Zend pondered for a moment.
"Could I bring my tape recorder?"
"Well", said the officer, "that's not usual, but perhaps."
They shook hands, the officer left, and Zend was full of enthusiasm for the documentary he was going to make about the Don Jail.
That's Zend. He was always turning everything into art. Toilet paper rolls became tubular poems. His sense of wonder and profound curiosity never abated. He was a good piano player, a great poet, a unique and clever novelist, maker of films and documentaries. He counted among his friends some of the greatest artists in the world. And it was friendship that was his greatest genius. He had a way of appreciating his friends, without direct praise, but with the way he looked at you, laughed at your jokes, stayed present in your life. He made you feel that you were more than you ever thought you could be just by sharing his genius with you so openly, with such abundant good will.
Laughter. I could always make Zend laugh, and there were times when we laughed so hard and for so long, our faces streaming tears, that an observer would have thought us mad. The opposite was true. We were sane, vividly alive, and dancing with all the gods. He had the most wonderful laugh. I can honestly say that I have never found another soul to share what we shared when things got funny, and with Zend, things were almost always funny.
That an artist whose work was so acute, whose vision so unique and challenging could bring forth memories such as those I share here is a tribute to his great heart and humanity. There were many times when we sat seriously in his office, working at translating Nicolette, discussing the structure of Oāb, figuring out what I should do with the second act of my new play. It's not that he didn't have a serious side. He did. But even his serious side was somehow funny.
I once said that Robert could invite God and the Devil to dinner and they'd both end up enjoying themselves, and share a taxi back to eternity, laughing all the way. I miss him. His place in my heart cannot be filled.