Summer Heat, a Mentor’s Passing, and a Memento Mori

Saturday, June 27, 2026 – Orlando, Florida

It is brutally hot outside. According to my Microsoft Weather app, the temperature here in my corner of Orange County is already 91°F (33°C) under partly sunny skies. The humidity is 56%, the wind is barely stirring out of the east-southeast at 4 MPH (7 Km/H), and the heat index has climbed to 101°F (39°C). Because this is Florida in late June, the afternoon will probably find a way to turn the dial a little higher; the forecast calls for 93°F (34°C) by midafternoon.

Well. There are better days for staying cheerful.

I’m still sorting out my feelings about the death of Ms. Joan Owen, my chorus teacher for most of my three-year stint at South Miami Senior High School in the early Eighties. According to her sparse obituary, Ms. Owen retired from mentoring young singers and moved back to Lake City in 1996. I don’t know much about her life after South Florida, and that ignorance bothers me a little now. What I do know—or at least what I’ve heard from musical professionals who knew her at Coral Park High, South Miami High, and elsewhere—is that she kept a watchful eye on former students who stayed close to music: singers, naturally, but also music directors, choral teachers, and a few of us who found our way behind the scenes.

As I wrote in yesterday’s post, Ms. Owen died six months ago. I only found out on Thursday night, after Googling “Elizabeth Joan Owen” on a whim. I wasn’t looking for an obituary, exactly. I was hoping for a blog post, an old newspaper article, some stray mention that would tell me a little more about her. Still, given Ms. Owen’s age, part of me must have known that a death notice was one of the things I might find.

I first met Ms. Owen on a cold, still-dark January morning in 1981. I was 17 going on 18 then, and, nudged along by my friend Bruce Schulman, I’d walked to her office in the music department annex with the intention of auditioning for a spot in the Boys’ — or Men’s — Ensemble. I’d made some noises about maybe joining the chorus before winter break a few weeks earlier, and on the bus ride to South Miami High, Bruce had, in essence, told me it was time to “put up or shut up.”

I hemmed and hawed a bit about this, but because we were having this tête-à-tête in front of a gorgeous junior named Mary Ann Peña, I didn’t want to look like a coward. So I eventually said, “Okay, Bruce. You’re right. I did say I wanted to join the chorus after hearing you guys sing at the Christmas concert. I just hope I don’t sound shitty at the audition, ’cos I’m not at my best at 7:15 in the morning, y’know?”

Bruce rolled his eyes. “No one, Alex, is at their best at 7:15, except for Mary Ann here,” he said with a knowing wink.

I could, of course, regale you with a 100% factual account of my first meeting with Ms. Owen, but since I fictionalized that event — and it was an Event, at least for me — in my novel Reunion: Coda, I’ll share that version here.

(Note: This excerpt has been edited for length and pacing. This fictionalized version is very close to how I remember that morning — only lightly shaped for storytelling.)

A Change of Schedule

7:05 AM – SMSH Music Department

I followed Bruce Holtzman down the hall like a man walking toward his fate. Bruce had been singing in the Men’s Chorus since the start of the year and insisted I should join too. He said Mrs. Quincy was kind, the audition was easy, and that I was making too big a deal out of it.

But singing in front of someone felt like baring my soul, and I was terrified she’d hear every crack and flaw.

We stopped at her office door. Bruce clapped my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Jim. It’s just an audition, not the Spanish Inquisition.”

I knocked. Mrs. Quincy looked up from her desk, small and warm-faced, more fairy godmother than gatekeeper. “Hello, boys. What can I do for you?”

“Hi, Mrs. Quincy,” Bruce said, nudging me forward. “My friend would like to try out for the Boys’ Chorus.”

“And you are…?”

“Jim Garraty,” I managed.

She asked about my singing experience, and I told her about sixth grade chorus and how my voice changed in junior high. I didn’t mention the real reasons — grief, heartbreak, and the feeling that singing belonged to a younger version of me.

“Well, you’re here now,” she said gently. She checked the clock. “We don’t have much time. What’s your favorite song?”

My mind blanked. “I can sing ‘Ben,’” I blurted out — not my favorite, but the only title that surfaced.

“Just one verse,” she said.

I took a breath and sang. The first notes were shaky, but my voice steadied as I went on. When I finished, she smiled.

“That was very good, Jim. Would you like to join us?”

I hesitated only a moment. “Yes, please.”

She filled out a hall pass and a schedule change form, and Bruce and I stepped back into the hallway. Relief washed over me. I had done it. I was in.

And maybe that is why Ms. Owen’s death has stayed with me these past few days. It is not only that she is gone, though that is sad enough. It is also that her passing turns that January morning into something more than a memory: a small, quiet memento mori. The teacher who opened that door for me is gone now, and the nervous boy who walked through it is no longer young. I suppose I am grieving both of them in my own imperfect way.