Remembering Magic
When I was in High School, I had the coolest job. I worked at a magic shop called "The Magic Magic Shop," located in Los Alamitos, California. The Magic Magic Shop is no longer with us. It was located in a small strip mall, which was torn down some years ago to make room for a Burger King. I will occasionally drive past the location and when I do I am overwhelmed with nostalgia, a symptom of my recently acquired middle-age. If I were to ever write my own coming of age story (and please just shoot me if I do), half of the story would take place at The Magic Magic Shop.
At that time, The Magic Magic Shop was the HQ for The Long Beach Mystics, a local magic club with an astonishing history and an international reputation. This was a club for magicians under 21, a surprisingly disproportionate number of whom, compared to clubs like it all over the world, went on to professional careers in magic. It is not an exaggeration to say that, within the magic world, The Long Beach Mystics are renowned.
On the very same day I was hired to work at the shop, I was also made Vice President of The Mystics, pending my "audition" in front of club members. It is fair to say that The Mystics were, though active and still developing professional-level talent, past their prime by then. The stockroom in back of the shop had been converted into something of a clubhouse, complete with a small stage where members could perform for each other.
With my hands shaking terribly, I mumbled through my audition with a series of rope tricks. My "patter," the things I said during my routine, had to do with owning a pet rope named Fred. My routine contained more excruciatingly bad jokes and puns than it did slight-of-hand skill (e.g. "Oh, Fred is being Knotty again").
For reasons that can only be associated with the narcissistic delusions of an adolescent, I continued developing this routine and eventually won first place in a magic contest. It should be noted that the only other competitor in my age bracket was a guy who did party magic for children and tipped his young volunteers a dollar as they left the stage. One of the judges actually wrote on my score sheet that if I won, it would say more about my competition than it would about my act. I scored points for being generally affable on stage and technically competent, but the tricks I performed were not difficult.
The competition was video taped, but I have been told that the video was lost or taped over long ago. For this, I give thanks to the magic gods, not only because the jokes were so awful, but because I was wearing black Angel Flight pants, a white dress shirt unbuttoned to mid-chest and with the collar laid flat, a black vest, and brown suede shoes. My hair was down to my shoulders.
A true multi-use facility, The Magic Magic Shop was also home to the Wait Wait Wait School of Juggling, founded by the shop's manager, Randy Pryor. I learned to juggle and then became an assistant instructor, which meant I dragged all the equipment out and put all the equipment away. From fellow students I learned to ride a unicycle and several times rode a 6 foot unicycle from my home to work at the magic shop, 4 1/2 miles away. This, by the way, is an activity I do not recommend. It was either the unicycle or walk, and every time I did it I arrived at the shop swearing I would never do it again, and walking bow legged.
The Magic Magic Shop was owned by Stan Allen, now publisher of Magic Magazine, the magic industry's most successful publication and host of Magic Live, a trade show for magicians that sells out. Stan Allen was one of my first mentors, not in magic, but in life, along with the shop manager, Randy Pryor and magician Michael Weber.
Aside: Trying to find a URL to send you to for Michael Weber is surprisingly difficult, given his success as a movie consultant through a company he founded with magician Ricky Jay called Deceptive Practices, and his corporate speaking and entertaining, and his career as an author...but it is strangely appropriate to Michael, who often came and went from The Magic Magic Shop with a random ninja-ness. Numerous times he walked quickly into the magic shop, almost always when I was the only person there, to perform some card or coin trick he was developing. After executing the trick, every time successfully as far as I knew, he might say "hmmm," or "ah, yes" or some such thing and then leave without further comment. Michael was, and I suppose still is today, one of the cool kids who enjoyed the company of not-so-cool-kids. It's not that links don't exist for Michael (Google "Michael Weber magic"), it's just that none of them really capture him...and that, I'm sure, intentionally or not, is the point.
It was while working at The Magic Magic Shop that I learned to throw a playing card, thanks to a book written by the aforementioned Ricky Jay and some lessons from friend Ken Hada. It is a skill I retain and that one day will, I am certain, save my life. The shop was the scene of several brutal card fights that often left small welts wherever I took hits to exposed skin.
My senior year in high school we moved to San Jose, California. I found a magic shop near our house to hang out in, and was generally accepted by the locals, but I was just "one of the regulars" and eventually my interest waned.
I can still manage a few slight of hand tricks for my kids, and even wow them with something now and then, like I did this morning when I correctly predicted which card my daughter would pick. If you know how these things are done, you'll note that I keep it simple. One thing that Michael Weber taught me, and that I've used in many ways outside of magic, is that the effect is what matters, the experience of your audience. Your physical dexterity as a magician matters only to the extent that it serves the effect.
I have yet to show my daughters my rope tricks, however. I can still perform them, but I don't have much left up my sleeve anymore, so I'm holding them in reserve.
