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charlene · 04-04-2016, 09:52 PM

part 1 of 3

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jed-ry...b_9601596.html

A New Life, A New Memoir: Toni Tennille Speaks About Life After The Captain

Jed Ryan is a New York City-based freelance writer and photographer with a focus on LGBTQ issues.

Love Will Keep Us Together. Muskrat Love. Do That To Me One More Time. These are the irresistible songs that cemented their place in pop culture forever, and made household names of Captain and Tennille, the musical husband-and-wife team who performed them. “Captain” was keyboardist Daryl Dragon, and “Tennille” was dynamic singer/songwriter Cathryn Antoinette “Toni” Tennille. In addition to their impressive discography, Captain and Tennille also hosted their own popular variety show on ABC from September 1976 to March 1977. The duo were undoubtedly America’s sweethearts during the 70’s and early 80’s, presenting the image of a perfect couple both on and off the charts. It was therefore a surprise in late 2014 when it was announced that Captain and Tennille were divorcing— after 39 years of marriage.

Today, Toni Tennille lives in Florida with Bee-Bop and Lula, her two champion Australian shepherds. After a truly variegated career spanning many decades, she is now retired from show business. However, Tennille has decided to tell her story at long last. Entitled Toni Tenille: A Memoir, the new book promises to be a candid and emotional journey of her colorful life and career, from childhood to her current life as a newly single woman. It also promises some very revealing— and not always pretty— insight on her life with The Captain. Ms. Tennille took the time to speak with me about her new book and much more:

Hello, Toni. Congratulations on the book! I really look forward to reading it.
Thank you. It took a few years to get it done, but we’re pleased with how it turned out.

What inspired you to write the book? Was there a specific moment when you just knew it was the right time?

Not at all. You know, when you finally get to be my age and you’ve had some success, then your friends and your fans from “the old days” will always say, “You need to write your memoir!” I wasn’t ready to write it, because I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. I started thinking about it when I moved to Prescott. That was in 2009. When you read the book, you’ll understand a lot more about my thinking. But I wasn’t ready to write about it back then because— well, first of all, I didn’t think that my story was that interesting...

Really?
The only famous person I ever slept with was Daryl. There was no rehab or anything like that! I thought that it would not be that interesting, for those reasons. There wasn’t anything really salacious. But, why did I write it? I thought about it over the last five years or so, wondering about what I would do and how I would write it, but I would never have written it by myself. And I would never have worked on it with a writer who I didn’t know. Then my niece, Caroline Tennille St. Clair, sent me a couple of manuscripts that she had written. One was a novel for kids, for the “8 to 14” crowd. It was lovely and well-written, and I thought it was good... but it didn’t speak to me because of how old I am. However, the second novel she sent me absolutely knocked me flat! It was shocking how wonderful it was. I read it, and I then found myself wanting to know more about the characters, and wanting to know where she got the idea for it, and everything else. I gave it to my friends and people that I knew of all ages, and they all had the same reaction that I did. So, I thought, “This young woman is a fine writer.” She’s my sister Jane’s youngest daughter, and I’ve known her since she was six years old and she sat on my lap on our Christmas special while I sang Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas to her. I’ve watched her grow and become this writer and painter. She just has all kinds of wonderful talents. So, I talked to her about it. I asked, “Would you be interested in it?” She was. I said, “If I work with you, Caroline, let’s see what we can come up with!” We started working over two years ago, when we were on a short family cruise. Caroline got out her digital recorder, and Jane and I sat down and started talking and remembering. Caroline got hours and hours of story from Jane and me. We made sure that we had our facts correct, and we argued about the right years and stuff like that. As we began, we decided that we would tell the story in the traditional memoir format. We would start at the beginning, early in my life, and we would take it up to now. That’s the way I wanted to write it. Caroline too. As we began to work together, I found that I was really good at writing what happened. I was born in 1940, and grew up in Alabama in the segregated South as the daughter of white, upper middle class parents in Montgomery. I left Alabama in 1959 and moved to California. Then I met Daryl, who of course was a very important part of my whole life. Caroline would take my story and put it into historical context: She put it through what was going on in history at the time in this country. Caroline has the ability to set a scene. I can tell what happened, but she can set a scene so that people feel like they are there. I couldn’t do that on my own!

Wow! That sounds amazing. So... when you and The Captain, Daryl, divorced in late 2014, the news exploded all over the internet. People were saying silly things like, “Love couldn’t keep them together” and that kind of thing...

Ha, ha!...

Yes. People thought they were being so clever. But anyway, I would imagine that many of your fans were upset about it...

Yes, I imagine...

Was your book in part motivated by your desire to tell the “real story”?

I’m sure that psychologists are going to have a field day trying to figure out what it is about Daryl when they read the book! But I was desperately in love with Daryl, from the very first time we started working together. I wrote many, many love songs for him. It turned out later that he never read the lyrics. He didn’t know what I was writing. Here I was, coming from a loving family. Not a perfect family, but a family that loved. All of us. I have three sisters. I grew up with the idea that I could help anybody find their way to a more loving space. Oh, it was so naive— but that’s the way I was! I couldn’t tell what Daryl felt about me, except that I knew he thought I was a wonderful songwriter and a fabulous singer— and he really wanted to work with me and make records together. I knew that... but I was hoping to open the door to this man. I felt bad for him. I felt, “Oh my gosh, he just doesn’t understand how wonderful I can be!” He was very negative about everything. I thought I could get through. There’s a very short poem written by Edwin Markham that I am going to read to you. It’s called Outwitted, and it has been somewhat of my theme from the first time I learned it, when I was in high school:
“He drew a circle that shut me out—
Heretic, a rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!”

I spent my whole marriage trying to take him into the circle of the love that I had for him— and I was never successful. People put us in that place: “Oh, they have the perfect love” No, we didn’t. I did, but he didn’t... and I could never make it happen. Finally, after many years, it just died. It’s a cliche to say that if you don’t take care of the garden, the flowers are going to die. That’s kind of what happened. I am at the “last checked box”. You know what I mean? When they ask, “What age are you?”, I say, “I am the last box: 75 and up!”. I wanted to have the life I felt I could have. But I couldn’t as long as I was with him. I tell you: It took a lot of thinking, a lot of soul-searching. I went to a wonderful therapist in Prescott who really helped me through the worst time of trying to figure it out. Finally, she said to me, “Toni, why don’t you go ahead and make this decision to leave Daryl, and get a divorce?” I said, “Well, I’m worried about how disappointed people will be.” That’s honestly what I said! She said, “This is not somebody else’s life. This is yours. You have to make the decision about what you want to do.” I thought about what she said, and I thought, “You know? It’s true. I get to make this decision”. And so I did. Not that it was easy, but I did it!

Just to backtrack... when you say that you are at the “last checked box”, I’d prefer to say that you are in the “evening of your life”! Evenings can be wonderful!

(Laughs) I am. I’m in the evening of my life, and it’s a wonderful life. I’m here in Florida, and I’m surrounded by the love of a great family. I just feel wonderful.

04-04-2016, 09:52 PM	#26
charlene Moderator Join Date: May 2000 Posts: 16,001	Re: Toni Tennille's Blog: Gord Memories part 1 of 3 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jed-ry...b_9601596.html A New Life, A New Memoir: Toni Tennille Speaks About Life After The Captain Jed Ryan is a New York City-based freelance writer and photographer with a focus on LGBTQ issues. Love Will Keep Us Together. Muskrat Love. Do That To Me One More Time. These are the irresistible songs that cemented their place in pop culture forever, and made household names of Captain and Tennille, the musical husband-and-wife team who performed them. “Captain” was keyboardist Daryl Dragon, and “Tennille” was dynamic singer/songwriter Cathryn Antoinette “Toni” Tennille. In addition to their impressive discography, Captain and Tennille also hosted their own popular variety show on ABC from September 1976 to March 1977. The duo were undoubtedly America’s sweethearts during the 70’s and early 80’s, presenting the image of a perfect couple both on and off the charts. It was therefore a surprise in late 2014 when it was announced that Captain and Tennille were divorcing— after 39 years of marriage. Today, Toni Tennille lives in Florida with Bee-Bop and Lula, her two champion Australian shepherds. After a truly variegated career spanning many decades, she is now retired from show business. However, Tennille has decided to tell her story at long last. Entitled Toni Tenille: A Memoir, the new book promises to be a candid and emotional journey of her colorful life and career, from childhood to her current life as a newly single woman. It also promises some very revealing— and not always pretty— insight on her life with The Captain. Ms. Tennille took the time to speak with me about her new book and much more: Hello, Toni. Congratulations on the book! I really look forward to reading it. Thank you. It took a few years to get it done, but we’re pleased with how it turned out. What inspired you to write the book? Was there a specific moment when you just knew it was the right time? Not at all. You know, when you finally get to be my age and you’ve had some success, then your friends and your fans from “the old days” will always say, “You need to write your memoir!” I wasn’t ready to write it, because I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. I started thinking about it when I moved to Prescott. That was in 2009. When you read the book, you’ll understand a lot more about my thinking. But I wasn’t ready to write about it back then because— well, first of all, I didn’t think that my story was that interesting... Really? The only famous person I ever slept with was Daryl. There was no rehab or anything like that! I thought that it would not be that interesting, for those reasons. There wasn’t anything really salacious. But, why did I write it? I thought about it over the last five years or so, wondering about what I would do and how I would write it, but I would never have written it by myself. And I would never have worked on it with a writer who I didn’t know. Then my niece, Caroline Tennille St. Clair, sent me a couple of manuscripts that she had written. One was a novel for kids, for the “8 to 14” crowd. It was lovely and well-written, and I thought it was good... but it didn’t speak to me because of how old I am. However, the second novel she sent me absolutely knocked me flat! It was shocking how wonderful it was. I read it, and I then found myself wanting to know more about the characters, and wanting to know where she got the idea for it, and everything else. I gave it to my friends and people that I knew of all ages, and they all had the same reaction that I did. So, I thought, “This young woman is a fine writer.” She’s my sister Jane’s youngest daughter, and I’ve known her since she was six years old and she sat on my lap on our Christmas special while I sang Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas to her. I’ve watched her grow and become this writer and painter. She just has all kinds of wonderful talents. So, I talked to her about it. I asked, “Would you be interested in it?” She was. I said, “If I work with you, Caroline, let’s see what we can come up with!” We started working over two years ago, when we were on a short family cruise. Caroline got out her digital recorder, and Jane and I sat down and started talking and remembering. Caroline got hours and hours of story from Jane and me. We made sure that we had our facts correct, and we argued about the right years and stuff like that. As we began, we decided that we would tell the story in the traditional memoir format. We would start at the beginning, early in my life, and we would take it up to now. That’s the way I wanted to write it. Caroline too. As we began to work together, I found that I was really good at writing what happened. I was born in 1940, and grew up in Alabama in the segregated South as the daughter of white, upper middle class parents in Montgomery. I left Alabama in 1959 and moved to California. Then I met Daryl, who of course was a very important part of my whole life. Caroline would take my story and put it into historical context: She put it through what was going on in history at the time in this country. Caroline has the ability to set a scene. I can tell what happened, but she can set a scene so that people feel like they are there. I couldn’t do that on my own! Wow! That sounds amazing. So... when you and The Captain, Daryl, divorced in late 2014, the news exploded all over the internet. People were saying silly things like, “Love couldn’t keep them together” and that kind of thing... Ha, ha!... Yes. People thought they were being so clever. But anyway, I would imagine that many of your fans were upset about it... Yes, I imagine... Was your book in part motivated by your desire to tell the “real story”? I’m sure that psychologists are going to have a field day trying to figure out what it is about Daryl when they read the book! But I was desperately in love with Daryl, from the very first time we started working together. I wrote many, many love songs for him. It turned out later that he never read the lyrics. He didn’t know what I was writing. Here I was, coming from a loving family. Not a perfect family, but a family that loved. All of us. I have three sisters. I grew up with the idea that I could help anybody find their way to a more loving space. Oh, it was so naive— but that’s the way I was! I couldn’t tell what Daryl felt about me, except that I knew he thought I was a wonderful songwriter and a fabulous singer— and he really wanted to work with me and make records together. I knew that... but I was hoping to open the door to this man. I felt bad for him. I felt, “Oh my gosh, he just doesn’t understand how wonderful I can be!” He was very negative about everything. I thought I could get through. There’s a very short poem written by Edwin Markham that I am going to read to you. It’s called Outwitted, and it has been somewhat of my theme from the first time I learned it, when I was in high school: “He drew a circle that shut me out— Heretic, a rebel, a thing to flout. But Love and I had the wit to win: We drew a circle that took him in!” I spent my whole marriage trying to take him into the circle of the love that I had for him— and I was never successful. People put us in that place: “Oh, they have the perfect love” No, we didn’t. I did, but he didn’t... and I could never make it happen. Finally, after many years, it just died. It’s a cliche to say that if you don’t take care of the garden, the flowers are going to die. That’s kind of what happened. I am at the “last checked box”. You know what I mean? When they ask, “What age are you?”, I say, “I am the last box: 75 and up!”. I wanted to have the life I felt I could have. But I couldn’t as long as I was with him. I tell you: It took a lot of thinking, a lot of soul-searching. I went to a wonderful therapist in Prescott who really helped me through the worst time of trying to figure it out. Finally, she said to me, “Toni, why don’t you go ahead and make this decision to leave Daryl, and get a divorce?” I said, “Well, I’m worried about how disappointed people will be.” That’s honestly what I said! She said, “This is not somebody else’s life. This is yours. You have to make the decision about what you want to do.” I thought about what she said, and I thought, “You know? It’s true. I get to make this decision”. And so I did. Not that it was easy, but I did it! Just to backtrack... when you say that you are at the “last checked box”, I’d prefer to say that you are in the “evening of your life”! Evenings can be wonderful! (Laughs) I am. I’m in the evening of my life, and it’s a wonderful life. I’m here in Florida, and I’m surrounded by the love of a great family. I just feel wonderful.