Leather

She said her name was Leather. A few in the small hiking group turned with bemused looks toward the petite African-American lady with the runner's hat and big glasses as she introduced herself. I walked alongside her and asked her about herself. She spoke carefully from behind the glasses that were bigger than her face. In an endearing, nerdy voice, she told me she was working on an M.A. in Social Work and that these hikes were a good respite from the burden of year-round coursework.
As the hike progressed, she told me about her dad's Creole roots and the smells that would come from the kitchen when he cooked. About how she thought she dreamed in Italian, but later found out it was her son practicing opera during late night showers. Then the talk turned to the music that we listen to.
She turned the tables on the Beet Seeking Missile by asking, "Who is your favorite female singer of all time?" I hemmed for a second, hawed for another, before I semi-pandered her with an answer of Aretha and Ella. She stared at me for a second and then I added, "But Bjork has always blown me away." Her eyes lit up at that. She told me how she really liked the ever-evolving diminutive Icelandic singer.
Leather told me how she thought that Chaka Khan's jazz phase was her best, but that Chaka was pressured into going back to playing her popular songs. Somewhere along the line I mentioned James Brown once and then again.
"Wait," she stopped me. "You've now mentioned James Brown twice. That man was a despot." She proceeded to tell me how once when her ex-husband's band was opening for Brown in Oakland, that she had accompanied him while 8 months pregnant. She encountered Brown and his entourage rushing down a stairwell and they shoved her out of the way so hard that she went tumbling. Then, to her utter humiliation, they stopped and laughed at her when she reacted with fury. This was an anecdote that jibed with the biography I had recently finished on Brown. The dude was a little bit crazy, more so in his later years.
So I asked this fifty-something lady of color-"Who is your favorite band?" She turned to me and stated, very matter-of-factly. "Queens of the Stone Age. 
She told me how she had heard that Dave Grohl had played with the band. So she checked them out. She immediately loved the band and the songwriting of Josh Homme. She has gone to see them five times. "Sometimes it's sounds like a big wall of noise and I love it."
By then, the hike was nearing it's end, and I thanked Leather for the musical chat. Amazing what you'll hear when you talk to a stranger about music.....