Victor Garber – more tomorrowROG
Month: March 2009
H is for Heart
I was musing – as I wont to do – about the different definitions of the word heart.
There’s the muscle that beats every second or so, which helps circulate the blood, the one that’s subject to attack.
Then there’s the romantic notion of love as represented by a symbol. Related, there’s the center of one’s feelings and emotion, such as a heartwarming tale. One fears that heart breaking.
There’s the middle, the core: the heart of the city, the heart of the matter, the heartland. Above is Into the Heart of the Crab Nebula. Here’s a blogpost meditation called Heart of the Matter.
There’s courage and resolve, to hearten. Sometimes they give the Purple Heart to stouthearted people like that.
Many heart words are combinations of these and other meanings. Heartthrob, for instance is the literal pulsing of the muscle, or an infatuation.
Here’s one of my favorite heart songs, from Damn Yankees.
A whole bunch of idioms which you could learn by heart.
As I think back on the hearts games I played this weekend – really – perhaps it’s time for the obvious conclusion, the Wilson sisters:
ROG
Top 25 Most Influential Albums meme
From Johnny B, whose intro I’m also purloining:
The title is self-evident, and I’m taking it to mean 25 albums that were most influential in shaping my music-listening tastes for all time. This is, as many have noted, VERY DIFFICULT- mostly because I’m trying to list albums that were truly influential, rather than just being a favorite.
BLUE – Miles Davis. First jazz album I could recognize without looking, led me to investigate others.
BEST OF JOAN BAEZ- Joan Baez. Oddly-named album that came out in 1959(!), with her performing several folk songs that became staples of the Green Family Singers, notably “So Soon In the Morning”.
WEST SIDE STORY Original Soundtrack. It was the Quintet version of Tonight (“The Jets are gonna have their way tonight”) that I discovered you can have more than one melody going on at once. The rest of the album’s great, too.
LIVE AT CARNEGIE HALL – Pete Seeger. A live album from June of 1963 that also influenced the repertoire of my father and the Green Family Singers.
BEATLES VI – My first Beatles album that we used to lipsynch to. Not my favorite, but the one that launched my Beatles obsession in earnest.
PARSLEY, SAGE, ROSEMARY AND THYME – Simon & Garfunkel. The first S&G album in the house, it was purchased, not by me or my sister, but by my father, in large measure for 7 O’Clock News/Silent Night. It launched my near complete Paul Simon collection, which led me to Dylan.
SUPREMES SING HOLLAND-DOZIER-HOLLAND – Motown albums in the day were disappointing. It had the hits, sure, but much of the rest of the albums tended to be weak. Not this one, which features Remove This Doubt later covered by Elvis Costello. More importantly, it highlighted the composers in a way that forced me to look at liner notes more carefully.
AFTERMATH – IMHO, the first decent Rolling Stones ALBUM; many more would follow. It also has the first pop song I owned of greater than 10 minutes, Goin’ Home; didn’t know you could DO that.
DISRAELI GEARS – Cream. A friend of mine chastised my 7th grade history teacher for referring to the group as The Cream, rather than Cream. Anyway, this was something unlike anything I’d heard before.
THE BAND – The Band. This is the second album with the brown cover. Roots music that was new and yet familiar.
BLUE – Joni Mitchell. An appreciation for the female singer-songwriter generally, and this one in particular.
TEMPTATIONS GREATEST HITS, VOLUME 2 – This was an album of my sister’s that was half the David Ruffin-led group, and half the Norman Whitfield-produced group featuring Dennis Edwards. It showed a real evolution of the group and of Motown generally.
LED ZEPPELIN – I remember clearly the day in June 1969 I heard the first LZ album at Harry Shuman’s house. It was an OMG sensation.
VOLUNTEERS- Jefferson Airplane. Very much an album suited to my budding activism.
WHAT’S GOIN’ ON- Marvin Gaye. Social consciousness in Motown music.
SURF’S UP – Beach Boys. While I owned Pet Sounds, I didn’t embrace the rest of the band’s oeuvre until this one, which launched an investigation both forward and back.
TALKING BOOK – Stevie Wonder. Though his later 1970s work was even better, this was the first album of his that I owned where he wrote, played, produced almost everything. (The Music of My Mind album did that also, but I bought it later.)
THAT’S A-PLENTY – Pointer Sisters. Eclectic. 1930s jazz, country, funk. I like me some eclectic music, which is why I enjoy Elvis Costello’s SPIKE so much.
LONDON CALLING – the Clash. While there were songs that moved me before this in the punk movement, no album was as significant.
DISCIPLINE – King Crimson. There’s a whole body of Robert Fripp’s work (the Roches, Daryl Hall) that I really enjoy, but this was the first in this time frame.
REMAIN IN LIGHT – Talking Heads. That whole fusion of what made them work for me coalesced here. The fact that I saw them live around this period (1983 or ’84) did not hurt.
REM- Murmur. This somehow got me to listen not only to them but also U2, who I have somehow linked in my mind.
ATLANTIC RHYTHM & BLUES – This is seven 2-LP sets covering 1947-1974 that got me in touch with lots of music of the past. And while this wasn’t a box set per se – it is now, with 8 CDs – it did motivate me to buy other historic boxes such as Chess, plus ones covering my growing up period, such as Phil Spector, Motown and Buddah.
NEVERMIND – Nirvana. I really didn’t know I was supposed to take this seriously. “A mosquito, my libido”? But I liked it and somehow ended up getting a bunch of Pearl Jam as well.
AMERICAN RECORDING – Johnny Cash. The first record on his new label in 1994 not only gave me a new appreciation of John R. but of the artists he covered.
Note that there are plenty of artists I like, such as the Mamas and the Papas, Elton John, Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen who don’t make the list just because, in my mind, didn’t meet the criteria.
ROG
A few days in the life
Apparently, there are actually blogs that do nothing but note all the things that happen in people’s lives. I’ve been resistant to that, but I’m inclined to note the last few days in some detail. I suppose I could have made these many Twitter posts – and be mocked – but frankly have been too busy.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 4
After racquetball, go to the dentist. He’d put a crown in last fall, but he was dissatisfied with the spacing between my teeth, where food would get caught, so he’s doing a redo gratis. It may be free, but it’s not free of discomfort. Also takes longer than planned and I miss my bus – another one doesn’t come for 2.5 hours, but my colleague picks me up.
End of the day, wife drops off daughter at my work to take home, so wife can go to meetings, one work-related, the other at church. Unfortunately, she can’t find the first meeting and the second one is canceled.
THURSDAY, MARCH 5
Father-Child Pancake Breakfast at daughter’s daycare. That was nice, but I had to break up a couple boys who were literally about to come to blows over toy dinosaurs. A friend of mine that I’ve only known since 1958, whose birthday is today, BTW, suggested over four years ago that it’s probably a good thing I had a daughter rather than a son. I didn’t understand at the time, but I think I do now.
FINALLY take items to the post office. This was something I was going to do on December 20, along with finishing the Christmas letter; the wife had edited what I had wrote. But I NEEDED just that one day, and when I ended up taking care of my sick child instead – and into the evening, because the wife had a meeting – not only did the window of opportunity go away, but so did a whole bunch of my holiday mojo. I was actually quite melancholy over it for weeks. I never did complete the letter – that weekend was impossibly full, and the presents, bought weeks before, never got sent. So, on this day, packages to my mother and sisters, plus some other items to Eddie, Tom the Mayor, Scott and a woman in Canada finally went out the door. (I STILL haven’t sent to Lefty Brown’s friend Anthony, because I don’t have his address.)
Take bus downtown. At my stop, Washington and Lark, is a fire truck, with an EMT truck pulling up. There’s a guy they need to defibrillate sitting outside the kiosk; it’s cold – could they not have done this in a vehicle? While this was going on, an ambulance and another fire truck stop a block away at Dove and Washington. What’s going on there?
My bus shows up, but not a half block on my journey, a car pulls out of its parking space and hits the bus I’m on. No one was hurt; in fact, I barely noticed. But the bus driver had to wait for the police and the CDTA supervisor. Fortunately,the bus company sent another vehicle less than 25 minutes later to finish the trek.
That evening, a first rehearsal with our new church choir director, Janet Davis, followed by a gathering at the home of the interim director, Chris, who lives in this quite historic house (once the home of the Albany Conservatory, and before that, a Presbyterian manse).
FRIDAY, MARCH 6
I heard that on the news that Albany High School will be delayed two hours because of the presence of Fred Phelps, who I mentioned here. This is actually something I’ve known for over a week ago but was told not to report, lest Freddy and the schemers be tipped off. So after I dropped off Lydia, I did what I suggested others not do – go to the high school. Across the street from the school there were the Westboro people well outnumbered by he counterdemonstrators. Most of the good guys were well behaved and spoke on their megaphones about Christian love.
Then people went in two different directions. Some, including me, went downtown to SUNY Central to rally where Phelps said he’d be on his website; evidently, he finally figured out that this WASN’T the campus and didn’t show. Still about 150 people (way more than the 50 the Times Union reported) made some noise and got lots of support from the passersby.
Meanwhile, the others went uptown at the not optimal (read: busily dangerous) Fuller Road and Washington Avenue, where the Phelps people ended up. That also went well, according to reports. Incidentally, there was ALSO a fairly large rally Thursday night in front of City Hall, where the mayor – who’s running for ere-election this year, unsurprisingly – showed up.
[We interrupt this blog to note End the Lies, a a new website showing some of the worst perpetrators of lies about GLBT people. Now back to the narrative.]
I had received a $50 gift certificate from the Downtown Business Improvement District in a drawing I barely remember entering for a place called Salon 109 at 109 State Street in Albany, so I opted to get a massage there. It was…WONDERFUL. Later, had lunch with my wife – this almost never happens – as we partook of an especially very good buffet of Indian food.
SATURDAY, MARCH 7 (yes, it was my birthday)
Very busy time in my house, with one person, John, fixing our oven that’s been out six days and our hall lights that had been out for over six months, someone else, Bonnie, cleaning the house, and lengthy conversations with both of my sisters and aforementioned old friend – HB, Sara Lee).
Played backgammon for an hour with the Hoffinator and a couple games of hearts with her and friend Orchid; I shot on the last hand to win the second game. Game playing – just what I wanted as a present. The Obama speeches book, the racquetball equipment and the Clapton 2004 DVD were just bonuses.
SUNDAY, MARCH 8
Church youth did Godspell Jr. It was excellent; surprisingly moving.
The weather is warming and I took Lydia to the playground for the first time this year. The ground is muddy, but the wood chip base around the slides is absorbent and not too bad.
That’s enough.
ROG
20 Women I Admire
I have opted to list just American women, merely as a way to limit it. It is NOT a list of THE 20 Women I Most Admire. Actually, it was the first 20 that came to mind.
Abigail Adams
The wife of the second U.S. president and mother of the sixth used her “intellect and lively wit” to prod progress for women “in her many letters which were preserved.”
Jane Addams (pictured) “founded Hull-House in the 19th century and led it well into the 20th. She was also active in peace and feminist work.”
Clara Barton
She was a “pioneering nurse who served as an administrator in the Civil War, and who helped identify missing soldiers at the end of the war, is credited as the founder of the American Red Cross.”
Rachel Carson
With Silent Spring, she “wrote the book that helped create the environmentalist movement in the late 20th century.
Judy Collins
“Part of the 1960s folk revival and still popular today,” her music affected me greatly even before I received “Who Knows Where The Time Goes” for my 16th birthday – 40 years ago! I also had a chance to see her live, which was a true joy.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg (pictured)
A progressive voice on the Supreme Court in spite her recent cancer.
Katharine Graham
She was the Washington Post publisher who “took over the family business after her husband’s suicide and saw it through the Watergate scandal.”
Billie Jean King
Not only a fine tennis player, she worked hard to get women players better pay.
Laura Linney
My favorite working actress. Here’s a tease for the award-winning John Adams miniseries on HBO, which I have not yet seen. It features Linney as Abigail Adams – a twofer!
Jessica Mitford
She wrote The American way of Death, an expose of the funeral industry, which has a profound affect on my view of life…and death.
Mary Tyler Moore
The star of two of my favorite television shows ever (The Dick Van Dyke Show and her eponymously-named show), she has also been a speaker on what they used to call “juvenile diabetes” and stem-cell research.
Toni Morrison (pictured)
Possibly the author I’ve read the most.
Rosa Parks
There’s so much myth around her defining act. She wasn’t just tired, as this narrative shows.
Eleanor Roosevelt
The wife of FDR took “positions on issues like civil rights…often ahead of her husband and the rest of the country. She was key in establishing the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights.”
Margaret Sanger (pictured)
She responded to “seeing the suffering caused by unwanted and unplanned pregnancies among the poor women she served as a nurse” by taking up “a lifetime cause: the availability of birth control information and devices.”
Gloria Steinem
The editor of Ms. magazine. I was a charter subscriber. What more is there to say?
Harriet Tubman
The “Underground Railroad conductor during American slavery was also a Civil War nurse and spy, and an advocate of civil rights.”
Sojourner Truth
Best “known as an abolitionist…she was also a preacher and spoke for women’s rights. She was one of the most in-demand speakers of the mid-19th century in America.”
Madam C.J. Walker (pictured)
She was the first great black entrepreneur, turning her hair care product sales into a business empire.
Babe Didrikson Zaharias
A multi-sport athlete, she excelled in most of them.
Quotes from About.com.
ROG