Month: July 2023

Sunday Stealing: WTIT

“That’s part of your problem.”

This week’s Sunday Stealing is from WTIT: The Blog. Cheers to all of us thieves.

1. What are the 3 most important things everyone should know about you?

I’m pretty easygoing. So if you ticked me off, it was likely something egregious and/or repeated. I think in numbers; I might remember your phone number before I recall your name. I think in music, so I often quote or modify a musical phrase.

For example, my cat Midnight is a greedy eater, butting Stormy away. So I sing to him, “Midnight, don’t be a dipwad” to the tune of Billy, Don’t Be A Hero. My wife thinks this is funny because she knows I HATE Billy, Don’t Be A Hero.

2. What is the strangest thing you believed as a child?

I don’t think it’s that strange, but based on my dreams, I figured I’d figure out how to fly. No plane, just me. Sometimes, I still do.

3. Thinking of school classes, which were your favorite and least favorite?

I was very good at spelling. Math, up to trigonometry, was great. History, especially American history, I liked.

I was terrible at art. And I sucked at shop class; see question 8.

4. What is your favorite fast food?

A Friendly’s Strawberry Fribble. It’s like a milkshake.

5. What song comes closest to how you feel about your life right now?

It’s Too Darn Hot. This is Ella Fitzgerald because it’s Ella.

6. Have you ever taken martial arts classes?

Once or twice, I think, but never seriously.

Getting Better

7. Does your life tend to get better or worse, or does it just stay the same?

This is a complex question. In the main, I was probably getting better emotionally on a personal basis. Still, I fret about global warming, economic inequality, political insanity, et al., in the world my teenage daughter will inherit. Also, myopic news reporting describes triple-digit temps F in the southern and western US, often without mentioning similar European conditions (above 40 C).

8. What arts and crafts have you tried and decided you were bad at?

Any and all. I was terrible at making anything in Cub Scouts. Creating a bookcase or pottery in shop class in junior high school was disastrous. My father was incredulous that I got a B in art in 7th grade, but the teacher said I did my best. In the 1990s, the people in my book group were doing origami; I sucked at origami. You do NOT want me on your Pictionary team.

Quid est veritas? 

9. What is the truest thing that you know?

Sometimes BOTH things are true.

10. Are you more of a giver or a taker?

I try VERY hard to be a giver. One has to be intentional about these things.

11. Do you make your decisions with an open heart/mind?

Ditto. I try extremely hard to make decisions with an open mind. But I’m convinced when I’ve seen so much evidence, real evidence, not just conjecture or rumor, that a path is wrong.

12. What is the most physically painful thing that has ever happened to you?

The first root canal. Oddly, the second one wasn’t so bad.

13. What is the most emotionally painful thing that has ever happened to you?

Undoubtedly, something involving affairs of the heart, fortunately not in this century.

14. What is your favorite line from a movie?

“That’s part of your problem: you haven’t seen enough movies. All of life’s riddles are answered in the movies.” It is SO self-referential. From Grand Canyon (1991)

15. Can you eat with chopsticks?

Not well.

She works hard for the money

Old Songs Festival

Les Green.Carol PowellOne thing I’ll say about my wife: she works hard for the money. As some of you may know, she retired as a teacher of English as a New Language at the end of June 2022. After a fall, getting COVID, and spending four days in the hospital during her six months “off,” she went back to work.

She’s been the program director of Wizard’s Wardrobe, a one-on-one afterschool tutoring program in Albany’s South End. The tutoring takes place only during the school year. So you’d think that the summer would be relatively easy? Not so much.

She has to compile reports about each student and get them to the parents and the teachers. There are three Saturday field trips in July, including one today.

Additionally, she is doing “tabling,” showing up at various community events trying get more students, tutors, and other volunteers. I know this well because most of the material is currently in our house, specifically in her office, because the Wizard’s workspace is being renovated over the summer. Her “off-season” is exceedingly busy.

Sometimes she is so focused on doing the next thing on her agenda that it is difficult to have a present-tense conversation.

Take a break

When she takes a break and says she wants to go to the cinema, I always say yes, because movies. Still, she totally surprised me when she suggested attending the Old Songs Festival. If we were going to go, it had to be on Friday, because Saturday was a high school graduation party and Sunday was likewise busy.

For the uninitiated, Old Songs, taking place at the Altamont Fairgrounds,  is “a family-friendly festival of folk, traditional, Celtic, and world music and dance. ” It “is known for its relaxed atmosphere, interactive sessions and workshops, hands-on experience and participatory nature. In addition to evening concerts each night, there are over 100 daytime workshops, dances or performances. Also featured are craft, food and instrument vendors, and a well-run children’s activity area.”

It’s been going on since the early 1980s. I had attended it several times, having purchased music there. But I had not attended it in two decades, before our daughter was born. My wife had never been there at all.

It had been so long since I had been there that I forgot that we could bring our own lawn chairs. We sat in the Dutch Barn and saw Rum Ragged, a very fine Newfoundland band, followed by the ‘genre-bending” Gaslight Tinkers on the main stage.

We checked out the West African Drum Circle at the grandstand before returning to the barn for Open Mic, with lots of fine musicians. You can download an album by Drew Jacobs, my favorite of which is Dylan’s Just Screwin’ With You.

That evening

After eating some very good Jamaican fare, we listened to the Main Stage Concert. Forty Degrees South from Australia, Matt and Kim Watroba, Andy Cohen, Steve Gillette and Cindy Mangsen. Then Tret Fure who used to play with Cris Williamson, who I have on vinyl. They were all fine sets. we left around 8:30 pm, not before the rain came.

My wife LOVED it! She wants to go again next year. We saw our churchmate Harriet, and our friends Broome and Jay were also around somewhere. The power of recreation is quite strong.

i’m sorry she’s doing work on her birthday, an aforementioned field trip, but I hope she enjoys the day regardless.

The pic, BTW, is of my father, Les Green, and my fiancee shortly before our wedding. Song.

Music I heard in my head in France

I sail my memories of home

This should be no surprise: I often hear music in my head. This is some of the music I heard in my head in France. Now there are LOTS of songs about Paris and France generally.
An American in Paris by George Gershwin. I mean, how could I not?
My Father– Judy Collins. One of the relatively few songs written by Judy. Here are the first (and also penultimate) and last verses.
My father always promised usThat we would live in FranceWe’d go boating on the SeineAnd I would learn to dance
I sail my memories of homeLike boats across the SeineAnd watch the Paris sunAs it sets in my father’s eyes again
Here are two songs by Joni Mitchell:
April in Paris. Many versions of the song, written in the early 1930s, exist. But the Count Basie version from the mid-1950s, specifically the Pop Goes the Weasal take, is stuck in my ear.
I Love Paris. Lots of versions of this classic exist. It’s the iteration by Les Negresses Vertes from the 1990 album Red Hot + Blue: A Tribute To Cole Porter. That collection “created massive media attention for AIDS relief and became the first release in a 15-album series. “
Quiche Lorraine – the B52s. I ate quiche Lorraine in a restaurant in Paris. My wife wanted me to tell her how this song went, but I can’t do B52s sufficiently.
A ringer
Kiss Me (Official Paris Version) – Sixpence None The Richer. I was not familiar with this before. My friend Steve Bissette posted it on Facebook WHILE I WAS IN FRANCE. So I MUST include it.
La Vie En Rose – Edith Piaf. I heard this in Paris! Also, a posting about Piaf is the last one in that display we saw in Roissy.
Genius In France – Weird Al. The Roissy display ends with Piaf. The placard before was Albert Schweitzer, whose death in 1965 I remember, but I didn’t know who he was until he passed. He’s the antithesis of the narrative in the Yankovic song.
Finally, the national anthem.
All You Need Is Love – The Beatles
The 1812 Overture by Tschaikovsky

July rambling: the most peaceful

Forever Chemicals

For the 13th year in a row, Iceland ranks as the most peaceful country in the world, according to the Institute for Economics & Peace’s annual Global Peace Index (GPI). The United States? We’re #131!

At Least 45 Percent of US Tap Water Contaminated With PFAS  “Forever Chemicals” – So far, the scale of contamination in local water systems and private wells outpaces detection and cleanup efforts.

For Your Safety: What to Know about Door Knock Journalism

Facing extinction, Tuvalu considers the digital clone of a country

Oklahoma judge dismisses Tulsa race massacre reparations case filed by last known survivors

The displacement of homeowners to build Dodger Stadium in Chavez Ravine

Jan. 6 suspect arrested near Obama’s house after Trump posts the address

Hunter Biden, and why he did not get a sweetheart deal

US Senate confirms first female Muslim federal judge in US history. Civil rights attorney Nusrat Choudhury was confirmed this week to the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York after the Senate voted 50-49 mostly along party lines. Choudhury also makes history as the first Bangladeshi American to serve as a federal judge.

Other courts continue to make news.Tributes to Alan Arkin, Virtuoso Comic Actor With a Serious Side, Who Died at 89

“It isn’t fair, it isn’t right” – the 75th anniversary of The Lottery by Shirley Jackson

The Man Who Broke Bowling: Jason Belmonte’s two-handed technique made him an outcast. Then it made him the greatest—and changed the sport forever.

Now I Know: Minecraft 1, Censorship 0 and The Cold War’s Most Important Hot Dog Stand and North Korea’ Crappy Way to Feed People and The Record Setting Olympian Who Was Lost to History and When Exercise Was Actually Torture

Moms for “Liberty”

USA Today has a pretty straightforward piece about the so-called Moms for Liberty, and how djt, DeSantis,  Nikki Haley et al. found it necessary to pay homage. As Kareem Abdul-Jabbar noted. M4L “aren’t supporting liberty but taking away the liberty of those they oppose.”

“Our children belong to the Lord, not the government,” declared Patriot Mobile spokeswoman Leigh Wambsganss. “This is not a political war, it is a spiritual war!”

As the Weekly Sift guy observes: “An authoritarian world with clear rules and clear categories comes with an implicit promise of safety for those who obey and conform. So that nonbinary kid on the subway whose gender you can’t quite identify — it’s not that they’re going to attack you themselves. It’s that they represent a crack in the ‘safe’ world order, a manifestation of Chaos. And as those cracks grow, who can predict what demons will spill into the world?”

Of course, obedience and conformity are the exact opposite of the Liberty the group is supposed to stand for. But I guess Moms For Obedience and Conformity just doesn’t have the same ring.”Also, Kareem also notes how Ron D’s “campaign has decided to abandon any pretense of rational arguments and embrace open hatred and contradictory messaging.” I hate it when I agree with djt, but Ron DeSanctimous is about right.

MUSIC

Peter Sprague Plays Guinnevere featuring Rebecca Jade

At Broadway Backwards 2023, Les Misérables’ inspiring anthem  One Day More was set among a modern-day, ragtag group of activists preparing for an equality march in Washington.

Jolene – the PFC Band

Coverville 1447: Cover Stories for Colin Hay of Men at Work, and George Michael & Wham! and  1448: Cover Stories for The Seekers/New Seekers and Bill Withers

The Annotated “Stars and Stripes Forever”

Increase and Multiply – dropped from 1776

Both Sides Now – Annie Lennox (Live at Gershwin Prize 2023)

June and Hey, Bulldog – the Mona Lisa Twins

Light My Fire– Big Daddy

Helene’s Theme from Indiana Jones and the Dial of Distiny by John WilliamsDo We Really Need Christian Lofi? Even when it comes to ambient mood music, there’s no such thing as secular. (No, I was unfamiliar with the Lofi term.)

Finally

Wings by Jessica KantrowitzThere is a fence to keep us in and a fence to keep us outand there are gatekeepers and those who debate the requirements for entry or exitBut you and I, my friend we are birds we have wings.

1972: meeting with my draft board

follwing suit

I met with my draft board on September 7, 1972, to appeal being reclassified as 1-A, eligible for military service when my initial request for conscientious objector status had been rejected.  For some reason, I thought it was later in the fall. And other details I misremembered.

As I sought a graphic, I discovered the current vernacular of draft board involves fantasy league sports. Nope, not that.

The board

There were three men on the panel. Someone asked me if I had a bugging device. (I didn’t and wasn’t sophisticated enough to jerry-rig one.)  “The chairman knew me from the fact that I was B.C.H.S. [Binghamton Central] student gov’t pres. He asked me vague and unanswerable questions about my beliefs and asked what I had done for humanity lately.”

(In retrospect, I could have mentioned how I had fought against war, was getting myself to be an educated citizen, and the like.)

“He also said that in trying to understand me thru my letters, he found me rather flippant and is trying to find the real me. I’m not flippant – rather wry but also honest.  He said that if a Hitler [or a Nixon, I noted in my head] tried to take over the world, wouldn’t my love of humanity [have me] fight to save them? He paralleled helping countrymen with helping family.”

Garland Hamlin was on the panel. He was a member of my church. His wife tried to teach me piano. I went to school with his two daughters and his nephew. His parents-in-law were my godparents. Yet he acted as though he did not know me, so I followed his lead.

He “asked questions like, ‘Do you think WWI was justified?’ I wasn’t about to justify ANY war, but he kept driving at it.

The third guy bugged me the most – he didn’t say a damn thing. [It all [left a bad taste in my mouth, but no worse than expected.

Hitchhiking back to college

My father gave me a ride out onto Route 17. It took me three rides to get back to college. One from some “freaks” to Windsor; this was a positive term in my mind, i.e., hippie freaks. One ride to Liberty with a guy from Rhode Island. Then an older black man from Ellenville took me to New Paltz. The commonality is that all those drivers either disliked or hated Richard Nixon.

After visiting friends, I hitchhiked to Kingston. The guy drove too fast and tailgated. When he stopped at a bar for cigarettes, the guy stole a pack, then the proprietor took them back. I feared a fight, especially with the driver’s “Don’t tell me what to do” attitude.

I hitchhiked a LOT in those days, from Binghamton to New Paltz and back; from New Paltz to Kingston and back – the Okie and I lived there briefly; and especially New Paltz to NYC, though one needed to take a bus out of the city to hitch back.

There’s one particular hitchhiking story that I’m hoping I wrote about.

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