My Own New Year's Eve Countdown

When I was a kid, one of the things I always loved about New Year's Eve were the annual radio countdowns. Some had the 100 best-selling songs of the year, others played the songs with the most listener requests - and the truly ambitious ones did a day-long 300-song extravaganza featuring the top songs ever recorded.

Of course this was all back in the days when people actually a) listened to commercial radio, and b) used those corded telephone thingies to call their favorite DJ and request their favorite song... which is why I'm not sure radio stations even do countdowns anymore. Yet there was still something nostalgic - anticipatory, almost magical - about the skilled program director who could time his or her countdown so that the No. 1 song would play just before midnight, giving their listening audience that final little bit of closure they need before taking a cup of kindness yet for days of auld lang syne.

So it is in that vein (and with the help of the "plays" counter on my iTunes) that I decided to produce my own New Year's Eve countdown of my family's most listened-to songs of 2011:

1. Empire State of Mind (Jay-Z f/ Alicia Keys)
2. Make It Shine (Victoria Justice)
3. Volcano (Jimmy Buffett)
4. On The Floor (Jennifer Lopez)
5. You Belong With Me (Taylor Swift)
6. Kissin' You (Miranda Cosgrove)
7. Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow (James Durbin)
8. When I Grow Up To Be a Man (Beach Boys)
9. Denise (Randy & The Rainbows)
10. Dancing Crazy (Miranda Cosgrove)
11. Picture to Burn (Taylor Swift)
12. Mean (Taylor Swift)
13. Shake It Up (Selena Gomez)
14. Baby (Justin Bieber)
15. Who Says (Selena Gomez)
16. Don't Stop Believin' (Journey)
17. Magic (Selena Gomez)
18. I Wonder Why (Dion & The Belmonts)
19. Back to December (Taylor Swift)
20. Basket Case (Green Day)
21. Let My Love Open The Door (Pete Townshend)
22. Kookie, Kookie Lend Me Your Comb (Edd Byrnes)
23. You're Not Sorry (Taylor Swift)
24. New York, New York (Frank Sinatra)
25. Girls In Their Summer Clothes (Bruce Springsteen)
26. Love Story (Taylor Swift)
27. Sunday in New York (Bobby Darin)
28. Fearless (Taylor Swift)
29. God Only Knows (Beach Boys)
30. Welcome Back (John Sebastian)
31. Runaround Sue (Dion)
32. Enter Sandman (Metallica)
33. Leave It All To Me (Miranda Cosgrove)
34. Lonely Teenager (Dion)

35. So What (Pink)

36. Big Time Rush (Big Time Rush)

37. Electric Blue (Icehouse)

38. Gitchee Gitchee Goo (Phineas and the Ferbtones)

39. Girlfriend (Avril Lavigne)

40. The King of Wishful Thinking (Go West)

41. That Thing You Do! (The Wonders)

42. Fish Heads (Barnes & Barnes)

43. Step By Step (The Crests)

44. The Imperial March (John Williams)

45. All the Right Moves (One Republic)

46. My Girl (Mindless Behavior)

47. We Will Rock You (Queen)

48. The Way I Loved You (Taylor Swift)

49. Boston (Augustana)

50. Remember Then (Earls)

51. One Less Lonely Girl (Justin Bieber)

52. I Wanna Go Back (Eddie Money)

53. Backyard Beach (Phineas and Ferb)

54. Opus 17 (Don't You Worry 'Bout Me) (Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons)

55. Temptation Eyes (The Grass Roots)

56. Mrs. Robinson (Simon & Garfunkel)

57. Get Ready For This (2 Unlimited)

58. Help Me, Rhonda (The Beach Boys)

59. Laid (James)

60. If You Wanna Be Happy (Jimmy Soul)

61. Glory of Love (Peter Cetera)

62. Waiting On a Friend  (The Rolling Stones)

63. Darlin' (The Beach Boys)

64. I Guess That's Why They Call It the Blues (Elton John)

65. I Will Follow Him (Little Peggy March)

66. The Great Pretender (The Platters)

67. You Shook Me All Night Long (AC/DC)

68. Party In The USA (Miley Cyrus)

69. Learn To Fly (Foo Fighters)

70. Back On the Chain Gang (Pretenders)

71. Ever the Same (Rob Thomas)

72. Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow (The Shirelles)

73. Freak the Freak Out (Victoria Justice)

74. Sugar Sugar (Archies)

75. Song 2 (Blur)

76. My Back Pages (The Byrds)

77. Take Me Home Tonight (Eddie Money)

78. Walk Like A Man (Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons)

79. This Old Heart of Mine (The Isley Brothers)

80. Stay (Maurice Williams & The Zodiacs)

81. Crazy Train (Ozzy Osbourne)

82. I Got a Man (Positive K)

83. Can't Nobody Hold Me Down (Puff Daddy)

84. Cotton Eye Joe (Rednex)

85. Bittersweet Symphony (The Verve)

86. Buddy Holly (Weezer)

87. Freedom (Wham!)

88. We Can Work It Out (The Beatles)

89. Heart and Soul (The Cleftones)

90. Sherry (Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons)

91. Twist And Shout (The Isley Brothers)

92. Love You Like A Love Song (Selena Gomez)

93. Dedicated to the One I Love (The Shirelles)

94. Einstein On The Beach (Counting Crows)

95. Goodnight Elisabeth (Counting Crows)

96. Hats Off to Larry (Del Shannon)

97. Mission Bell (Donnie Brooks)

98. Big Man In Town (Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons)

99. Twist, Twist Señora  (Gary U.S. Bonds)

100. Bit By Bit (Theme from "Fletch") (Stephanie Mills)

I counted seven or eight from Taylor Swift, a bunch more from Selena Gomez, and a delicate smattering of Justin Bieber. Couple in Victoria Justice and the dark-haired chick from iCarly and you have living proof that the girls outnumber the boys in our house. But I do have to give props to my two boys: their unflinching love for the New York Yankees obviously propelled "Empire State of Mind" to No. 1!

Happy New Year!

   

My Big Fat Polish Christmas

For a whopping 364 days of the year, my family exists devoid of any real celebration of our ethnic heritage.

Sure it sounds sad, but you don't have to be a sociologist or an anthropologist (or any ologist, for that matter) to realize it was bound to happen. My 100% Polish grandfather married my 100% Italian grandmother; and my Polish/Italian father married my 100% Spanish mother. Then to complicate matters further, I went and married a 25% Polish, 25% French, 50% WASP woman who had ancestors on the Mayflower. (I like to joke that they actually do have an ethnic celebration: its called Thanksgiving.)

The end result of all this madness, of course, is that my wife and I now have five wonderful children who aside from their decidedly Polish last name have no real sense of their own cultural heritage.

Except for Christmas Eve.

Christmas Eve is the one night - the one holiday tradition - that has endured throughout my lifetime...and I've come to accept it as perhaps one of the few opportunities I have left by which to teach my children about their past.

Throughout my own culturally trifurcated existence, Christmas Eve has always been a celebration both of and with the Polish side of my family. The meal, at its core, consists of fish and pierogi - because in the true Polish tradition, you are not allowed to eat meat on Christmas Eve. My father recalls that growing-up the meal specifically called for seven different types of fish, although we have heard that in Poland the actual number is proscribed to be twelve (a discrepancy he simply chalks-up to his grandmother being a relatively poor immigrant). My grandfather's favorite is sledzie (kinda sorta pronounced SLEDGE-e), which is raw pickled herring... not particularly my cup of tea, but nonetheless a Polish delicacy available in large vats on the floor of just about every Polish deli and grocery on the infamous Broad Street in New Britain.

As for the pierogi: we get the real ones - the ones hand made by the little Polish ladies over at the St. Lucian's home and filled with good stuff like cabbage or sauerkraut or sweet cheese. (With my most sincere apologies to Mrs. T: I loathe bland, Americanized supermarket-freezer pierogi filled with potato and cheese... loathe!) Since my wife is part Polish too (the only ancestry we have in common), she more than qualifies to cook-up the pierogi... and this year, she's even adding potato pancakes to the mix!

In the Polish tradition, we also break and share the oplatek (kinda sorta pronounced oh-PWAH-tek) wafers - typically three communion-esque wafers with images of the Nativity on them. As our patriarch, my grandfather begins by saying a few words and then sharing the wafer with his wife and then sequentially with each of his three children, then his grandchildren... and by that point the ritual devolves into a joyous mass of chaos in which ultimately every member of the family has shared a piece of the wafer with every other member of the family and has wished them a Merry Christmas.

And then there's the song. Mixed-in among the secular sounds of Frosty the Snowman and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is the only Polish song any of us in our family will likely ever know: "Dzisiaj w Betlejem" (kinda sorta pronounced GEE-shy beth-LAY-hem). According to my grandfather, the literal translation is something to the effect of "come to Bethlehem" or "rejoice in Bethlehem" - but admittedly none of the rest of us have even the slightest clue as to what the actual words in the song mean. All that we know is that its my grandfather's song - a song I remember him singing with his brother, that was most certainly sung to them by their mother, and one unquestionably sung to her by her mother. The rest of us have heard it throughout our lives and have either picked-up the words either through rote or osmosis - and I am insistent that if my children know nothing else about their past, this song must be it.

We are hosting Christmas Eve for this first time this year - and while I do expect these next 48 hours to be a bit hectic, I am genuinely excited... because while Christmas always has been about faith and family, for me it has also always been about my Polish heritage.

Wesolych Swiat Bozego Narodzenia! (Which I'm pretty sure means Merry Christmas!)

New Blogs

I'd like to extend a laurel and hearty handshake to the two latest editions to the blogosphere: my little brother Nick and Prof. Geoffrey "Thug" Elterich... check out their words of wisdom at the links below:

• Nick: Spoven Weedle Presents at http://nickjake00.blogspot.com/

• Thug: "Of Intersections and Strange Things Told" at http://ofintersectionsandstrangethingstold.blogspot.com/

Visit 'em... Read 'em... Follow 'em...

The Ultimate Christmas Playlist

During the holidays there are only two things that can make me nauseous: excessive amounts of egg nog and Paul McCartney's "Wonderful Christmastime."

(I do feel bad saying that about any composition derived from any former Beatle, but its true. From those first few synthesized bars I know I either have to turn to another radio station or risk losing my lunch.)

"It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" isn't quite as bad, but its close; not to mention Angela Landsbury's "We Need a Little Christmas" or the stupid singing dogs barking "Jingle Bells". And by the 4,526,794th play of "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree", I have to admit: I've pretty much had it with sweet little Brenda Lee.

So this year I scoured my vast collection of Christmas CDs and spend an unfathomable amount of time in iTunes compiling the ultimate Christmas playlist... my very own "25 Songs for the 25th of December" (to steal the cheesy tagline from WCBS Fm):

1. "Adeste Fidelis" (Andrea Bocelli) - My favorite performance of this song is the one Luciano Pavarotti did with Vanessa Williams on Saturday Night Live back in the late 90's... but since that track is not commercially available, I've gone with Bocelli's equally breathtaking version.

2. "Kay Thompson's Jingle Bells" (Andy Williams) - A delightfully different take on a kids' classic, brought to you by the same guy who sang "Moon River".

3. "Merry Christmas, Baby" (Beach Boys) - The Beach Boys Christmas Album gets a bad rap. My brother and I listened to it so often as kids that wore out the cassette ribbon.

4. "Christmas is All Around" (Billy Mack) - The song itself is supposed to be a spoof, cleverly weaved into an ongoing subplot in one of my favorite movies, Love Actually. But listen to it once and you'll find yourself singing it at all season long.

5. "White Christmas" (Bing Crosby) - I used to think he was drunk when he recorded it... and while that most certainly could be the case, the movie of the same name helps solidify this one as an original classic.

6. "Christmas Auld Lang Syne" (Bobby Darin) - Play this one when its all over, after every one's gone home on Christmas night. I guarantee you'll get a little teary-eyed.

7. "The Chipmunk Song" (The Chipmunks) - Yes, I admit: I actually like this one.Please don't hold it against me. 

8. "Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home)" (Darlene Love) - The song itself is perfect... the fact that its also the title song to the movie Gremlins is just the icing on the cake.

9. "All Alone on Christmas" (Darlene Love) - A triumphant follow-up to "Baby, Please Come Home", albeit 20+ years later. This one was also featured in a Christmas movie: Home Alone 2.

10. "Please Come Home for Christmas" (Dion) - The more popular Eagles version is good, but how can you possible beat a Christmas song from the guy who brought us "Runaround Sue"?

11. "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing (Frank Sinatra) - The Chairman of the Board comes across as sincere - possibly moved, even - on the best cut from of the best Christmas albums ever.

12. "Another Rock n' Roll Christmas" (Gary Glitter) - That the nut who brought us the venerable Rock n' Roll Part 2 could even make a Christmas song (let alone a good Christmas song) is, in and of itself, quite an accomplishment.

13. "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" (John Lennon) - For a variety of reasons, its my single favorite Christmas song ever... not to mention that its the ultimate antithesis of Sir Paul's "Wonderful Christmastime" disaster.

14. "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" (Judy Garland) - The lyrics were eventually changed because record companies felt that the Judy Garland original (from Meet Me in St. Louis) sounded too depressing. I respectfully disagree. 

15. "Christmas Tree" (Lady Gaga f/Space Cowboy) - Like Gaga's discography (and like Gaga herself, for that matter), this song is both brilliant and utterly fu*ked-up.

16. "O Holy Night" (Lou Christie) - In 1966, his song "Rhapsody in the Rain" was banned by most US radio stations for its overly suggestive lyrics. He made up for it years later by recording this beautiful song about the birth of Christ.

17. "All I Want for Christmas is You" (Mariah Carey) - I was 16 when this album came out, and I admit I only bought it for the picture on the cover... but this song has managed to be one of the very very few modern hits to actually break through and become a bona fide Christmas classic.

18. "I Bought You a Plastic Star For Your Aluminum Tree" (Michael Franks) - The lyrics are cute and the predominant instrument in the composition is a xylophone... need I say more?

19. "The Christmas Song" (Nat King Cole) - While his guest shots on Night Court were impressive, Mel Torme's greatest accomplishment will always be penning this classic... and no matter how many artists try to remake it, the Nat King Cole original will always be the best.

20. "Christmas in Hollis" (Run DMC) - If you were alive during the 1990's, chances are you owned the original A Very Special Christmas album. And if you owned the album, you know that this was by far the best song on it.


21. "Merry Christmas Baby" (Otis Redding) - Ever since the aforementioned A Very Special Christmas album was released, radio stations have blown-up the Bruce Springstein version; but Lou Baxter and Johnny Moore originally wrote it to be an R&B song, and that's how I like it. 

22. "That Holiday Feeling" (Steve Lawrence & Eyde Gorme) - This song makes me feel like I'm cutting a rug at a Christmas party at my grandparents' house circa 1955... (which admittedly would be a bit weird since I wasn't born until 1977).

23. "What Christmas Means to Me" (Stevie Wonder) - He sounded like he was still Little Stevie playing around on his harmonica, but he was already quite the grown-up when he released this radio hit back in 1967.

24. "Someday at Christmas" (The Temptations) - Couple the peace-seeking message of the song with Melvin Franklin's incomparable bass on vocals and you have an overlooked masterpiece.   

25. "Christmas Wrapping" (Waitresses) - This song is like a drug: its bad for you, you know its bad for you, and you feel bad for even owning it... but you just can't. Stop. Listening.

Mom.

I love my mom.

That's not a very controversial statement, given that an overwhelming majority of human beings (and other species, for that matter) do in fact love their mothers; but admittedly, it could stand to be said (by me, at least) a bit more often than it is. The hustle and bustle of 21st Century tends to consume all of us in a way such that we are able to reflect on such things only on certain occasions... and this past Sunday, as we celebrated my mom turning 60, was one.

I spent much of last week making a slide show for my mother - a tedious task, given the fact that digital cameras have only been prevalent in about nine or ten of her sixty years. My grandmother provided me with an album of black and whites from when my mom was a kid, and then my father (ever the meticulous photo connoisseur  allowed me to borrow his OCD-infused albums from the middle years of her life. All in all I collected 195 pictures, which thanks to Mac technology (RIP Steve Jobs) were instantly coupled with four of my mom's favorite songs and melded into a Ken Burns-style slideshow.

She cried when we played it. So did everyone else in the room. But for me, the sentimentality of the final product couldn't rival that of the actual development. Its not often that you get to peruse sixty years of someone's life over merely a few days - and when you do, I think it helps you gain a greater appreciation for the genuine essence of said person.

Before putting the slideshow together, I knew without question the things I admired about my mother:

• When my brother and I were young (i.e. still in elementary school), she made a decision to go back to grad school; and she set an amazing example some years later when she finally graduated with her MSW.
• When my aunt was diagnosed with a vicious form of leukemia, my mom literally moved to Boston for nearly four months to be with her - day in and day out - so my uncle could try to keep life as normal as possible for their three little girls.
• And when my wife and I were four months pregnant with our first set of twins, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer... a diagnosis she faced with courage and ultimately defeated with valor. 

Putting together that slideshow, though, caused me to see other things - different things - that I don't always necessarily notice. From the simple (for most of her life she had short hair), to the complex (she still looks at my father the same way she did on their wedding day), I couldn't help but feel as though I had been blunted - stunned, even - by the obvious nature of such observations.

The observation that struck me the most, though, was the affinity my mom had/has for my brother and I together. Even before I had started to scan, I noticed the plethora of pictures of just the three of us. Pictures from Christmas and vacations; from school events and the park. There were literally hundreds of them... and after perusing them all, I felt a certain closeness - an identification, if you will - with that particular triumvirate: my brother, my mom and me. Not to slight my father (since he was likely the one who took most of said pictures), but there is something special about those particular images that capture my mother - the true essence of my mother - more than any of the others ever could.

Happy Birthday, Mom!

Minding The Gap

Few things bother me more than being handed a resume rife with unexplained gaps. Its foolish, its unprofessional and (quite frankly) its just plain stupid. I mean, seriously: do you really want me to guess what you were doing from September 2002 to March 2003?

Prison?

Rehab?

Riding cross-country on a unicycle so you could "find yourself"?

Or worse yet: maybe you got fired for incompetence from your last job and it took you six months, a name change and a few different time-zones to land your next one. That's the killer!

The answer, of course, is quite simple: explain the gaps and tell the truth. And having gone nearly two months without a blog entry, I feel I should do the same.

All of my writing time toward the end of October was spent laboring over a short story I submitted to a writing competition. I have never truly written a short story before, and quite frankly I was surprised with the manner by which the idea for the plot literally just popped into my head. People (i.e. my wife) have told me repeatedly over the years that I'm a tad long-winded, so keeping my story to 1,500 words was a challenge... but one I thoroughly enjoyed. I'll post my short story on here sometime after the contest closes.

The end of October was met with a most unusual occurrence here in Connecticut: snow. And no, not a few quick flurries to remind us that winter was just around the corner. What I'm talking about was a massive, February-esque nor'easter mere days before Halloween. Snow in and of itself is nothing new to those of us born and bred in New England - we have our snow-blowers and shovels ready at all times. But apparently the physics of heavy, wet snow falling on trees that still have their leaves is somewhat problematic... because my town looked like a hurricane hit it. Most of Connecticut was without power for six days; we were without power for ten. Thankfully, my in-laws live only a hour away and had power (and heat and hot water and an over-stocked fridge), so we packed-up the five kids and "moved" downstate for a week. Was it ideal? Not in the least. But it worked, and we were grateful... and I have a new-found appreciation for anyone who has to commute an hour to work every morning!

By the time our power had returned, I was engrossed in my friend's campaign for City Council - so that burned up a few more weeks. Then I finished my second set of revisions to a novel I wrote a few years back (more on that at a later date), and started researching agents with whom I could query it. Next thing I knew, it was Thanksgiving - and again, this being New England, the weather had skewed in the other direction, which meant it was 60-degrees and sunny outside when I adorned the front of our house with lights (which I have to admit came out pretty damn good this year).

Now its December - the single most magical, fanciful and chaotic month of the year. My kids are already high off of candy canes, while I'm already obsessed with squeezing every last drop out of the Christmas season.

Unfortunately, my fun-old-fashioned "Dogsled Ride to the North Pole" idea was already nixed by my wife.

Damn. 

Oh, Suzanne(a)

Big shout-out today to my friend Suzanne Palmieri, a debut author from New Haven who scored not one but TWO two-book deals last week. (And yes, for those of you mathematically challenged, that equals four books.) Here are the announcements from Publisher's Marketplace:

• Suzanne Palmieri's THE WITCH OF LITTLE ITALY, in which a troubled senior at Yale returns to her estranged, magical family in the Bronx and unlocks secrets dating back to WWII, as well as her mysterious, lost memories, to Vicki Lame at St. Martin's, in a nice deal, in a two-book deal, for publication in April 2013, by Anne Bohner at Pen & Ink Literary (World English).

• Suzanne Hayes and Loretta Nyhan's I'LL BE SEEING YOU, a story of unexpected friendship told through letters shared between two American women on the home front during World War II, to Erika Imranyi at Mira, in a two-book deal, by Anne Bohner at Pen & Ink Literary and Joanna Volpe at Nancy Coffey Literary & Media Representation.

I was introduced to Suzanne a few years ago by a mutual friend who knew we were both writing novels and trying to get them published. Suzanne is not only a better writer than me, but she's also faster and more persistent. In the time it took me to draft two novels, I think she had churned out six or seven or eight... which is why I'm not surprised she's sitting on that pair of two-books deals.

Suzanne has been a great critic and an inspirational friend, and she stands as living proof that plenty of amateurs blessed with vivid imaginations can, will and do make it in this business. Do yourself a favor and check her out... because pretty soon you're going to own one of her books: http://suzannepalmieri.com/

What if...?

My wife and I took this picture of our five kids last weekend on a visit to the University of Connecticut:

Over the last twenty years, UConn has become one of the top public universities in the country, not to mention the "College Basketball Capitol of the World". I hold two degrees from this fine institution, I was the editor of the campus newspaper, and I was front-and-center that magical Monday night in 1999 when Coach Calhoun hoisted his/our first-ever NCAA Championship trophy in Tropicana Field... but more than anything else, UConn is where I met my wife.

We have known each other for 14 years, have been married for 11, and have five wonderful children - and when I look at this picture, I can't help think of the improbable things that had to have happened in order to bring us to this point in our lives. Yes, it sounds kinda Doc-Brown-Back-to-the-Future-ish, but think about it: at some point in October of 1997, I'm sure I stumbled drunk past this very statue, sorting through the dozens and dozens of girls' phone numbers that were voluntarily thrown at me at that night's array of parties... yet 14 years later there we were taking this picture. The time in between was and is filled with countless "what ifs".

What if she aced freshman chemistry and remained a nursing major instead of switching to journalism?

What if I didn't wander over to the campus newspaper looking for a job my freshman year?

What if her dumbass high school sweetheart hadn't broken up with her over the summer?

What if Billy had in fact beeped the horn of his car, demanding we leave that silly party before I had a chance to talk to her?

What if she said no?

What if she got sick of me?

What if she didn't have a genetic predisposition to release more than one egg per month?

What if we decided to stop after two?

What if we decided to stop after three?

The picture of my kids reminds me of that picture of Marty McFly and his siblings - the one that starts to fade bit by bit as he changes history, as he alters the "what ifs". But since I don't have a time-traveling DeLorean, the only conclusion I can draw is that life is some ironic mixture of free-will, divine intervention, and good old-fashioned luck.

I could drive myself crazy thinking about all the things that could have gone differently, that could have gone wrong... but in the end, I am where I am.

And for that, I'm eternally grateful.

Ode to Autumn

In an effort to offset the unnerving reality that its 150-degrees outside on September 26, I have compiled an exhaustive list of all the things I love about fall...

Cornstalks
Hayrides
The cool, crisp air
Political lawnsigns
Vermont
New York City
Central Park (how you tore your dress... what a mess... I confess...)
Its dark again by five o'clock
High school football
Corn mazes
Orchards
New England foliage
Real maple syrup
New TV shows
Apples
Apple crisp
Apple cider
Apple cider donuts
Apple pie
(Hell, even Apple Jacks)
Drinking a pint of Blue Moon at a rustic old pub
Playoff baseball
The World Series
The inevitable Yankees Victory Parade!
Tractor-pulls
The plethora of traditional New England fairs
Driving around the reservoir
Pumpkins
Pumpkin pie
Pumpkin seeds
Pumpkin beer
Barry Manilow's "Weekend in New England" (please don't judge me)
Our wedding anniversary
My birthday
Election Day
UConn Dairy Bar ice cream
Falling leaves blowing in the wind
Breaking out my winter jackets
Kettle corn
Watching my kids dress-up for Halloween
The smell of pot roast when I come from work
Lighting my fireplace for the first time in months
Wearing jeans
Cloudy skies
And of course: Thanksgiving.

(insert audible sigh)... I feel much better.

September 11, 2001

It may sound corny, cliché and wholly unoriginal, but September 11, 2001 started out just like any other day.

I rolled out of bed. I took a shower. I got dressed for work.

My wife and I were still technically newlyweds; no morning chaos, no children screaming for pancakes or Pop Tarts. She left for work before I did, which was typical given that she was financially supporting us (a truth I forget all too often these days). I had just finished grad school and was working as a lowly intern for the next town over. Though the pay wasn’t great, my commute was minuscule, thus giving me plenty of time to eat my cereal and read my morning paper.

The Yanks had just swept a three-game series from the Red Sox.

New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani’s approval rating had hit a new low.

The Musketeers (a movie I can’t recall for the life of me) won the weekend box office.

It was my best friend’s birthday.

Driving to work, there was some news about a plane hitting the World Trade Center, but it was more of a curiosity than a matter of national security; something briefly mentioned between the local traffic and the previous night’s sports scores. So I parked my car in the Town Hall lot, I grabbed my leather man-purse-thing and I shut my car door… and as if triggered by some divine intervention, I looked up.

The sky over tiny little Plainville, Connecticut was beautiful.

A beautiful, clear blue. Not a single cloud; not even the faintest hint of lifted fog or stale airplane exhaust. It was like an animated cartoon, or one of those drawings my kids did in Kindergarten: just a light blue mass and a perfect yellow sun.

Admittedly, I’m not one to notice things like that. I’m too concrete. I have a hard time seeing the natural beauty in the things I take for granted like the sun and the stars and the trees and the birds chirping. But in that moment, as I stood there in the parking lot, holding my leather work bag, ready for another day on the job, I actually said to myself: wow – what a beautiful day.

Minutes later I was upstairs in our conference room watching smoke bellow from one of the two World Trade Center towers. Anchors and experts were speculating on the air about what had happened: maybe the pilot fell asleep, or there was a tragic mechanical malfunction or something wrong with the air traffic controller.

Then, on live TV, we watched as a second plane emerged from the right side of the screen and hit the second tower.

In an instant, it didn’t matter how many games the Yanks had won or how many millions of dollars some silly movie took in on Saturday night. In an instant, I forgot that it was my best friend’s birthday or that The West Wing was supposed to sweep the upcoming Emmy’s. In an instant, I didn’t care that I had to cut the lawn or pay the electric bill or buy more peanut M&M’s for the office.

In an instant, my perfect blue sky was tarnished forever.

Someday one of my kids is going to ask me about 9/11 - about what happened and where I was and who I was with and what I saw. They’ll ask the same way I asked my parents about the Kennedy Assassination, the same way they asked their parents about Pearl Harbor.

And when they do I’ll tell them: “it started out just like any other day.”

High School

For years I had a recurring dream where I was frantically walking the halls of my high school, trying to find my guidance counselor. There was a class – usually Spanish – that I barely attended but forgot to withdraw from; and the merciless teacher insisted on giving me an F. Unless I weaseled my way out of it, I wouldn’t graduate.

The dream itself wasn’t rooted in any literal truth (since I managed to graduate high school just fine, thank you), nor was it all that uncommon. According to a psychologist I know, lots of people have “high school dreams” or “college dreams”, and they tend to represent some general sense of unfinished business and/or a need to still accomplish something. Over time, they usually stop recurring... which mine did a few years ago when I finally realized that high school, for all its glory, both was and is a cruel joke.

Don’t get me wrong: I liked my high school. I learned some stuff, I made some friends, and – save the street gang executive who got shot and killed on the front steps in broad daylight – I don’t think there’s anywhere else I would have rather gone. But society tends to make the whole high school experience thing a much bigger deal than it is.

The expectations.

The pressure.

The societal norms you have to live up to.

I remember walking around the hallways (in real life, not the dream) with an innate sense that what I was doing and what was happening both to and around me would have an unequivocally permanent impact upon my entire being for the rest of my natural life.

As it turns out, I was wrong. A confessed dork back in high school (a truth my wife would unquestionably extend to present day as well), I was ranked slightly higher than the pocket protector/chess club nerds, yet far far below the realm of popular jocks. Nearly twenty years later, though, neither the academic nor the social stratification matters… and as a parent, that more than anything else is what I’m trying to figure out:

• How do I teach my kids to work hard but not perseverate?
• How do I tell them that what can seem like a big deal at the moment is really, truly nothing?
• And how do I get them to see that this whole grand theory of “high school” is just one of many many many phases of life?

Thankfully, I’ve still got six full years to figure it out.

Don Corleone Heads to The Office

Over the years I have realized that people who go around quoting the Godfather fall into one of two categories: 1) the ninety percent of the population that only knows “leave the gun, take the cannoli,” or 2) the obsessive-compulsive elites who have managed to integrate even the most obscure Godfather quotes into their daily vernacular much to the annoyance of their spouses, co-workers and friends.

Unfortunately for my spouse, co-workers and friends, I fall among the later. Fortunately for me, though, I work for a couple of guys who appreciate The Godfather as much as I do... which inspired my patented list of Godfather Quotes for Use in the Modern Workplace:

10. Your secretary complains about having to work on Columbus Day/Veteran’s Day/Arbor Day/et cetera… so you politely let her know: “That’s the price you pay for the life you choose.” (Michael to Vincent, Part III)

9.     The boss hires one of those leadership consultants to come in and give a seminar. When he asks for the definition of teamwork, you raise your hand and shout: “All of our ships must sail in the same direction.” (Don Lucchesi, Part III)

8.     You and a co-worker both sleep with the same girl on the same night. The resulting awkwardness leads to an all-out fist-fight at lunch. The boss calls you both into his office; and when you’ve finally worked out your differences, you embrace your co-worker and assure him: “I will not be the one to break the peace we have made here today.” (Vito to Tattaglia, Part I)

7.     You’re at a staff meeting, laying-out a rather ambitions agenda for the next quarter. A recalcitrant subordinate yells out “that’s impossible.” So you get very very quiet, then softly announce: “If history has taught us anything… it’s that you can kill anybody.” (Michael to Al Neri, Part II)

6.     The guy in the next cubicle over confides in you that he hates, hates, hates his boss. You put a hand on his shoulder and gently reassure him: “Never hate your enemies. It affects your judgment.” (Michael to Vincent, Part III)

5.     Your boss starts raving about how great things are at the company. Sales are up, profits are up, shareholders are happy and everyone’s getting a big fat Christmas bonus… so you look at him and matter-of-factly state:  “Michael, we’re bigger than U.S. Steel.” (Hyman Roth, Part II)

4.     Your boss accuses you of stealing soap from the unisex bathroom. The company’s disciplinary panel hears your case and concludes that you, in fact, did not steal said soap from the unisex bathroom. Upon hearing this news, you spring to your feet and scream: “THIS COMMITTEE OWES AN APOLOGY!” (Tom Hagen, Part II)

3.     Your legal affairs office hires a new staff attorney to oversee ethics compliance. You introduce yourself, shake her hand and inform her: “I don’t need any more tough guys. I need. More. Lawyers.” (Michael to Vincent, Part III)

2.     An old friend and mentor who helped you get your first job many many years ago asks you do to a favor that you really don’t want to do. You look away and say, resignedly: “You know I’ll do anything for my Godfather.” (Johnny Fontaine, Part I)

1.     A back-stabbing, two-faced, double-crossing co-worker comes up to you after a meeting and asks how your sick aunt is doing. You look him straight in the eye and say: “We’re both a part of the same hypocrisy – but never think it applies to my family.” (Michael to Senator Geary, Part II)

I Want My MTV

August 1, 1981 – 12:01 a.m.

The countdown begins, the rocket launches; the little spacesuit cartoon guy plants his iconic flag on the moon as The Buggles (a one-hit wonder no one had ever heard of) took to the screen to sing about killing the radio star.

It was the start of MTV - a groundbreaking experiment that would redefine the futures of both music and television forever. But as history was being made, where exactly did I find myself?

In bed. Asleep. Probably hugging any variety of blankets, pillows or stuffed animals.

In my defense, I was only three; plus I’m fairly certain my parents didn’t have cable back then anyway. Nonetheless, it would have been nice to say I witnessed history, especially given how much of a role MTV played in the early part of my life, and the lives of just about everyone else in my generation.

Sure, “Video Killed The Radio Star” became the iconic front of early music videos (and also the answer to what is not the most over-used trivia question in the universe), but there were others that still to this day bring me back to being a kid, sitting on my couch watching the real MTV:

“You Might Think” by the Cars. (The water gushing out of Ric Ocasek’s fallen face is classic!)

Ray Parker, Jr. popping out from under the bed in “Ghostbusters”.

Anything by the Go-Gos. Anything by Scandal. Anything by Duran Duran.

Billy Joel’s “Uptown Girl”.

“Take On Me”!

The “Walk of Life” video with all of the sports clips.

Chevy Chase in “Call Me Al.”

“We Are the World” (again… and again… and again…).

And of course the granddaddy of them all: “Thriller”… because let’s face it: who among us was not obsessed with “Thriller”?

Over time, the music gradually gave way to general programming. I liked “Remote Control” and “Yo, MTV Raps”, and I even watched the first few seasons of the “Real World”; but (and you all know where this is going because you’ve heard it a thousand times) MTV really can’t call itself Music Television anymore. It’s all about money and reality shows and the style of in-your-face-sex-sells programming that prohibits me from allowing any of my children anywhere near MTV.

At least those of us who grew up with MTV still have a memory of it, though. At least we still smile every time we hear “867-5309” on the radio, thinking about the huge gap in the lead singer’s teeth… or laugh at the thought of the dancing midget every time we hear “Safety Dance”… or instantly think of Dexy’s Midnight Runners every time we see a pair of denim overalls.

Tune into MTV this very minute and you’ll assuredly encounter “True Life” or “16 and Pregnant”. The channel’s web page doesn’t even mention of today’s milestone anniversary. If you want to celebrate MTV’s 30^th, you’ll have to tune into XM Radio’s “80’s on 8”, which has all of the original MTV VJs (less the late great J.J. Jackson, of course) playing the original songs – in order - from MTV’s first day on the air.

Imagine that: thirty years later and XM Radio is killing the video star.

Of Cribs and Men

I took down the babies’ cribs last night… a sullen reminder that, in fact, they’re not babies anymore.

My son pretended to kiss his crib goodbye, while his twin sister nearly broke her foot on the scattered remains. The three older kids – all past inhabitants of said cribs themselves – were completely oblivious; and my dear wife, of course, tried her best to fight back tears.

As for me (i.e. the guy actually doing all the work), I just kept rolling the same thing over and over and over again in my mind: Damn - these things are a helluva lot easier to take down than put up!

May 2003 - I was in our old house sitting on the floor of what soon would be the babies’ room, surrounded by countless rails, spokes, screws, safety latches, bolts, Allen wrenches, et cetera. The room was a mess. I was a mess. A 25-year-old guy who had never even held a baby, and there I was building not one but TWO cribs for our forthcoming twins.

I don’t remember every exact detail of that particular day; but knowing me, I’m sure I whined to my wife about how hard I worked putting the cribs together… and then I’m sure she suggested we go out to dinner… and I’m sure once we were out we decided to go catch a movie… and once the movie was over we probably scooted over to Barnes & Noble to browse through the zillions of “how to be a parent” books that we most likely didn’t even buy… and then we probably headed home and actually watched SNL live so as to conserve future recording space on our standard VHS cassette.

Boy, have things changed.

In the eight years since I first built the cribs, we’ve moved, I’ve changed jobs and we’ve welcomed a grand total of five wonderful children into our lives. We can’t go to the movies or out to dinner on the spur of the moment anymore – hell, we technically can’t even put our children in a confined space to sleep anymore – but that’s just as much a part of parenthood as lying on the floor covered with seemingly endless pages of incomprehensible “EZ-build” assembly instructions.

According to my math, I have assembled, adjusted and disassembled the cribs eighteen different times – and that’s it. The crib phase is officially over; the bunk-bed phase has begun… and I only hope I can enjoy those last few remnants of innocence before that evil leap to puberty swoops in and changes everything.

Life's (NOT) a Beach

I hate the beach.

There – I said it. No more side-stepping the question or hiding from the truth. I’m putting it out there for everyone to see, hear, feel and know: I unequivocally despise the beach.

Of course this isn’t the easiest thing in the world to admit. After all, my wife loves the beach, as do at least four of my kids (I’m pretty certain that my son Kevin takes after me). Plus, it’s “the beach” – the one place universally associated with summer and fun and relaxation and all that other good stuff that everyone everywhere around the world enjoys. So to say that I hate it is not an easy thing… but it is the truth.

I don’t know when it all started, really, because as a kid we always spent time down in either Old Saybrook or Misquamicut. My brother and I would play in the water and catch crabs in the jetties, while my mother sat in her chair and read her books for hours… upon hours… upon hours. I liked it when the Italian ice truck showed-up, and I’d sometimes even grab a milkshake or some clam fritters at the snack shop; but by and large, it was all kind of monotonous. Some people can just lay there on the beach all day and relax – but even as a kid, I couldn’t.

As I grew older and even more idiosyncratic, the reasons for my aversion became all the more obvious:

·         The Sun. Yes – I know it’s essential to sustaining all forms of life (human and otherwise), but really: does it have to be so bright? And blinding? And hot? Which brings me to another point…

·         The Heat. You know what’s better than being outside in the heat? Not being outside in the heat. Sure, summer is supposed to be hotter than winter. We’re closer to the Equator or the sun or something like that having to do with the earth’s axis – but is it really that much fun to sit outside and boil when there’s a perfectly acceptable alternative (i.e. staying inside and not boiling)?

·         The Sand. It’s impossible to walk on, it coats the inside of my car, and three weeks later I’m still finding it in bodily crevices I never even knew I had.

·         Sand Flies. Because sand isn’t bad enough on its own, it has to have little gnatty pests flying around inside of it.

·         The Water. People piss in the ocean. Hell, even I’ve pissed in the ocean. Am I really supposed to swim in that?

·         Suntan Lotion. Messy, gooey and completely unnatural.

·         Sunburn. First it burns, then it itches… then you start to peel your skin off like an f’n rattlesnake. And as if all of that’s not bad enough, you’ve also increased your risk of cancer.

·         Finally, there are the Seagulls. I’m afraid of birds. All birds. Even little birds – like those teeny, tiny ones that fly away the minute you take a step toward them. And if I’m afraid of a teeny, tiny bird that flies away the minute you take a step towards it, I’m more or less petrified of those ginormous seagulls that fly right up to you and grab the food right out of your hand.

So yes – I hate the beach. But make no bones about it: when my wife and kids want to go, I’ll still go - stumbling across the sand in my Nike’s, sitting upright in my chair under two umbrellas, leaping to my feet every time the mere shadow of a seagull enters my airspace – because that’s what you do for the people you love*.

*An adage I hope my wife remembers next time there’s a new Jason Voorhees/Michael Myers slasher-flick out in the theaters.

Vacation: All I Ever Wanted

Merriam-Webster defines the word vacation as “a scheduled period during which activity is suspended”… which leads me to believe that neither Merriam nor Webster ever had small children.

We just got back from a sojourn to Martha’s Vineyard with our five kids, and both my wife and I are totally spent.

First there’s the prep work… then the packing… then the driving… then the unpacking… and then the whining, tattling, complaining, hitting, shoving, pulling hair, forgetting to go potty, refusing to sleep in a strange place, and general chaotic delirium that naturally develops among even the smallest assemblies of toddlers when they’re over-excited/over-tired and out of the normal throes of life.

Trust me: it’s rough.

Not that I’m anti-vacation. Quite the contrary, in fact. If anything, I’m the one who pushes the annual family vacation – insisting they’re essential to building great childhood memories. When my brother and I were kids, our parents took us on vacation every year; usually for a week, sometimes even two. In the early years we went camping at some Yogi Bear-themes campground in Massachusetts. Then when we got older we did the whole rent-a-cottage-by-the-beach thing in Rhode Island. And those last few years, before I went off to college, we took even longer trips to places like Provincetown, Virginia Beach and Ocean City.

All of our vacations are cataloged somewhere in my father’s meticulous array of photo albums, and just about every picture carries with it some innocent memory of the four of us: my parents, my brother and I. Every now and then I’ll look back on those photos and remember just how fun and adventurous, how carefree and relaxing those vacations were… and I’ll think to myself: what the hell happened? When did these vacation things turn into such a giant ball of stress?

My parents laugh whenever I share these laments with them, usually accusing me of having a selective memory.  Apparently my father nearly had a panic attack every year trying to put the goddamn tent together; and when it would rain (as it inevitably did every time we’d go camping), the tent would leak, thus forcing us into a nearby motel. Then there was the year the muffler on our station wagon fell off and we drove home going 20 miles-per-hour… and the year I spiked a fever and never left the hotel… and the year my brother and I cried on the ground, making a public spectacle out of a blown call in a wiffle ball game… and the year my brother poured orange soda into his ear… and the year I hurled sand at some lady sitting on the beach… and, of course, nothing could top the year my parents’ lounge chairs flew right off the top of the car smack-dab in the middle of I-84.

So while our family vacations may have been fun/adventurous/care-free/etc. for us when we were kids, they clearly weren’t a picnic for my parents. Yet thankfully, year after year, they managed to toil through - leaving my brother and I with a treasure-trove of lifelong memories.

Yes - my kids were a little crazy, and yes - my wife and I were a tad frazzled, and yes – we vowed several times to never ever ever go on vacation again; but then our daughter popped her little head up from behind her brother’s car-seat and declared: “Mommy, I have fun in Marfa’s Vinnerd”…

And in that instant, it was all worth it.

Struggling With The "Why"

My wife went to a wake for a 10-year-old boy last night; and though it wasn’t as bad as she expected, it was still the single worst experience of her life.

I am ashamed to admit (yet I admit nonetheless) that I was somewhat relieved I didn’t attend due to a confluence of a) not really knowing the family and b) not really having anyone else available to watch our kids. Death, in and of itself, has never really been an easy thing for me to grasp… but the sudden, accidental death of a 10-year-old boy is utterly inexplicable.

Maybe it’s because I’m a father.

Maybe it’s because I used to be a 10-year-old boy.

Or maybe it’s just because I’m human.

(insert depressingly audible SIGH here)

At any rate, the one thing that popped into my head every time I thought about this horrific tragedy was a paragraph from Stephen King’s “The Body” - a novella far better known by its theatrical moniker: Stand By Me.

There is a scene at the end of the movie when the four friends finally discover the body of Ray Brower, a boy about their age. The image on the screen shows the boy’s sneakers dangling in a bush while The Narrator explains: “The train had knocked him out of his Keds just as it had knocked the life out of his body.” But then they move on, depriving the audience (as movies-based-on-books so often do) of the seminal passage in the entire book:

That finally rammed it all the way home for me. The kid was dead. The kid wasn’t sick, the kid wasn’t sleeping. The kid wasn’t going to get up in the morning anymore or get the runs from eating too many apples or catch poison ivy or wear out the eraser on the end of his Ticonderoga No. 2 during a hard math test. The kid was dead; stone dead. The kid was never going to go out bottling with his friend sin the spring, gunnysack over his shoulder to pick up the returnables the retreating snow uncovered. The kid wasn’t going to wake up at two o’clock a.m. on the morning of November 1^st this year, run to the bathroom, and vomit up a big glurt of cheap Halloween candy. The kid wasn’t going to pull a single girl’s braid in home room. The kid wasn’t going to give a bloody nose, or get one. The kid was can’t, don’t, won’t, never, shouldn’t, wouldn’t, couldn’t. He was the side of the battery where the terminal says NEG. The fuse you have to put a penny in. The wastebasket by the teacher’s desk, which always smells of wood-shavings from the sharpener and dead orange peels from lunch. The haunted house outside town where the windows are crashed out, the NO TRESPASSING signs whipped away across the fields, the attic full of bats, the cellar full of rats. The kid was dead, mister, ma’am, young sir, little miss. I could go on all day and never get it right about the distance between his bare feet on the ground and his dirty Keds hanging in the bushes. It was thirty-plus inches, it was a googol of light-years. The kid was disconnected from his Keds beyond all hope of reconciliation. He was dead.

In a single paragraph, King impeccably captures the fundamental reality of an untimely death; but more impressively, he does so through the innocent thoughts of a 12-year-old boy who - as if by magic - suddenly understands what death actually is.

Of course understanding the "what" has always been the easy part... its the "why" that I still don't get.

"When In The Course Of Human Events..."

I teach an American Government course at a local university, and this past semester I was forced to endure the following class discussion:

ME: So July 4, 1776… what happened?
GIRL IN FRONT ROW: The Emancipation Proclamation?
ME: No.
STUDENTS: (crickets chirping)
ME: C’mon…anybody?
STUDENTS: (more crickets)
ME: What do you all do on July 4th?
GUY IN BACK ROW: Drink.
STUDENTS: (laugh)
ME: But what do you celebrate?
GIRL IN SECOND ROW: Summer!

With my blood about to boil, I decided I’d express my anger in the form of a pop quiz, which I ever so aptly titled: “Questions My 6-Year Old Nephew Can Answer”. There were three simple questions:

• How many states are in the United States?
• Who was the first President of the United States?
• Who is the current Vice President of the United States?

There were 30 students in the class – and to their credit (or to the credit of their 4th grade Social Studies teachers) 26 of them answered all three questions correctly. But of course my attention was drawn to the two students who thought there were 52 states, the four who thought Abraham Lincoln was the first President, and the two – TWO – who couldn’t name the sitting Vice President (they both answered Hillary Clinton).

To me, it was worse than those “Jay Walking” segments on Leno - because they weren’t random people on the street, they were actual COLLEGE students enrolled in an AMERICAN GOVERNMENT course.

I thought it completely and utterly pathetic… yet sadly, quite American. (Although I shouldn’t have been surprised. A survey was conducted back in 2006 that showed more Americans could name the five members of the fictional Simpsons family than could name the five freedoms contained in the First Amendment.)

Yes – July 4th is about spending time with family and watching fireworks and enjoying the start of summer. But let’s not forget that above all else, it’s Independence Day - the day when a group of brave men affixed their names to a document that told the single most powerful country in the world to shove it.

That bravery – and the 235 successive years of freedom that followed – is the true reason to celebrate.

A Naming Dilemma: What Do You Call Your Former Teacher?

I was at a work function a few nights ago when I ran into (of all people) my 11^th Grade history teacher. Miss McCarthy retired the same year I graduated from high school, and until Wednesday night I hadn’t seen her in almost a dozen years… yet there she was making her rounds at the cocktail party, donning a “Hi My Name Is” lapel sticker that said in handwritten letters: “Elisa”.

Situations like those always cause me to wonder: at what point, exactly, can and/or should you call your former teachers or professors by their first names?

Part of the answer lies with age.  A 17-year-old high school senior can most certainly have a 23-year-old coach or teacher; and the paltry 6-year age differential likely wouldn’t cause any awkwardness in addressing said coach/teacher by first name. But for obvious reasons, the older, more distinguished figures are unquestionably more susceptible to titles.

Demeanor has a lot to do with it too. The laid-back journalism professor or the happenin-ly hip baseball coach usually insist that you call them by their first names while you’re their students, let alone after. But the more staid, traditional authority figures tend to (consciously or not) send out a vibe that just screams: “that’s MR. Jenkins to you, kind sir.”

For me, though, the biggest factor always tends to be the extent to which I liked and respected the person. Like all professions, there are some teachers who have had such an influence on your life that you often think of them even in adulthood… and then there are those who weren’t worth a warm bucket of spit. The ones who impacted your life for the better deserve to keep their title – a sign of respect, an acknowledgment of a master-apprentice relationship. And the ones who didn’t? Eh – they probably don’t remember any of their students anyway.

So for every Barbara (9^th grade geometry), John (11^th grade Spanish) and Ray (undergraduate Shakespeare) in the world, there are plenty of people like Mrs. Sahadi (12^th grade history), Dr. Reiter (undergrad poly sci) and Professor Gilmour (grad school)…

And Miss McCarthy will always be Miss McCarthy.

OMG! JFK RIP in DAL-TX!

The other night, while flipping through the tv, I got sucked into watching a movie I hadn’t seen in ages: Oliver Stone’s JFK. I remember seeing the film in the theater with my dad when it first came out; and then, like any other obsessive-compulsive history buff, I had watched it a few times here or there over the years. Until the other night, though, I hadn’t seen it in possibly more than ten years… which got me thinking: could it happen today?

Could the assassination of a U.S. President possibly go unsolved in the year 2011?*

So I started visualizing the Kennedy assassination as if it occurred today – with hundreds of iPhone videos and thousands of digital photos. Had somebody seen something in the grassy knoll, they would have tweeted about it or texted a friend. Had people really seen a guy in the 6^th floor of the Texas Schoolbook Depository, it almost certainly would have landed on Facebook. And if it was, in fact, a conspiracy – if multiple groups of people really did plot to kill the President – the cover-up would have been impossible… information moves just too damn fast.

Almost everyone nowadays is a conduit of information; almost everyone acts like an amateur journalist. In the last year alone, not one but two – TWO – U.S. Congressmen resigned over digital photos leaked to the media… so I find it very had to believe that even the most sophisticated of villains could murder a chief executive (in broad daylight, no less) and manage to get away with it.

Every President is most certainly mortal, and as Michael Corleone so eloquently reminds us: “If history has taught us anything, it’s that you can kill anybody.” But thanks to modern technology and the vigilance of its users, even in our darkest of hours we should never again have to endure such a decades-long mystery as the one that still surrounds the death of President Kennedy.

*Yes, I know: according to Trivial Pursuit, Jeopardy and just about every American History textbook in the world, Lee Harvey Oswald killed John F. Kennedy… but I’ve never believed it was that simple. Oswald almost certainly was involved at some level; and though I do think Oliver Stone’s mass-conspiracy theories went a little too far, I’m 100% with him on the suggestion that there were in fact multiple shooters.)

10 Movies I Can't Believe I Paid Money To See In The Theater

10. Striptease (1996) – Even 90-minutes of watching Demi Moore’s boobs flop around didn’t save it.  

9. Dangerous Minds (1995) – I was more ghetto than the kids in that movie.

8. Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde (2003) – Not my fault… my wife was 38-weeks pregnant with twins, it was 150-degrees outside and we didn’t have central air.

7. Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle (2003) – See #8 above

6. Hulk (2003) – See #s 7 & 8 above

5. The Crow (1994) – If you offered $1 Million, I couldn’t tell you what it’s about. All I remember is the girl I was there with jostling me awake at the end.

4. The Object of My Affection (1998) – The female lead was played by Jennifer Aniston… ‘nuff said.

3. Bride of Chucky (1998) – My wife and I had been dating for about a year when I chose this debacle. It was the only time I ever thought we’d break-up.

2. Take Me Home Tonight (2011) – She wanted to see The King’s Speech; I wanted to see the movie with the Eddie Money song in the title. Unfortunately, I won.

1. The Real Cancun (2003) – I can’t bear to explain it… you’ll have to look it up yourself: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0360916/

Reviewing this list, I would be remiss to omit the fact that my amazing wife was present for seven – yes, seven – of these indisputable clunkers; and although I hold no doubt she will use this list as evidence of my less than stellar taste in movies, I need only remind her of one simple yet poignant fact:

SHE was the one who saw From Justin to Kelly… not me.

I'm Not Superman?

There comes a time in every boy’s life when he discovers that his beloved father is, in fact, NOT the flawlessly omnipotent end-all-be-all of creation. Unfortunately, there also comes a time at which every father realizes that his beloved son has made such a discovery… and man, oh man, does it hurt.

For the past twelve years (pre-marriage, pre-kids), I’ve been playing Fantasy Baseball with my college buddies; and during those twelve years, I have made the playoffs an astonishing nine times!

NINE!

None of my friends have even come close to that number (a fact I remind them of often). Yet in spite of those nine chances, I have never once managed to actually win the league championship (a fact they remind me of even more often).

Enter Alex: my 7-almost-8-year-old son who already knows enough about baseball to win any handful of sports bar trivia contests. These past two years he’s helped me manage my Fantasy team. He drafts players, makes roster moves and gives me a daily update as to how we’re doing. (We’re currently in 10^th Place out of 16 teams… an off year, to say the least.)

A few weeks ago I noticed that little Alex had proposed trading away Albert Pujols (i.e. the best consensus player in baseball) in exchange for Mark Texeira. I immediately canceled the trade and taught Alex an important life lesson: patience. “Pujols is off to a slow start,” I said. “But baseball is a lonnnng season.” So he shot me that “Father Knows Best” look I oh-so-treasure, and he went on his way.

Sunday morning – Father’s Day, no less - Alex brought me the sports page of our local paper and said: “Dad, we have a problem.” I went on to read how a ball nailed Albert Pujols on the wrist, causing damage severe enough to knock him out of commission for at least eight weeks - maybe more.

My heart sank.

“Maybe we should have traded him,” I mumbled half to myself, half to Alex… and that’s when he said it:

“Geez Dad - now I know why you’ve never won a championship.”

My wife laughed. So did Alex. And so did I… because, after all, it was funny. Not mean, not insulting – but funny. So much so that I even shared it with my Fantasy Baseball guys, who will assuredly relish in using my own son’s words against me for years to come.

Now I wholly admit that in the great scheme of life, these silly little fantasy sports games are not that big of a deal (as evidenced by my ability to still walk, talk and breathe despite my zero championships). But my take-away from this particular exchange managed to run quite deep. It was the first of many many many occasions my son will see me as imperfectly mortal; a truth that I know from my own experience as a son, will only get tougher and tougher to face as time goes on.

In the meantime, though, I still have four other kids who totally think I’m from Krypton… 

Beginnings

About ten years ago, before I had any children, I developed what could only be described as a most unusual obsession: locating, obtaining and - ultimately - watching the first-ever episode of Sesame Street.

Of course it goes without saying that like every other American born in the 1970’s, I loved Sesame Street. Bert and Ernie, Kermit the Frog, that mean bastard Oscar… they were all just as much a part of my family as my parents, my brother and my fish (named Sugar, who suffered quite the untimely demise at the hands of my brother’s Fisher Price baby vacuum cleaner - but that’s a story for another time). Yet in all my years and through all the hours of quality Sesame time I had amassed, I had never once seen how it all began.

Maybe Big Bird hatched from an egg or Super Grover used his magic powers to make the street appear; or maybe even Mr. Hooper fell asleep next to Suzanne Pleshette and dreamt the whole thing up. Either way, I wanted to see it - I had to know; so I scoured the Internet, looking for clues until finally I found someone on eBay selling a VHS cassette version of exactly what I was looking for.

The tape cost about $60, and when it finally arrived in the mail, I was like a kid on Christmas - tearing open the package, rushing into the living room, impatiently waiting for the cassette to play. And when it finally did I was crushed.

No bird’s egg.

No Super Grover.

No Suzanne Pleshette.

Oscar was orange and Big Bird was sort of goofy looking; but otherwise, the on-screen commencement of the single most identifiable children’s show on the planet was nothing special. I stopped the tape about five minutes in and realized: I wasn’t obsessed with Sesame Street… I was obsessed with beginnings.

Nice beginnings.

Clean beginnings.

Affixed, finite, “yes – this is where we’re starting from” beginnings - like Peter Parker getting bit by a radioactive spider, or Diane Chambers wandering into Cheers, or God creating the Heaven and Earth… or the unambiguous, unwavering declaration that Marley is, in fact, dead to begin with.

Which brings us to the present… in which I’ve begun writing a blog and you’ve (presumably) begun reading it; and to the extent that I will continue to write (which I will) and that you will continue to read (which I hope you will), I’d like to begin appropriately, with a clean beginning:

• I’m 33-years-old.
• I’m married (sorry ladies).
• My wife and I have five young children.
• We live in suburban Connecticut.
• I’m a writer.

And above all else: I’m a dork… because if searching for an obscure episode of a PBS children’s show doesn’t define dork-dom, writing a blog most certainly does.

Happy Beginning!