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.