Neal's Tales

Dancers of Paris

2009-10-13T12:10:00.000-07:00

Christmas Eve

2009-10-13T09:43:00.000-07:00

Idlewild—such a mysterious and enchanting name, one that invokes a place where enormous birds touch down to land. Idlewild Airport had its grand opening when I was only 108 days old. Fifteen years and one assassinated president later it was renamed John F. Kennedy Airport. However, for me it will always be Idlewild, the place where great steel birds glide in, stay a little while, and then glide out once again.

However, on this evening, Christmas Eve at 10:00, there were no birds landing and there was a wind chill factor of minus twenty. I sat alone in my cab hoping to escape from JFK with a living, breathing passenger and avoid a boring and unprofitable forty-minute “dead head” trip back to the city.

I always drove a cab on holidays. Business was great, tips were generous, and folks were really happy to see me. People said things like, “Gosh, you could be home with your family, but here you are rolling around the streets of New York helping others connect with loved ones to share their holiday cheer.” Or my favorite, which was usually said in a voice a little above a whisper by older women who lived on the Upper East Side, “You and Santa working together on Christmas Eve—you’re a great pair.”

Yes, that was me, motoring around a place the Dutch called New Amsterdam in a checkered yellow vehicle, escorting various citizens of the Big Apple to their desired holiday locations. The mother on her way to see her new grandson, the lover on his way to meet his sweetheart, the poor fool who had to work the night shift, the two gay lovers necking in the back seat, and the actress on her way to the theater would all enter and depart my vehicle during this festive night.

On holidays it was always best to work Midtown and stay away from the airports. In Manhattan on Christmas Eve people fought over you. Folks would see you pulling over to let someone out, and the race would be on. I was a rolling people magnet, and one that could possibly return home to Brooklyn with $250 cash in his pocket—a tidy sum for 1975.

The day had started off promising. As I was departing the company garage on Nostrand and Flatbush Avenues, I immediately picked up a fare going out to JFK. That I could get from Flatbush Avenue to the airport in less than twenty-five minutes always amazed my customers. To them I was like a great Sherpa in Tibet who guided travelers through the Himalayas. Instead of snow-capped mountains pointing their peaks toward the heavens there was Linden Boulevard, Bushwick Avenue, and my knowledge of a back entrance to JFK that only a few of the cabbie illuminati were aware of.

Best of all, at this south entrance there was a granite marker with the fading but still visible words “Welcome to Idlewild Airport” written upon it. I dropped my fare off at United at 3:15 and then zipped over to American to catch the 3:20 coming in from Houston. I had a little book of my favorite arrivals that I always kept on the front seat. The key to success at the airport was being aware of both where the plane arrived from and at what time of day. For instance, the 3:20 arriving from Houston on a Wednesday afternoon would have some young executives going into Midtown Manhattan, probably to the Hyatt or the Sheraton on 57th Street. On a later flight I might pick up someone in management going to one of the more upscale hotels such as the Pierre or the Royalton.

By 3:20 it was already down to ten degrees, and the wind was whipping. It was hold-on-to-your-hat time out at JFK. Fortunately for me, the airport was “stripped and working,” meaning very few cabs and a great number of frozen life forms all desiring a warm ride into the city as soon as possible.

There were hoards of them all shivering in front of the arrival terminal, like lost children begging to be taken home. When I saw a line of folks and no cabs, I pulled up, and before anyone could get in my cab, I yelled out, “I can take a few parties to Midtown.” Three folks who had never met before got in my cab. At that time it was a $15 to $17 tab into the city.

After they settled in and felt how nice and warm it was inside, I said, “Welcome, pilgrims, it’s $20 each, tip included, to get you into Manhattan today.” This statement was met with some resistance at first.

“Oh no,” one of them said, “can’t we just split the clock and give you a bigger tip?”

“Not on the day of Christmas Eve,” I replied. “It’s ten degrees and getting colder, so if you’d like to wait for another cab, be my guest.” I started to open my door to let them out.

One of them said, with a bit of an edge in his voice, “OK, fine, just get us into the city.” I then turned around and collected my twenties before engaging the gas pedal.

They also noticed that I didn’t throw the flag down, and the meter showed all zeros. When they were so bold as to ask why, I simply said that I was putting all the money in my pocket and that was that. Just to make sure the deal was closed I turned around and lifted my hands, palms up. “Is there a problem?” I asked. They then bowed their heads and grimaced as if I were the devil himself.

I attempted to crack a few jokes, but my passengers seemed content to stay in a somewhat subdued state. It was a quiet ride into the city. I dropped them all off by 4:10 and then I continued to roll. From the Sheraton to the Village, and then up to 86th Street and through the park to the West Side, I was magic. It was one in, one out, and everyone wanted to ride with me.

I was sailing, and by 7:30 I had over $120 on the clock and $70 in my pocket. The cabbies and the company split the clock fifty-fifty, so I was on my way to at least a $250 night.

I was staying away from the hotels, as a trip to the airport now would not be in my best interest. There was an ice situation happening, flights were being canceled, JFK would be a tomb, and dead heading back when the city was working would not be the right choice. I also knew that during an ice storm some of the roads around JKF became impossible, and slipping around the wilds of Queens was simply not on my dance card.

Traveling north on Park Avenue I was hailed by a doorman. It was 7:30. Probably some well-to-dos out for a night at the theater, rushing to make an 8:00 curtain. “Open the trunk, please.” Words of doom, I could feel it. Oh God, a late night airport call. Before I could make an excuse, two elderly women slid into the back seat. As they did the one with the large hat said, “We need to make a 9:00 at Air France, we’re taking the red eye to Paris. Get us there in time, and we’ll give you a $10 tip.” I thought of just refusing, but I could tell they were seasoned New Yorkers, and they could probably talk a leopard out of its spots, so I opened the trunk, put the baggage in, and headed out.

I then began to ponder my current situation. I could get them to JFK by 8:20 and grab the 9:00 United flight coming in from Miami. That would ensure me of taking a nice little Jewish man with a great tan to an apartment in Brooklyn. That was acceptable; as the ride would roll me out of the airport, and I could then work the discos in Bay Ridge, pocket some more dough and, I hoped, catch a fare back into Midtown.

I delivered my Park Avenue fare to Air France in plenty of time, and as promised they happily handed me a ten for the tip. The wind was really picking up, and it was starting to hail. The 9:00 from Miami couldn’t land, and many planes were now being diverted up to Connecticut. It was either dead head it back to the city or take my chances at another terminal. There were cabs everywhere, all the lines were sucked up, little yellow vehicles as far as my eyes could see.

It was time to cut my losses. I’d work the shorty line, where I’d humbly take a local call, usually $6 to $8 to Forest Hills or Brooklyn. I’d been fortunate all night—why should it stop now? My little radio told me that many streets in Queens were becoming caked with ice, so I’d take that short fare out of the airport, stay on the main boulevards, and make my way back into the city.

I noticed there were at least seven cabs on this line. When there was a fare going only a small distance, the dispatcher came out, blew a whistle, and extended his arms over his head about a foot apart, thus denoting a local or a short call. However, on this night he kept blowing his whistle. No one seemed to want the fare, and as each cab pulled up, the driver took one long look, shook his head, and took off.

How bad could it be? As I desperately needed to move out of this frozen tundra, I made the move and rolled up to the dispatcher.

I pulled my sock hat down over my ears, threw on my gloves, and placed myself in front of the man with the whistle. “They’re going to Inwood, Long Island,” he said. “You got to help these people out, they’re about to freeze to death.” Inwood, Long Island, the worse possible address from the airport. Inwood was east of JFK, in other words away from the city. To make it worse, it was not an O.T. An O.T. means out of town, and you could double the clock, but Inwood was the last town within the city limits, an $8 fare at best, and you had a fifty-five-minute drive back to the city with no chance of picking up a passenger. I knew the area—the streets would be frozen solid. He noticed my hesitation, and then gazed at me with a death stare and yelled, “For God’s sake, it’s Christmas Eve, they’re both crippled, and they’ve been sitting out in front of the terminal for half an hour shivering in their wheelchairs. The terminal is going to shut down in ten minutes—you have a heart beating in there, pal?” He poked his frozen finger into my wet and icy pea coat. Sure, I thought, I have heart, but on nights like this I just like to give it a little time off. The dispatcher looked dragon like with all the foggy breath coming out of his mouth as he repeated, “You want these poor cripples to sit here all night and freeze to death?”

I looked at the couple; and their helpless faces looked back at me. Two forlorn and frigid bodies staring intently at the same individual who recently hustled three businessmen from Houston, Texas. However, they didn’t see that part of me; they saw deliverance, they saw warmth, they saw home.

“OK, fine, I’ll do it. Can you help with the wheelchairs?” I asked.

“Sorry, pal, I got a job to do here, it’s your gig now,” and he walked away into the frigid night. I wheeled the woman to the cab. I helped her up and into the back seat. The man was really large, maybe three hundred pounds and approaching fifty or so years old. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and literally dumped him beside his wife who was somewhat younger and at least one hundred pounds lighter. I opened the trunk and just managed to stuff the two wheelchairs in. I had to remove my gloves to work the catch, and as I did I could feel my flesh start to stick to the metal. The night was now turning extremely cold and very unprofitable.

Seven dollars and fifty cents later I pulled up in front of Dave and Blanche’s house. The roads were slippery, the street was dark, but with a little luck I could help these folks into their home, jump back in the cab, hop onto the Long Island Expressway, and be back in action.

As I shut the clock off, Dave handed me the keys and asked if I could unlock the door first to minimize the time they spent in minus-twenty-degree weather. His request sounded reasonable; however, as I approached their gate, I realized that my sojourn in Inwood, Long Island, was just beginning. The walk to their door was a good fifty feet, and it was covered in at least two feet of snow with six inches of frozen sleet on top.

I jumped back in the cab. “How long have you been away?” My blue lips quivered.

“Oh, two weeks. We were down in the Virgin Islands, we had a great time.”

And as Blanche was about to give me a description of her tropical vacation, I held up my hands and said, “Why didn’t you hire a neighborhood kid to shovel your walk when you were away?”

“Well, it wasn’t snowing when we left,” Dave replied, with a late-night, post-vacation, jet-lagged grin.

“Is there a shovel around?” I asked.

“Yes, there’s one in the house,” Dave said.

I had already shut the clock off; this was now my time we were working on. I could have been in the city raking in the cash, and instead I was stuck in Inwood, Long Island, in a cab with two people and two wheelchairs and a dead-end street with one flickering street light.

I closed my eyes and tried to conjure all the available intelligence that I could muster on a snowbound Christmas Eve in the middle of nowhere. I then asked Dave, “How well do you know your neighbors? Perhaps one of them might have a shovel and help us out.”

“Folks on this block are really not too friendly,” Dave replied. I looked at Dave’s and Blanche’s anxious faces, and I realized that no matter what happened I had to get these people back into their home. It was now pushing 10:30, and I suddenly felt a surge of confidence. I was just one friendly neighbor with an available shovel away from rescuing Blanche and Dave. I left the cab running with the heat on, and started on my journey down Christina Street with a frozen nose and a hopeful heart.

Halfway down the block I saw lights on and a Christmas tree flickering. As there was no bell I knocked, and a suspicious face soon peered through a glass window. I smiled and said, “Look, I’ve got two folks in my cab and they’re in wheelchairs, they’re crippled, you know, and I need to borrow a shovel so I can get them inside. Can you help us out?”

He shook his head and said, “I don’t know you or those people, go away or I’ll call the police.”

Hmm, that was not the response I was seeking. I tried another house. “Please, I’m in a desperate situation here. I’ve got to help Dave and Blanche get into their home,” I said with the most humble expression I could muster.

He looked me over and replied, “OK, I’ve got a shovel, but I want a $20 deposit.”

“OK, fine.” I pulled off my gloves with my teeth and removed a cold and crisp twenty from my wallet and put it in his hand. Without making any eye contact at all he folded the bill in two, slipped it in his pocket and quickly shut the door. As I walked back down the street I comforted myself with the thought that my mission had taken a positive turn.

I stood in front of the cab and held the shovel up, and Dave and Blanche applauded and gave me the thumbs up sign. I headed toward the walk. Dave rolled down his window and asked if I could jump back into the cab and find something pleasant for them to listen to on the radio. I agreed and twisted the dial until we found a lovely version of the “Hallelujah Chorus.” I turned around and asked if the music of Handel was to their liking, and Blanche said, “You are just the nicest cabbie we have ever had. Both Dave and I think you should get some kind of recognition for how much you’re helping us and on Christmas Eve as well. And if you don’t mind me saying this, you know you do look a bit like Jesus with your long hair and beard and all. I hope you don’t mind but, you know, you really do.”

They both laughed as I exited the cab with shovel in hand and commenced to dig. After twenty minutes or so there was frost inside my nose, and my fingertips and earlobes were numb. I thought that as far as mitzvahs go, this was a big one, a really big one. I did wonder if seeking a reward from the almighty for my good deed was really in the spirit of a mitzvah, but at that time my brain started to freeze, and thus my internal spiritual discourse was suspended. I shoveled the snow off the three steps and made it to the door. However, as I was taking their keys out of my pocket, I noticed that there was a three-inch sheet of ice on the landing in front of the door and it was rock hard. It was now 11:30. Where would I ever find an ice pick?

As I walked back to the cab I could barely feel my feet. High-top Converse sneakers and three feet of snow are not symbiotic. Dave and Blanche were looking through the frosty windows with hope. They smiled at me and I smiled back at them and held up one finger so they would know it was almost done.

I stood in back of the cab hoping for either an inspiration or better yet a divine intervention. I looked to the sky and the sky just looked back. I lowered my head and almost started to pray when I realized the answer was right in front of me. Yes, the lug wrench from the car jack. With a new burst of enthusiasm I quickly open the trunk. As I removed the wheelchairs, the metal was so cold it sent a shiver up my arm and down through my back.

Hallelujah, I found the lug wrench, closed the trunk, and started walking toward the house. As I was passing the cab in a hunched-over, frozen stagger, I must have looked like an enchanted fairy as my beard, hair, and eyebrows were all glistening with ice. I proceeded to repeatedly bang the sharp part of my lug wrench on the doorstep.

After a few minutes of chopping I stopped to rest, and as I did I glanced back at the cab. Dave and Blanch were kissing, and their hands were touching each other’s cheeks. They had large heads, which bobbed up and down in a little dance as they embraced. A smile spread across my face, and I made a small but humble bow in the direction of the lovers canoodling in the rear seat of my cab.

My restored faith coupled with a new sense of purpose enabled me to crack through the remaining ice and open the door. I held the lug wrench up to the sky and cried out, “Home, sweet home!” I returned to the cab and shut off the engine. I lifted Blanche into her chair; I wheeled her up three steps and into the living room. I returned to the cab; I lifted Dave up and wheeled him into the house as well. I found the thermostat, and in a few minutes glorious heat was pouring through the home of Dave and Blanche.

Dave opened a bottle of scotch and mixed it with hot water, and we all defrosted together. I explained about the deposit on the shovel. “No problem,” Dave replied “Here’s the $20 for that. We’ll return it tomorrow. Oh, and this is for you,” he said as he handed me a fifty. The impact of the large tip and the scotch hit at the same time. Yes, I thought, I’m back on it! I looked at the clock. It was midnight. I could return to the city by 12:30, work until 2:00, and make my $250 night. I said my farewell to Dave and Blanche. “Oh please,” they said, “take a load off, and have another scotch.” I told them both that duty called and I must roll on. As Dave shook my hand he said, “Well, this is a Christmas Eve I won’t soon forget.”

To which I easily replied, with the last gulp of scotch sliding down my throat, “Neither will I.”

I stepped back out into the chill, walked down the now accessible path, hopped back into my cab, skidded down a few side streets, and then happily entered the Long Island Expressway. As New York’s illuminated skyline came into view, I turned up the radio, laid into the gas pedal, and headed into Gotham one more time.

Mezuzzah blues

2008-05-23T10:18:00.000-07:00

On the 13th of April 2008 I entered my seventh decade here on earth. To commemorate my 21,000 plus days of breathing, eating, laughing, crying, and dealing with all matters earthly, I and eighty-five friends spent the day eating, singing, and having a joyous and mirthful time.
That evening as I laid my contented head on my pillow, I noticed a small blue box with a little yellow bow sitting on my night table. During the party one of my friends went into my house and left me a gift. How kind, I thought. Though I had told everyone no presents, I did feel excited at the sight of one by my bed. I opened the box, and inside was the most lovely and ornate mezuzah I had ever seen.
An Israeli woman named Ester Shahaf created it. Ms. Shahaf fabricated the mezuzzah using a combination of silver, pewter, and Swarovski crystals, a very special type of crystal created by a Swiss engineer in the latter part of the nineteenth century. I had never owned a religious item so ornate and looked forward to mounting it upon my door. Little did I realize that this four-inch tall object of Judaica would soon lead me into a spiritual crisis.
The next morning as I read the instructions for mounting my gift, I realized how little I knew about the entire concept of a mezuzzah and thought what a lapsed Jew I have become.
Mezuzzah means “doorpost,” and, yes, while it is decorative and ornate, it’s not as important as the rolled-up parchment scroll that rests inside. The scroll contains passages from Deuteronomy 6:4–9 and 11:13–21. The scroll is to be prepared by a scribe writing in Hebrew with a special quill pen. At the end of the instructions, right after the part about inviting a rabbi to participate in the ceremony, in four-point type were the words parchment not included. On the very bottom of the instruction sheet was a web address and the scroll part number.
Being the great grandson of the famous Polish Tsitsis mogul Rabbi Joseph Kanet and the product at least 3,000 years of Judaism, I decided not to rock the spiritual boat, and I soon found myself going online to purchase part #9064 from www.jewishsource.com
I punched in the part number. I learned that for $26 plus shipping I could purchase what was described as follows:

Standard Kosher Hand-Written Mezuzzah Scroll. Executed in Jerusalem by a traditional scribe.

Will fit any mezuzzah case in our collection.

Underneath this description I read that for $9 more I could receive a mezuzzah scroll that was scanned by a computer to ensure the consumer that the scroll was error free. You would think that a talented and trained scribe writing the same verses from Deuteronomy over and over again would not need his worked checked by a computer. Though my knowledge of the old religion is fading somewhat, I can say with absolute certainty that there is no mention in the Bible of any of the great patriarchs owning a scanner.
I felt myself falling ever so quickly into a spiritual abyss. I opened my Bible (actually my neighbor’s Bible) to the passages from Deuteronomy that were to rest inside my beautiful new mezuzzah. Chapter 6 verses 4–9 were a bit stern but acceptable. They were about loving Yahweh with all your heart and then writing the words from Deuteronomy

…on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

It was chapter 6 verses 13–21 where things really got rough, especially verse 15:

For the LORD thy God is a jealous God among you lest the anger of the LORD thy God be kindled against you, and destroy you from off the face of the earth.

Was this the message I wanted to place inside my beautiful work of art handcrafted by Ester Shahaf? Why couldn’t there be a more optimistic message such as

May a song be on your lips and love in your heart

As you enter and leave my home.

Please sit a while, have a cup of tea.

It’s not easy being a Jew. Two thousand years of persecution mixed with a monotheistic sky God with insecurity issues is not by any means a recipe for inner peace.
God needs a hug, or perhaps a week at Esalen writing poetry, bathing in the tubs, and at least two massages a day.
Or better yet an evening with Pema Chödrön in a rustic eighth-century monastery situated on a high peak somewhere in Tibet where the only sounds he can hear are the wind, the chanting of the monks, and the bells of the yaks.
What if Yahweh and I could go to couples counseling to try and talk things out? I’d probably make the mistake of saying something like, “God should be a little more compassionate and forgiving.”
To which the therapist would say, “Neal, remember the ‘I’ message here. Now I want you to turn your chair toward God and use the ‘I’ message, not the finger-pointing ‘you’ message.”
I’d face my creator and say, “I am very uncomfortable with a deity who is vengeful, jealous, and destructive. Things like turning women into pillars of salt, killing the first born, and condemning poor Eve for thinking are hardly what one would call the acts of a peaceful and loving God.”
The therapist would turn toward the almighty and ask, “How do you feel about what Neal just said?”
“Well,” the Lord would reply while fondling his beard, “Neal is made in my own image, so he’s stuck with me. However, the good book has shown that I am willing to deal, to compromise—that’s what the essence of a covenant is—and I’d be ready to deal with Neal as long as he promises to keep the faith.”
It’s true, I thought, Yahweh has made deals with Abraham, Jacob, and Moses, so why not with me? He hasn’t been all bad—he gave Noah a rainbow sign and he delivered my ancestors from bondage.
There were other factors as well. If you count that squirrel I shot for no reason when I was sixteen, I am 0 for 10 on God’s commandments. I’m also getting on in age, and what if, just what if there really is this edgy, omnipotent, bearded deity calling the shots both here on earth and all over the universe?
Since I couldn’t prove he doesn’t exist, I decided to offer the creator of the universe a deal. I would put the prescribed verses from Deuteronomy in my mezuzzah, but he would look the other way while I created a bootleg scroll. Or simply put, I would keep his commandments, but I refused to pay retail for them. I raised my head and looked to the heavens for an answer. I saw two doves flying through my garden; truly this was a sign from on high that the Lord and Neal were now in business together.
With one hand one my mezuzzah and the other on my mouse, I googled the digital universe for mezuzzah scrolls. I found a nice six-by-eight-inch 72 dpi jpeg and brought it into Photoshop. Using a trick a graphic artist taught me I made it into a three-by-three-inch 300 dpi tiff, truly a miracle! I then sampled the blue of the flag of Israel and used it as a light tint backup color.
You will not find such a colorful scroll on www.jewishsource.com. This so-called “source for everything Jewish” is located in Niles, Illinois. Anyone familiar with Lenny Bruce’s theory on Judaism will know that if you live in Niles, Illinois, you’re simply not Jewish.
I printed my creation out with my HP LaserJet 2430dtn on a very biblical looking piece of parchment paper, and it was good.
I will soon mount it on my office door, where all who visit Gourd Music can enjoy the art of Ester Shahaf. And when I’m on my phone wheeling and dealing in the music business, I can look at my beautiful gift and realize that like all the great patriarchs before me, I, too, have made a covenant with the Great I Am.

Jackie Mitchell

2008-04-06T21:31:00.000-07:00

On April 2nd. 1931 a 17-year old girl took the mound for the double A professional minor league team the Chattanooga Lookouts. This was only the second time in the history of professional baseball that a woman came this close to pitching in the major leagues.
Virne Beatrice “Jackie Mitchell” was born in Memphis Tennessee sometime between the sinking of the Titanic and the outbreak of World War I. Jackie’s dad loved baseball and he had aspirations for his daughter to be the first women to make it the majors. Mr. Mitchell’s neighbor was Dazzy Vance a future hall of fame pitcher with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Dazzy taught Jackie his famous drop pitch and the art of focusing and control on the mound.
Both Dazzy and her dad constantly worked with her and by the age of seven Jackie had already mastered the drop pitch and became a childhood star in the sand lot league in and around Memphis. Jackie also excelled at basketball, tennis, running, shooting and boxing.
At sixteen she played for a professional women’s team in Chattanooga and at seventeen signed a contract with the Chattanooga Lookouts a double A affiliate of the Cincinnati Reds. Jackie had many offers from professional women’s teams but turned them down to play in the men’s league with the hope of going on to triple A and then on to “the show” as those in the minor leagues called it.
In March of that year The Chattanooga News wrote:

She uses an odd, side-armed delivery, and puts both speed and curve on the ball. Her greatest asset, however, is control. She can place the ball where she pleases, and her knack at guessing the weakness of a batter is uncanny.... She doesn't hope to enter the big show this season, but she believes that with careful training she may soon be the first woman to pitch in the big leagues.

Each year as the New York Yankees would break from spring training they would venture up to Chattanooga on their way to New York to play the lookouts in an exhibition game. The 1931 Yankees were a powerhouse club that featured Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Dixie Walker, Red Ruffing and Tony Lazzeri.
A capacity crowd of over 4000 filled Lookout Stadium to cheer on their local heroes and pray for a miracle. Seventeen-year-old Jackie Mitchell was brought in early in the game to face Babe Ruth with runners on the corners. Jackie struck out Ruth on four pitches and then struck out Lou Gehrig on three quick drop pitches.
Jackie became an overnight hero as word quickly spread around baseball that a teenage girl had struck out two of baseballs greatest icons.

This news did not please the current commissioner of baseball Kenesaw Mountain Landis. Landis was a former federal judge who ruled with absolute power and was dubbed “the baseball tyrant” by many of the sports journalists. He was the man who banned “shoeless Joe Jackson” for life following the 1919 Black Sox scandal. When Landis heard of Mitchell’s performance he cancelled Jackie’s contract on the grounds that baseball was “too strenuous for women.” He then went on to ban all women from the sport, a ban that was not lifted until 1992.
Jackie was out of a job but wanted to keep playing ball and soon hooked up with The Israelite House of David. The Israelite House of David was a religious commune that was founded by Benjamin Purnell and his wife Mary in Benton Harbor, Michigan around the year1902. It was their belief that by gathering all the twelve lost tribes of Israel together it would hasten the return of the messiah. To be a member of the commune one must refrain from sex, haircuts, shaving, and the eating of meat.
To support his spiritual undertaking Mr. Purnell operated an amusement park, a zoo, bowling alleys, sponsored a traveling jazz band and at least three baseball teams. By 1915 he had a number teams on the road barnstorming away and playing against other semi-pro teams, minor league teams and various clubs in the Negro Leagues. Legendary pitcher Satchel Paige referred to the Israelite House of David team as “the Jesus boys.” Baseball became so popular with the House of David commune that they needed to enlist players outside of their organization and in 1932 signed the lefty female phenom Jackie Mitchell.
Jackie toured with the bearded boys for five years. On September 12th. 1933 she started an exhibition game against the St. Louis Cardinals where she was the winning pitcher. The next morning a sports writer for a local St. Louis paper wrote:

Benton Harbor's nomadic House of David ball team, beards, girl pitcher and all, came, saw and conquered the Cardinals, 8 to 6, last night at Sportsman's Park.

It was while touring with The House of David that Jackie became friends with olympic champion Babe Didrikson.

Though Jackie did have her moments of glory, life on the road for a female pitcher in the mid 1930’s was no easy chore. Being a woman in baseball left her as a target for endless degrading jokes and she choose to retire in 1936 at the age of twenty-three. She returned to Chattanooga and worked for her father in the optometry business and latter married. She passed away in 1987 at the age of seventy-three.

Shortly after her death many critics dismissed the fact that she struck out Ruth and Gehrig at the age of seventeen. Some baseball aficionados claim that it was a stunt set up by Joe Engel the president and owner of the Chattanooga Lookouts. According to Jackie Mitchell’s biographer Jean L.S. Patrick there is film footage that clearly shows that both Ruth and Gehrig were fooled by her drop pitch. Also Ruth was quoted in a local paper shortly after the game as saying:

"I don't know what's going to happen if they begin to let women in baseball. Of course, they will never make good. Why? Because they are too delicate. It would kill them to play ball every day."

Baseball Hall of Fame researcher Amanda Pinney has studied the incident and has repeatedly said that the strikeouts were real. Ruth and Gehrig had every intention of hitting the ball. Tony Lazzeri the Yankee second baseman who was on deck while Gehrig went down swinging confirms Pinney’s conclusions.
The kindest notice I found in the press about Jackie was from the New York Times dated April 4th. 1931:

Cynics may contend that on the diamond as elsewhere it is place aux dames. Perhaps Miss Jackie hasn't quite enough on the ball yet to bewilder Ruth and Gehrig in a serious game. But there are no such sluggers in the Southern Association, and she may win laurels this season, which cannot be ascribed to mere gallantry. The prospect grows gloomier for misogynists.

There will always be a controversy surrounding the events of April 2nd 1931. However Virne Beatrice “Jackie Mitchell” has earned her place in the great book of baseball lore as “the girl who struck out Babe Ruth.”

Jackie Mitchell with Babe Ruthe & Lou Gehrig - Chattanooga, Tennessee April 1931.

The Ghost of Gight

2008-03-31T20:32:00.000-07:00

It’s truly an exercise in the thrift, trying to explain a song in eighty words or less as I often do when creating liner notes for recordings. For within a song there are many songs and a multitude of different stories. Say a the main focus of the piece is Highway 101 and your enjoying the ride as you speed down the road. However, if you wish there are always many side roads one can take. All of which exists in a song, especially the older ballads.

A very timely quote about songs and ballads is from folklorist Frank Harte:

All songs are living ghosts

And longing for a living voice

For example track #13 on Celtic harper Kim Robertson's recording Highland Heart which is actually about a ghost titled: The Ghosts of Gight.

Here’s the whole story in 83 words:
Gight Castle (near Fyvie above the river Ythan) was home to the Gordon’s for many hundreds of years. It was built by William Gordon around 1479 and eventually sold in 1787 to clear the gambling debts of one Mad Jack Byron whose son was the famous poet Lord Byron. The ghosts’ legend concerns a piper who was sent to investigate an underground passage and never returned. Though it is said that the sound of his pipes can still be heard at the castle.
That’s it, four hundred years of a Scottish family and their castle is now compressed into less then 90 words.

As I would hate to short change the Gordon’s and their estate here is (as that obnoxious man on the radio says) the rest of the story:

In or around 1787 Catherine Gordon (the daughter of the 12th Laird of the Gordon’s of Gight sold her families estate to pay off a gambling debt accrued by her husband “Mad Jack” Byron. “Mad Jack” was anything but a loving husband as he pilfered money from his wife so that he may run around Paris, drank, gamble and visit numerous houses of sin. He died before his son was three. Mad Jacks father “Foulweather Jack” was an officer in the royal navy with a reputation for attracting storms and his brother known as “the “Wicked Lord Byron” was a suspect for not one but two murders. As well as being members of the Gordon Clan they were also direct descendants of King Edward III of England (1312-1377).

William Gordon constructed Gight Castle around 1479 as a home for many of the Gordon clan. The castle sits along the Ythan River just east of the town of Fivie. For the two centuries that the Gordon’s owned their castle they were plagued by mysterious circumstances some of which lead to the demise of a number of the occupants of the said estate. All of the various tragedies were prophesized by one Thomas of Ercildore who lived near the Eildon Hills sometime around the 13th century. His story goes something like this:

One day a wizard named Michael Scott instructed three imps (who were known to the Scots as little mischievous devils or sprites) to split one hill into three. Out of the split hills came a Fairy Queen who abducted Thomas for seven years. There have been many verses written about this abduction, here be a few:

And see not ye that bonny road, that winds about the fernie brae?

That is the road to fair Elfland,where thou and I this night maun gae.

"But, Thomas, ye maun hold your tongue, whatever ye may hear or see,

For, if you speak word in Elflyn land, ye'll neer get back to your ain countrie.

After his seven years in fairyland Thomas returns with the gift of both poetry and prophecy. He used these gifts to his advantage as he would create poems to illustrate his predictions and soon he became known as Thomas the Rhymer. In a very real sense he was the first Scottish rapper and the only one known to have the gift of prophesy.

He is credited with predicting the death of King Alexander III in 1286, the defeat of King James IV at the Battle of Flodden in 1513 and the Union of the Crowns of Scotland and England in 1603. Thomas soon gained the reputation as sort of a Nostradamus of Scotland. He became so popular that the Jacobites consulted his predictions before their uprisings of 1715 and 1745. For the Gordon clan he wrote theses prophecies:

‘When the heron leaves the tree,

The Laird o’ Gight shall landless be.’

When the Gordon’s first owned Gight Castle there were Herons living in a large tree by the castle. Around 1735 the herons flew away and in three years the estate was sold to the Earl of Aberdeen.

His next poem for the Gordon’s:

‘‘At Gight three men by sudden death shall dee,

And after that the land shall lie in lea.’

In 1791 Lord Haddo fell from his horse on the Green of Gight. A few years latter a servant on the estate met a similar death while working on the farm. In this century a worker was crushed to death while working on a wall. The castle is now in ruins with only a small guesthouse standing on the estate and of course the ghost of a piper who disappeared while working underneath the castle.

Catherine Gordon emerged from the ruins of Gight and moved to London. Shortly after relocating, her son Lord Byron is born (1888). Byron is born with a clubfoot an issue that some say was one of the causes of his erratic and sometime violent behavior.

At the age of ten Byron inherited the titles and the estates of his great-uncle “The Wicked Lord Byron”. Byron then attends many prestigious schools (including Harrow and Trinity College) where he begins his career as a writer of prose and poetry. At the same time he is indulging himself in what some have called “an abyss of sensuality."
One of his lovers Lady Caroline Lamb described him as “mad, bad and dangerous to know."

In 1814 Byron became obsessed Anne Isabella and pursues her for a year. She is gifted in math and science Byron refers to her as the “princess of parallelograms”. In 1815 she agrees to marry him and in December of that year she gives birth to Byron’s only legitimate child a daughter whom they name Ada who would latter be credited as the first person to write a computer program.

Byron’s moods soon sink and his behavior turns violent. Fearing for her and her daughter’s safety Anne Isabella off to her parent’s estate. A year latter they were divorced and Lord Byron soon leaves the country. He then travels though central Europe with his personal physician Dr. John Plidori and in 1816 they decide to rent Villa Diadati an elaborate estate constructed on the shores of Lake Geneva Switzerland.

Meanwhile Clara Mary Jane Clairmont one of Bryon’s many lovers is relentlessly pursuing him. Claire was an aspiring writer and had an affair with Byron (as many women and men did) shortly before he left England. She constantly wrote to Byron for career advice in publishing but her desire was to always be Bryon’s lover as she had been at seventeen when they first met in London.
Clara is so obsessed with him that she persuades her eighteen-year-old half sister Mary Wollenstonecraft Goodwin and her lover, poet Percy Bliss Shelley follow him to his estate in Switzerland. Realizing that Claire is pregnant with his child Byron allows them to stay and soon forms a close friendship with Shelley and his young lover Mary. They swim in the Lake Geneva, inspire each other to write and indulge themselves with Laudanum, the additive opium beverage that became the drug of choice during the Romantic and Victorian era.

It then rains for a week straight and Bryon suggests they read a book of German ghosts stories published in Leipzig in 1811 titled “Fantasmagoriana” compiled by German author Fredrich August Schultz originally titled Gespensterbuch. After reading a number of the stories Byron then challenges his guests to create their own personal tale of horror.

Dr. Poldori based his character on Byron and called his work “Lord Ruthven” which was about an aristocratic vampire who bites into the necks of members of the establishment for sustenance. The novel is released in 1819 as “The Vampyre and for many years it is attributed to Byron. It is the first work in print to take the folklore of the vampire and place it in a contemporary setting. Shortly after being adopted for the stage in the 1820’s many authors including Poe, Dumas and Tolstoy wrote similar works, which of course culminated at the end of the century with Irish author Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

Mary Wollenstonecraft who in a year would become Mary Shelley wrote a novel about the dangers of the industrial revolution titled “The Modern Promethus” after the character in Ovid’s Metamorphoses who created a man “in godlike” image from clay. She worked on this idea for the next two years and released it under the name of Frankenstein.

The mysteries that followed the Gordon’s for two centuries, the untimely deaths, the rhyming prophet Thomas of Ercildore, and the missing piper who became the Ghost of Gight have now manifested themselves in the birth of the gothic novel.

Lord George Gordon Byron (1788-1824)

Do Nuns Have Feet?

2008-03-29T19:41:00.000-07:00

The Madonna House was a two-story red brick building that was clearly visible from my bedroom window. It had a huge curved wooden door; with a large crucifix suspended ever so stoically above. Each time the oval gothic style portal opened, nuns would appear or disappear.
I’d gaze at them through the ninth floor window of the eighteen-story apartment house known as Knickerbocker Village and watch them making their way down Market Street. When they traveled in groups they were like an apparition from the middle ages. I could clearly see them—their long black habits and veils waving together in the wind, the metal keys suspended from their belts, and the wooden crosses, which adorned all of their necks. Their habits covered every part of their bodies except the center of each nuns face. The East River was just one block away and when the wind would blow it was as if they were gliding en masse and their feet never touched the earth. I ‘d be alone each afternoon and I’d watch them sail across Cherry Street on to Market Street and then they would pass under the crucifix, through the wooden doors, and slowly disappear into the great red fortress known as The Madonna House. In my eyes they were a fleet of dark ships floating home into their mysterious and vast red brick harbor.
I was a troubled child, a troubled nine year old growing up on New York's lower east side. Besides being raised in an extremely violent neighborhood I was also disturbed by the fact that my parents were communists. The second stage of the House of Un-American Activities Committee was in full swing and my greatest fear is that the FBI would come knocking on my door and take my parents away. This was a well-founded fear as they did just that to our neighbors Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.
This was the environment I grew up in— physical threats on every corner and a precarious political agenda permeating the air in our home. I never let on to my parents that I was aware of all this political intrigue.
In 1955 instead of verbalizing fear and asking for help a nine year old starts to sleep walk, have constant nausea and become extremely anxious and begins to visibly shake from time to time.
At one point I became so frightened of the elevator that I’d always opt to climb the nine flights rather then enter it alone. My parents started to notice my restless behavior and decided that I needed a creative outlet and arranged for me to have piano lessons at The Madonna House.
I’m nine years old and I’ve never once talked to a nun and now once a week I’m fated to enter those big wooden doors and God only knows what goes on in there.
At least I knew who Jesus was. I had been told a number of times by some of my Catholic friends that my religion was personally responsible for his demise. I was extremely worried about being in contact with the nuns. Why did they have so many keys on their belts? How did they seemingly just glide down the street? Would they be angry with me because I was Jewish? I needed some help and advice and I knew it wasn’t going to come from my parents.
I did have a Catholic friend, his name was Tony d’Angelo and he lived on the sixth floor in the apartment down the street. Tony and I played baseball together, we were both Dodger fans, and we liked to hang out in the luncheonette read comics and drink cokes real fast and get a wicked sugar buzz. Tony was twelve and had 5 brothers and three sisters, it seemed like his mother was always pregnant. They also had one of those crucifixes (a real big one) mounted on the wall a few feet over their diner table. It was easily two feet high and the same length wide.
The Lords only son was featured in such great detail that one could easily see the nails plunging into his hands and feet. His head was lowered and the sculptured lines on his face revealed the intense pain he must have been experiencing. “Tony” I said pointing at the immense metal crucifix on the wall “how could you look at that guy when you eat”? “Ah it’s nothing” Tony replied “it’s been there for so long I don’t even see it any more, you get used to it. My father’s mother gave it to us, and then “boom” she drops dead the very next day. So my dad likes to keep it over the dinner table because it reminds him of his mother Teresa.”
“Well why don’t you just put a picture of your fathers mother on the wall instead” I asked? “Well” Tony replied “my mother wasn't too crazy about my dads mom but she’s very religious so this way they’re both happy, while she’s seeing Jesus my dad’s seeing his Mom.
“Funny thing” Tony continued, “every Saturday before my dad goes to the track he gets up on a chair and rubs Jesus’ head. Now check this out every Wednesday night before my mom goes to bingo she rubs his feet.” I then explained to Tony about my upcoming piano lessons at the Madonna house and my many fears about coming face to face with a nun.
Tony knew the Madonna House as he attended a Catholic Youth Group there once a week. Tony told me he didn’t know what all those keys were for either but he was pretty sure they didn’t lock up little boys and girls with them.
“Look it’s like this” Tony said, “first take off your hat when you go in, don’t say nothing dirty or disgusting or you’ll have to go to confession and you won’t like that.
As a matter of fact just ask them what room you piano lesson is in, and if your scared keep your head down and don’t say nothing stupid, take my word for it nobodies going to bite you or slap you with a ruler.”
I then told Tony that I had this fear that a nun could read your mind with a secret device that sat on top of their head underneath the crown of their wimple.
Tony looks at me rolls his eyes and says, “Who told you that stuff”? “No Neal they’re just people you know people doing a job just like a cop does his job, a fireman does his job and well a nun does her job”. “What job is that”? I asked? “Oh “Tony replied “it’s like there all married to God and they give their life to him and serve him. So you know they never go out on a date with a guy or you know they never do the nasty, you know sex with anybody.”
This latest bit of information actually comforted me, as at least I knew that nun’s and I had something in common. Not that I knew anything at all about sex but I knew it existed and it had something to do with being naked.
Tony did tell me about the time his sister dropped a candy wrapper on the floor and one of the Nun’s made her carry a very large and heavy rock around the building three times. This sounded a little harsh but nowhere near any of my creative vision of whips, fires, and devils with flaming pitchforks and of course eternal damnation in a place where the only thing to eat was tuna fish.
The day soon arrived for my first piano lesson. I elected to avoid the elevator and took the stairs down the nine flights to the lobby. I created a sort of rhythm with my feet as I made my way down the steps and I would also hum a little tune in counterpoint to the noise my shoes made. I did that “dance” each time I would ascend or descend the stairs; it was one of the rituals a child performs when alone to help keep him or her self-sane. I felt a sense of relief as I crossed over the baseball field, as this was always a safe place for me.
It was an extremely clear and bright afternoon, which only heightened the black habits of the nuns against the red brick building. I was really trying hard not to look too Jewish, as I wanted my first trip to the Madonna House to be as painless as possible.
I approached the large door there were three nun’s speaking outside. They were conversing in English they were not speaking in Latin or in any secret nun language that I had imagined.
Proceeding inside I went to the front desk and I walked as quietly as I could so as not to attract any attention. I did notice that as well as nuns there were also people in normal clothing just as I was. I stood in front of the information desk and waited for the nun to raise her head.
I noticed that she seemed to be dressed differently then the other sisters. I learned latter that she was a beginner nun called a novice. She lifted her head, she was young and pretty, she had a black veil pinned to the back of her head that accented her beautiful red curly hair. She looked at me, smiled and said, “oh yes your here for your one O’clock piano lesson, let me show you to the room.” Not only could I see her feet I could see clear up to her ankles, and the little man on her Cross-seemed almost to be smiling. I was so relieved, but not for long.
I entered the room and immediately recognized my piano teacher; it was Mr. Bloom he worked for the kosher butcher. I saw him only yesterday boning a chicken. He was bald and had a funny little mustache and wore wire rimmed eggshell glasses. It was the first time I saw him without a bloody apron and a cleaver in his hand and he still looked frightening. Mr. Bloom I exclaimed! I didn’t know you were Catholic? He scrunched up his face, removed the cigarette from his lips and looked at me with his little beady eyes and said “what Catholic, I’m Jewish just like you, I rent the room and give piano lessons, case closed, now sit down and show me what you know and try not to waste too much of your parents money.
He was arrogant, mean and horrible all at the same time. I tried to learn my scales but it’s hard to perform music when one is shaking inside. I returned a few times and each time the pleasant young nun would greet me with a smile before I entered the room with Mr. Bloom.
She’d always ask me if I had learned any pieces yet. I told her that I was working on “Volga Boatman” and the first part of “Ode to Joy” which in it’s own way seemed fitting since my father’s family was German and both my parents were communist.
It was during my third lesson that Mr. Bloom really cut me to the quick. As I was making the best pass I could at Beethoven, Mr. Bloom (with cigarette smoke bellowing out of his mouth) barked out “your fingers, there so stiff, there like bayonets”.
I never learned how to play the piano; but I did get to talk to a few nuns and they all seemed very helpful and very much human. My parents were not pleased when I told them that I’d rather play baseball with my friends on Saturday afternoons then take piano lessons. I was somehow getting used to them being annoyed with me as they both always seemed to be in a state of agitation.
I did have one less fear, as I looked out my window and watch the nuns walked down Market Street I realized that my friend Tony was right. Just like everyone else nuns had a job to do and like a policeman a fireman and a soldier they wore a uniform as well.

A rare look inside The Madonna House which was located on 173 Cherry Street, between Market and Pike Streets,
From the nypl digital library collection.

Reinventing History

2008-03-04T16:02:00.000-08:00

Reinventing History
Mac Bethad mac Findlác was the last of the Scottish Gaelic kings. He was born in 1005 and died at the hands of Malcolm III at the battle of Lumphanan in 1057. Both Mac Bethad and his wife Queen Grouch were born into royalty. As with many rulers in this period of history he had his rivals and in 1040 he defeated Duncan I at the battle of Bothgowanan to secure his thrown.
After his accession he managed to keep the highlands of Scotland secure against invasion from the south and his reign went unchallenged until his defeat seventeen years latter. According to the literature that remains Mac Bethad was a revered and beloved king. In the “Duan Albanach” (an historic middle Gaelic poem) he is described as:
The strong one was fair, yellow haired, and tall.
Very pleasant was the handsome youth to me.
Brimful of food was Scotland, east and west,
During the reign of the ruddy, brave king.
Mac Bethad was also remembered as being a pious and compassionate king and in 1050 made a pilgrimage to Rome to meet with the Pope and gave money to the poor.
Mac Bethad mac Findlác son of Ruadri son of Domnall and the last Celtic king of Scotland died defending his kingdom against the Normans and the anglicized Scots.
Two hundred years latter almost all power in Scotland moved into the hands of the lowland Scots who were strongly influenced by the Normans and spoke a dialect of Scottish and distained all forms of the Gaelic language and culture. The highland Gaels were seen as both troublesome aliens and thus the history of ancient kings such as Mac Bethad mac Findlác need to be reinvented. The new Scottish elite took great pride in the fact that king Mac Bethad was defeated by Malcolm Canmore a direct ancestor of the Stewart line.
In the fourteenth century a Scots historian named John of Gordon invented a mythical character called Banquo who was then allegedly murdered by the king Mac Bethad. Over the next two hundred years historians of the new Scottish elite added the murder of King Duncan and then Scottish writer Hector Boyce turned Queen Grouch into the manipulative, heinous Lady Mac Bethad. The spin then was captured by English historian Raphael Holinshed and became part of Holinshed’s Chronicles. Mr. Holinshed’s work became a very important source for the hot young playwright and poet William Shakespeare. Shakespeare’s Macbeth was created between 1603-1606 probably to honor that fact that King James I (also known as King James the VI of Scotland) who was both a Scot and a Stewart was now on the throne. James the first was fascinated by the concept of witches and wrote the work Damenonolgie that was a study of the supernatural in 1597.
Perhaps the great bard knowing the new kings fascination with witchcraft and that he claimed to be a direct descendant of Banquo (the Scottish warlord who probably never existed) created Macbeth in his honor. Shakespeare was no fool and he wanted his plays to sell and what better way to welcome a new Stuart king then to continue this incredible political spin against the last Gaelic king of Scotland.
Shakespeare’s plays have been translated in almost every language in the world. Between live performances films and television the play Macbeth or as it is know to actors as “The Scottish Play” has been performed I would imagine tens thousands of times.
If one says the name Macbeth would anyone think of a beloved Scottish king in the defending this Gaelic kingdom in the year 1050? Probably not. Macbeth conjures up witches, treachery, murder, deceit and of course Lady Macbeth saying:
"Here's the smell of the blood still; all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. O, O, O."
One could call Macbeth a form of character assignation or a Scottish political spin, which in all reality has never stopped spinning. Why would anyone care that the life of a thousand year old Gaelic king has been twisted into a story that never happened? Who cares if it’s true or not when the results are memorable lines such as:
Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player, 
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, 
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
 Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, 
Signifying nothing."
Shakespeare quite literally wrote the book on historical fiction and five hundred years latter the world still celebrates and enjoys the work of the bard.
Question: Is it ethical when writing historical fiction to completely destroy the character of a human being? Does it matter since its fiction anyway?
I have always been a student of history. Interestingly enough almost all my favorite historians are women: Zoe Oldenburg, Elaine Pagels, Karen Armstrong, Barbara Tuchman and my latest favorite— Lady Antonia Fraser. I have recently read Fraser’s work on Henry VIII, a lyrical illustration of Tudor England and of course Henry and his six wives. Fraser is wonderful in what I like to call the art of historical minutia. Every character is described with so much detail and accuracy that the reader feels that if he or she could somehow met theses characters on a different plane one would have no problem getting into a conversation with them. Individuals create history, and Fraser gives one an intimate portrait of each personality and how each individual’s temperament dealt with the political climate in which they were thrust. Her work (The Six Wives of Henry VIII) is thoroughly referenced and cites close to a thousand sources.
I was motivated to finally read Fraser’s work after completing Philippa Gregory’s historical novel “The Other Boleyn Girl”. Had Ms. Gregory’s book been a work of total fiction it would have been quite an enjoyable read. However I felt this work has crossed an ethical boundary in her treatment of Henry’s second wife Anne Boleyn.
According to Antonia Fraser and a majority of historians that have studied the period Anne Boleyn was a highly educated women who spoke three languages, wrote music, collected poetry and was educated in the Netherlands and in France. While she was Queen of England no one was executed for heresy or any other religious reason. However, she was also extremely high strung and outspoken and that coupled with her inability to provide a son for Henry Tudor lead to her demise in May of 1536.
Henry and his advisor Cromwell also wanted her out of the way to appease the Spanish over the way he treated his first wife Catherine of Aragon. Henry claimed that Anne was a witch that cast a spell on him and had committed adultery and had an incestuous relationship with her brother. For which Henry VIII sent Anne, her brother and five court musicians to their deaths. It was Anne’s sister –in- law Jane Parker, who started the rumor that she had slept with her brother. Jane Parker confessed that is was a lie as she and Anne’s cousin Catherine Howard were sent to the block in 1542. Henry also dispatched his Lord Chancellor Sir Thomas More and John Fisher the Bishop of Rochester for refusing to go along with his Act of Succession. In the end he even had his right hand man Thomas Cromwell executed for setting up his ill-fated mirage with Anne of Cleves. While he weren’t busy destroying all the people around him Henry Tudor did his best to destroy both the Irish and Scottish civilizations. Antonia Fraser does mention that Anne did have a sister who was probably a year or two older then her. Her name was Mary who first had an affair with the king of France and while she was in court in England she had a short affair with Henry VIII. She married a commoner named William Stafford and never returned to court again, not even for her sister’s trial and execution.
All of theses facts are basically turned upside down in Phillipa Gregory’s “The Other Boleyn Girl”. The novel is from the point of view of Mary Boleyn now a sincere and sensitive young girl who is suddenly cast off by the King Henry in favor of her manipulative, conniving sister Anne. There is no mention of the fact that Mary was thrown out of the French court for her having one too many affairs. Almost everything in this novel is distorted. Henry VIII is shown as being manipulated by Anne and he actually experiences pangs of guilt for his treatment of his first wife Catherine of Aragon.
In Gregory’s novel Mary has two children by the king, Anne has sex with her brother and delivers a deformed child all of which at least according to scholars of this period never happened. Henry did have a son out of wedlock from his affair with a woman in court named Elizabeth Blount. He was made the Duke of Richmond but died very young. There is no historical evidence of him having any child with Anne Boleyn’s sister Mary.
Over 70,000 people were executed during the reign of Henry VIII and now according to Ms. Gregory Henry Tudor had a feeling of sensitivity and remorse. Gregory credits the historian Retha Warnicke as source for much of her information. Dr. Warnicke who currently teaches history at Arizona State has publicly distanced herself from the novel. Which brings one to ponder the question—Is Philippa Gregory’s depiction of Anne Boleyn (even in a work of fiction) ethical or is it a clear case of character assignation? I personally feel that there was already an extremely compelling tale just in the truth of what happened so why change it?
I would imagine the answer from the writer would be that it’s a work of fiction and most people will realize that the author has manipulated the characters to create her own story. However the fact that Gregory has Anne being impregnated by her brother (which is a proven lie) amounts to what can only be labeled as a cheap and a manipulative shot. Poor Anne first she was dispatched by the sword and five hundred years latter she is slain by the pen.
All of these issues will take a giant leap for the worse upon the release of the movie, which will star Natalie Portman as Anne and Scarlett Johansson as Mary and will be in theaters by December 2007. I managed to down load a copy of the script and after reading it I decided it’s just not worth getting angry about. I’m not really a critical person but I must say that using this script for kitty litter would be an insult to my cat. The only thing accurate in the script is that there were indeed people with theses names who lived during this time. My favorite part is when Henry is bonding with Henry Jr. (who is the issue of Henry and Mary). It’s so sweet……and all so untrue.
Anne Boleyn will soon join King Mac Bethad mac Findlác and his wife Queen Grouch in the category of misunderstood and unfairly maligned figures in history.
After all why worry about someone who died a half of a century ago when our current history is being manipulated every day in the media. Just turn on Fox news and one can watch our daily history being reinvented as it happens.
After obsessing about Boleyn for two weeks I decided it would be easier to give in then to suffer about it. As a matter of fact I’m intending to write to the producers of the film and suggest a new and exciting ending. It will go something like this:
Henry decides that both sisters are to be dispatched but of course he feels really bad about it. He cancels his hot date with Jane Seymour and goes up on the podium where poor Mary and Anne are awaiting the blade. He then breaks into a killer version of the Whitney Houston hit “I Will Always Love You” and just as he’s finishing there’s a total eclipse. All in attendance fall silent. Then there’s a great light coming out of the sky. Descending from the heavens is a large rectangular form with the words San Dimas on it.
It’s a phone booth from the 20th century flying out of the sky and landing right in front of the executioners dock at the Tower of London. Out pops Bill and Ted reprising their roles from “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure”. They have become kung fu masters and quickly subdue Henry and his guards and then take the historical babes back to San Dimas California. Mary and Anne then open a clothing store at the San Dimas mall called Babe-A-Lott, marry Bill and Ted, and in there spare time perform a new age disco version of Macbeth for senior centers in the greater San Dimas area.

Thru Time

2008-02-18T20:16:00.001-08:00

Thru Time
Part 1 – Heading West
December 13th 2006 never entered my existence last year. Or, perhaps a more accurate description would be— I never showed up for the thirteenth of December, it literally flew away,
vanished, disappeared, never to grace any of its minutes, hours or seconds in my life. On December 12th at 3:00pm I and a few hundred other souls boarded a 747 at S.F.O. and headed west over the Pacific to the island nation of New Zealand. Nine hours into the flight we were only one hour away from December 13th. All of which changed as our flying steel vehicle passed over that magic longitude of 180º. As a Tonganese family was watching a video thirty eight thousand feet below us we simply passed on into December 14th. It was indeed December 13th for those in Hawaii and all my friends in California but for all aboard Air New Zealand flight number 28 there was absolutely no interval between December 12th and December 14th. We simply slipped through the grip of the hands of time. Which makes the mind wonder what indeed might have happened in my life on that day? Would that have been the day I started my award-winning novel? Fallen in love? Met an old friend for lunch? Or perhaps just simply grown a day older? I’m thankful I wasn’t expecting an important phone call on that day or had a ticket to the opera for I was simply not present in the world on December 13th. So let it be known that on December 13th 2006 I never told a lie, sang a song, read a book, took a breath or boiled an egg.
Meanwhile almost everyone else on the globe was acknowledging the 13th of December by being born, riding a bike, creating poetry, stealing, kissing, dying, cooking and just hanging out.
I was and still am a member of a very select group of travelers who actually crossed the International Date Line at exactly midnight and thus skipped an entire day.

Part 2 – Heading East
While all of you were sleeping in Santa Cruz California (say at 3:00 am on January 15th) my January 16th began. I was in a folk club on Mt Victoria called “The Bunker” in the charming New Zealand town of Devonport. After much merriment and libation I collapsed on my pillow at two am realizing I that I would arrive back in America before I ever left New Zealand.
I awoke at 8:00 am and washed some comfortable fitting clothes for my thirteen-hour plane ride. My kiwi friends treated me to a farewell lunch and as I munched down a bowl of delicious green-lipped Mussels in Tai simmer sauce I knew that on this day I would once again travel through time. I’m shuttled to the airport for the 8:00 pm flight to San Francisco. This will be the first of two 8:00 pm’s I will experience on January 16th. The other is when I will be reading this piece to my writing group on the west side of Santa Cruz. As I board the 747 at 8:00 pm it is currently 11:00 pm January 15th in Santa Cruz. The lost day of December 13th has been reborn as the double day of January 16th as I am once again time traveling across the magic longitude of 180º. In New Zealand it is now tomorrow as I fly east into today.
Eight miles below, someone in Tonga is cooking an Ono fish for her family as soar into the darkness. The woman next to me is in a writing group in Carmel. She is so inspired by the fact that I’m scratching out a story for my own writing group that she takes out her laptop and commences to write as well. Two writers are now elbow-to-elbow, bouncing in the turbulence, trying to fight off fatigue by putting it all down on paper.
We land in San Francisco at 11:00 am, my son picks me up and I arrive home with just enough time to type my time travel story down and to deliver it to my Tuesday night writing group in my 29th hour of my thirty-three hour day of January 16, 2007.

Apparition

2008-02-18T20:12:00.000-08:00

Charlotte Anne Moberly (1846 - 1937)

During my last sojourn between my home in California and the Pensacola Baptist hospital in Florida I made plans for my father’s imminent demise. I contacted a local funeral home and signed all the papers to release his body to them upon his death. I never saw his body after he died
As I sat there discussing my father’s cremation procedure I imagined that they must get many clients my age flying into Florida to take care of the last details of their parents life. When they asked me if I wanted his ashes shipped to my address in California via the United Parcel Service I declined. The thought of my father’s remains arriving with various compact discs and folk music books on a UPS handcart was to macabre for me. I asked them if they could take care of it. I elected to pay an extra $50.00 to have the last little bits of Solomon Hellman dropped into the Gulf of Mexico. I then handed them my credit card, and I returned to the hospital to sit with my dad.
The hospital was very old and extremely disorganized. Two of the three times I visited my dad, they sent me to the wrong room. My father once another patient’s chart hanging from my his bed.
My father’s skin was quite yellow as his liver was failing from Scotch permeating his vital organ for decades. His heart was giving out and he had colon cancer as well. A number of his teeth were cracked and he had a musty smell about him. His blue gray eyes were bloodshot and there were scales forming on his scalp among the last strands of his thinning white hair.
On November 5th 1988 I spent my last morning with my father. He was in and out of consciousness but we managed to exchange a few words. I planned to return in three weeks, but I didn’t think he’d make it that far.
Two weeks latter as I was working on a paper in my family student-housing apartment at U.C.S.C. an attendant called me from Pensacola Baptist to let me know my father had died of cardio pulmonary collapse. She had all the emotion of someone ordering a pizza, but at the same time I realized she probably makes many calls like these and I understood her lack of compassion. I told her I had everything taken care of and said goodbye. She never once mentioned my father’s name.
The first feeling I had was of relief and then I spent some time reflecting on that November morning less then two weeks ago when I saw my father for the last time. At least that’s what I thought.
Following my fathers demise I went through a similar behavior pattern I did after my mother’s death. I didn’t drink alcohol or smoke any pot. I went to sleep before ten and got out of bed at 7:30. I needed to stay as clear headed as possible to enable myself to accept the fact that my relationship with my family was like a musical composition that ended on a suspended chord, and would never be resolved.
On a positively beautiful December afternoon (three weeks after the news of my father’s death) I went downtown to the post office to ship some packages. The day presented itself with my favorite Santa Cruz weather— nice and sunny but a little cool with a sky dotted with small and billowy cumulus clouds. After mailing my packages I stopped halfway down the post office steps to speak with a friend. As my friend was bidding me goodbye I felt a tap on my shoulder. Interesting in all the years I’ve been walking this planet very few folks have ever tapped me on the shoulder to get my attention. It’s usually an “excuse me” or eye contact and a gentle hand on the side of one’s arm but hardly ever an actual tap on the very top on my shoulder. I looked left and then right and saw no one but felt the tap again. Whoever was trying to get my attention was standing behind me two steps up. Figuring it was one of my friends having fun with me I turned around with my hands on my hips and said in a joyful but somewhat loud voice “yeah, what’s up?
I wished I had never turned around. I felt like Ebenezer Scrooge seeing Marley’s face in the doorknocker, however this face didn’t fade away, it simply just stared, as I stared at it. Opposite me was an exact replica of my father, looking as he did just before he went into the hospital for the last time.
He was smiling and said, “what do people do around here, this is really some town you have”. His smile was so bright it almost seemed like he was dancing.
As I listened in bewildered silence the only reply I could muster was “you want to know what people do?” As I spoke I could feel my mind becoming like the lyrics of an old blues song, the one about “The Two Trains Running”:

Well now there's two, there's two trains runnin'

Well ain't not one, (ho!) goin' my way

Well now one run at midnight, and the other one runnin' just 'fore day.

The first train was my rational self, speaking within my head. “Ok Neal, yes he’s got that cracked tooth exactly where you father’s was, he also has the blood shot pale blue gray eyes and yellowing skin as well as that musty smell. He’s my dad’s height, and his voice is the same timbre. Take a breath, take a breath, I’m sure there are many older men of Jewish German extraction who would look a lot like your dad once they have reached his age. It’s just an amazing coincidence. It’s probably the smell of him that’s influencing all your other senses, that must be it. Remember Neal you worked in a behavioral lab for two years and seen a lot empirical data illustrating how our senses can deceive us.
The old man said “well what kind of things go on here” and as he spoke he bobbed his head ever so slowly as if he was following a melody somewhere in his mind. I found myself l licking my lips as I replied, “well there are many artists here and there’s the beach and many places to get a cup of coffee”. He smiled and as he did he never let go of my eyes. I felt frozen as if I was captivated by some beam of energy coming out of this, out of this, of this what? Who is this man?
As I was forcing words out of my mouth the second train took off and the voice from the coal car said “you never saw his body, you haven’t heard from the mortuary, remember how that hospital put the wrong clipboard on his bed? What’s more, the nurse who called you did not once mention his name and the State of Florida has never sent you a death certificate.
The specter then said, “how long have you’ve lived here? What do you do here? Are you one of these artists who hangs out and drinks coffee?”
Now my mouth was completely dry and I felt like I was getting off on some kind of mind-altering substance.
Just as Mr. Dickens’ character I too wanted to yell out:

Mercy…Dreadful apparition, why do you trouble me?

The first train spoke to me again: “come on Neal, breath, this is not your dead father coming back to haunt you. Anyway it’s not a ghost it’s probably just another old man with a liver condition who for some reason looks like your father. Just relax, look at your watch and tell him you have to leave. Tell him any lie just go.”
I couldn’t leave. It was alarming and I was frightened but at the same time I was entranced.
He then said what to me was his verbal coup de gráce:
“Those folks in back of the bookstore, don’t they have jobs to go to or do they just sit, read and drink coffee all day?” The last time my father was in Santa Cruz he said the exact phrase to me in the exact same cadence.
The second train returned and a passenger in the luxury cabin called out and said, “they might have gotten the charts mixed up, perhaps he went into remission and then just got dressed and left the hospital. He wouldn’t be the first person to do that. He then hiked over to his bank, and withdrew his remaining money. After all it was his dough. He probably got a hotel room, rested up and then he flew to San Jose and presto here he is.”
The first train then asked the second train “well, why didn’t he call?” And the second train replied, “he’s probably not being very rational. After all the last time he saw his son, he was leaving him for dead in a run down hospital in Pensacola, Florida. I then made an announcement to both trains that I did what I could for him and I don’t feel guilty.
I wanted to bust out of myself and say to this eidolon “listen man I just lost my dad and you look a lot like him and it’s really starting to get to me so, please enjoy your visit here in Santa Cruz but I have to leave now, ok…goodbye.” I wanted to say it, but I didn’t.
As the first train ascended a hill the tall conductor with the large mustache reminded me that I was the individual who thought of astrology as a fun subject to talk about on airplanes, and I didn’t believe in steel ships flying to earth from a far off universe or in the yeti, ghosts, or any type of experience which is referred to as the paranormal.
Just then two older English women from the latter half of the nineteenth century turned around on their stools in the club car of the second train and said, “oh is that so Neal? Remember us? Sure you do, I’m Eleanor Jourdain and this is my friend Charlotte Anne Moberly we were principal and vice-principal of St. Hugh's College, Oxford. You watched our story with rapt attention many years ago on PBS and you really bought it, didn’t you? We were the two retired academics (and devout Catholics I might add) who while walking through the gardens at The Palace of Versailles on August 10, 1901 and took an unknown path and somehow strolled through a curtain of time and saw Marie Antoinette talking to her lover in 1788. When questioned about the incident we correctly described not only what the Queen of France really looked liked, we also identified her lover as someone with a very swollen right side of his face. The path we took into the gardens ceased to exist seventy years before we ventured down it. There were only two historians in France who knew of this path and only one who knew that Marie Antoinette had a lover who at one time suffered from small pox which altered the right side of his face. So tell us Neal how did we know? If two old retired faculty from Oxford College could walk through a curtain of time why couldn’t this man in front of you be your father? Really Neal there are many realities happening around you at all times. Not just your brush your teeth in the morning and get ready for another day reality. There are countless realities with countless possibilities. We know that you have never forgotten our story and if were making you feel anxious try closing your eyes and clicking your heels like little Dorothy did. Tell your dad to do it as well and before you know it you’ll both be back home.”
“No, no,” my rational first train cried, “don’t listen to those women they will make you go mad. It’s just a folk tale Neal, it means nothing, and those old English women are probably now laughing in their graves.”
“Hey Neal,” a voice called to me, it was my friend Elise, exiting the post office. Just seeing someone I knew was a relief, “thank goodness” I thought, a friend.
Elise made a beeline for me and immediately gave me a hug and said she just heard that I lost my father and how sorry she was for my loss. “So how are you holding up Neal?”
I was tempted to say, “Well Elise, I’m somewhat faint and approaching a massive anxiety attack but before I do I wanted you to know my father is not lost at all. He or perhaps his doppelgänger is currently standing right in front of us. He’s come back from the dead to spend some quality time with his son before traveling on to another dimension.”
What I did say was, “well I’m ok, and I’m dealing with it as best as I can.” Elise glanced at the old man (who politely nodded to her) and then glanced back at me and knew something was up. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt anything, I’ve got to run, call me, let me cook you diner sometime next week.” She nodded to the old man, squeezed my hand and walked away.
The old man then said: “is she your girlfriend”? She’s very pretty. Do you ever sit in that courtyard in back of the bookstore with her and drink coffee?
“Were just friends but yes sometimes we have coffee together.”
He smiled and nodded and then took a gave at the sky and said, “What a beautiful day.”
After the short encounter with my friend Elise the trains stopped running and I wasn’t afraid anymore. I felt as if someone had thrown me headfirst into a deep lake and I was finally surfacing.
“Oh Jesus” (I thought) he busted my chops when he was alive and now that he’s dead he’s still giving me shit. Perhaps he just showed up on his way to the next dimension to say goodbye in his own weird Sol Hellman fashion.
I then realized what day it was. It was the Winter Solstice, the day of the longest night. A day that many ancient cultures viewed as one of those times when the veil between worlds was very thin. The Druids believed this time to be when the Sun God ventured into underworld to learn the secrets of life and death. Also this deity would also escort the dead out of the underworld to be reincarnated.
I didn’t notice any ancient spirits standing with my father, perhaps there are curtains of time and various realities that for reason’s we can’t yet comprehend are somehow open up to us. The resemblance was so strong I that could not look at him for more then a few seconds at a time. It was like starring into the sun.
Though he was a kind person my father was always distant from me while he was alive. I then thought, “Why should he be any different now?” Maybe this was his way of saying “goodbye”.
I finally mustered up the courage to say “ I really have to go” and he replied exactly as he did to me when I was young and said, “Well go man go” and sort of saluted me. I sort of saluted him back and said, “Enjoy your time here in Santa Cruz” and began to descend the steps. After I crossed the street I turned around figuring as in most ghost stories he wouldn’t be there. But he was, and he waved to me again. I waved back and smiled, he waved once more and smiled at me, and then I went home.

Eleanor Jourdain (1864 - 1924)

Ultimate B.L.T.

2006-02-13T18:37:00.000-08:00

Ultimate BLT
Oh praise be to the sun, our bright shining ally in the center of our solar system. For you, you are the eternal fire in our universe, the keeper of the light, and the giver of life.
In September of each year our fiery orb crosses the celestial equator from the north to the south, a journey celebrated by many cultures on this third planet from the sun as the Autumnal Equinox. To astrologers it’s the day the sun enters into the sign of Libra, the constellation of the balance. The Mayans were dazzled by all the colors forming into triangles of light on their pyramid at Chickén Itzá. The Japanese celebrate Higan, also known as the six perfections: perseverance, effort, meditation, wisdom, observance of precepts, and giving. They also believe that this special day is an opportune time to reflect on life’s interior meanings.
I celebrate this day of equal light and darkness by creating the ultimate bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwich.
It all starts with a journey to the fertile fields of Corralitos, where my destination is the much-heralded Corralitos Sausage Company, to acquire the “B” of my Ultimate BLT. While it is true that my ancient ancestors would frown on my current choice of savory, in my own wonderful, compassionate soul I forgive them. For if my great grandfather Israel Kennett could only have sampled this tasty piece of piggy, surely he would have understood why I journey south to purchase a two-pound slab of swine. It’s a lean bit of bacon, light on salt, no artificial ingredients, and smoked on the wood of an apple tree. Yes, the very tree that tempted Eve is now sacrificing itself to the flames to add just the right flavor to our dearly departed omnivorous, domesticated, hoofed mammal.
This venture to the south is followed by a Wednesday afternoon trip to the farmer’s market to purchase Molino dry-farmed tomatoes and Route One lettuce.
Dry farming utilizes soil moisture from the prior winter’s rain as the only form of irrigation. The advantages are a concentrated flavor and a sugar-acid balance that make this pomodoro the ultimate, most blissful, most flavorful little red beauty that ever sprouted from God’s green earth. I am a personal friend of Joe Curry, and he saves his very best tomatoes and puts them aside just for me. As Joe places the ripest of his harvest in my bag, I sing out, “bella, bellissima pomodoro.”
With the lettuce I keep it pure and simple. None of this radicchio or arugula stuff, just pure and crisp romaine lettuce is all that’s needed. I place the lettuce in the same canvas bag as the Molino tomatoes, for it’s good they get acquainted before they start working together.
Ah, the bread—the proper bread is a great source of debate with many lovers of the BLT. Shall it be rye, brown, francese, plain white, or ciabatta? The choice of bread has been, and I’m afraid will always be, a source of debate among lovers of this classic sandwich. The answer for me is as follows. What we have going on is a very delicate balance of textures and flavors. The crisp lettuce, the juicy but not too loose tomato, and the warm and crunchy bacon. A bread with too much body mass will overwhelm and stifle the wonderful trio of bacon, lettuce, and tomato. Making a BLT on a francese roll would be like experiencing an intimate scene of dialogue in a film and having the music on so loud that the words are lost. The bread must act as both a platform and a vehicle for our lovely trio, one that will only enhance the experience and not in any way, shape, or form (and I do mean this literally) negate it.
A great BLT is a complex edible symphony, one in which all the parts maintain their individuality, yet at the same time surrender their tasty nuances in the true spirit of gastronomic gestalt and dwell as one. This equinox I choose Sumano’s Bakery ciabatta bread. Though I am skeptical about its naked and pale texture, I feel it will toast up well, and its many crevices will add some fun places for the mayo to dwell.
With the mayonnaise choice I have to stay with tradition and of course go with Hellmann’s, though for some reason it’s known west of the Mississippi as Best Foods. I don’t waste my time with some kind of safflower oil concoction or other type of healthy alternative.
My ingredients are now all together, but the critically intense work has just begun. For now without the correct timing and the correct application of all the ingredients, my ritual could easily plummet into a spiritual abyss.
All ingredients must sit together at room temperature as I invoke the spirit of all the great BLT makers in all the luncheonettes in New York City. I heat my cast iron skillet (using a Teflon pan would be heresy) to a comfortable medium heat.
I then lay the bacon down four strips per sandwich, and as I do, the strips greet the metal with a friendly sizzley “hello.” As they are slowly cooking, I cut the tomatoes, neither too thin nor too thick, and place them down ever so gently on a plate to await their glorious marriage.
The lettuce has been carefully washed and spun with all traces of ribs removed. The mayonnaise is open and eager to join this eatable canvas.
Once the bacon has been turned, the bread swings into action. It has to be brown all the way but with no traces of crusty darkness. As the toast is finishing, I remove the bacon and gently pat it down with a paper towel.
Now it’s time to assemble my edible equinox creation. Mayo on both pieces of toast, then the tomatoes. I then place the lettuce between the tomato and the bacon, for I feel it’s texturally more secure that way. I don’t want an immediate confluence of tomato and bacon; I like the lettuce to work as a buffer. Here’s where many folks really go askew: they push the bread down so hard that the bacon is crushed. One must gently, ever so gently caress the concoction together. Then I take a sharp knife and make a diagonal cut. A straight cut is what people from small towns in Nebraska and Ohio execute. I place the masterpiece on a plate, where it waits for the consuming mouth to enjoy the warm and crunchy (yet still pliable) bacon, the exploding sensation of a dry-farm Molino tomato, the joyous lettuce, the condiment-ing mayonnaise and ever-so-supportive bread.
My first Ultimate BLT goes to my neighbor. With this offering I realize that I am truly invoking the Japanese Equinox celebration of Higan, illustrating the six perfections: perseverance, effort, meditation, wisdom, observance of precepts, and giving.

Gorilla

2006-02-13T16:03:00.000-08:00

Gorilla

We thought we were living a counterculture lifestyle, but in truth farming and raising animals were part of the American way of life from its inception. Was having long hair and driving beat-up pick up trucks really a protest against society? We fancied ourselves as some new American vanguard, but in a very real way we were emulating the local lifestyle-hardly an act of revolution.
However, once a year for our three years in the Piedmont area of Virginia we encountered a subculture that was indeed living on the fringes of American society.
The carney or the traveling carnival show would set up each summer a mile or so down the road from our farm in Bedford County.
These were hard-core people who were living more of an altered lifestyle than an alternative one. They didn't smoke pot and plant vegetables and run away from wild roosters. They were individuals whose lifestyle showed on all parts of their bodies. From the long scars on their faces and backs to the missing fingers and teeth, these were the souls who had been long forgotten and cast away by the mainstream. Each year when they'd pitch their big top on a nearby farmer's field, it was more an attempt at survival than entertainment.
In 1969 there was not a lot to do in the region around Altavista, Virginia, and for the one week that the carney operated it was quite the local hit. The freak shows, the house of mirrors, bearded ladies and lion-faced men, games of chance, the hootchy-kootchy show, dog acts, a ram with four horns, a fire eater, a five-legged horse, a giant rat, foreboding-looking clowns, the world's smallest horse, the world's largest horse, various preserved human or animal specimens that are still too painful to describe, and one very old and sad-looking gorilla.
The owners of the carney would employ us to help put up the big top, drive stakes, and at the end of the run help strike the tent and pack up. Knowing we were the local weirdos, they'd ask us if we could sell them any drugs. They weren't interested in pot or magic mushrooms; their lifestyle called for the hard stuff: amphetamines, heroin, uppers, downers-they were always disappointed when we said that just wasn't our thing. That year (the summer of 1970), we were offered an additional job on the evening before they broke camp. They needed two people to drive a large pick-up-one with what looked like an old camper on back. They needed this rig to be driven up into the Blue Ridge Mountains town of Staunton, Virginia.
It was a pretty small truck, so why (we asked them ) did they need two? “We need two because you'll be taking Congo up to his next performance. It wouldn't be a good carnival without a gorilla, now, would it, boys?” The old carney spit tobacco through the gap in his front teeth as he spoke. He went on to say “he bites a bit, but he's a good old soul.” He then help up his right hand to display his two shortened fingers. “Try not to drive too fast and watch out for bumps and please don't let anyone know there's a gorilla in the back of that camper as we really don't have that type of legality if you know what I mean.” I looked at my friend; we both nodded. Sure, $50.00 bucks each for driving a gorilla up into the mountains, yeah great it'll be a trip. They also agreed to give us money for a bus to take us back to Lynchburg.
David and I awoke at sunrise the next morning. We joked about our upcoming adventure over toast and coffee. We then jumped into one of our many beat-up vehicles and drove down to the carney camp. The first thing we noticed was how frightening these folks appeared without the reality of the carnival as their backdrop. Many of them looked like convicts, and all of them looked desperate. Our welcome greeting went something like “Don't either of you fuckers even think of opening the back of that pick-up to look at Congo, 'cause if anything happens to the ape it'll come out of your ass . . . get it? Remember we know where you live . . . OK?”
We both nodded a nervous nod, jumped in the pick-up, and started our three-hour journey to Staunton, Virginia, with a full tank of gas, a gorilla in tow, and minds full of apprehension. David and I both decided that smoking a joint with a gorilla in the back would not be in our best interest. We agreed to do the job, go home, and never work for these carney people again. We both agreed to forget we were transporting an illegal gorilla to the Shenandoah Valley. We did wonder what the jail term would be if the police pulled us over. How would I ever explain to my parents, the same parents who paid for my college education, that their recently graduated son was busted for driving an unlicensed gorilla down an interstate? We were nervous, we tucked our hair under our hats, and we tried to look like two good old boys driving their camper down the road on a Sunday morning. Two good old boys and one old gorilla on a journey up a mountain. We would take 460 west to Bedford then 132 to 501; from 501 it was a straight shot to Buena Vista and highway 81 north, which would take us into Staunton. We were a little worried on the small roads, worried that some cop with nothing to do on a Sunday morning would jump at the chance to pull over two guys with beards and check out what may be in the back of their truck. We sailed down 132 took the left at Big Island to get on 501 and soon found ourselves on the outskirts of Buena Vista. We could hear Congo as we headed down the road. He would make grunting sounds, and sometimes he would almost have the tone of a young child.
We wondered if he had ever been free, if he had known the life of a highland gorilla, or was the poor ape just bred in captivity? Had he ever mated or journeyed through a rain forest, or was this carney life his only reality this incarnation? Through the cab window we could make out his shape; we noticed he hardly ever moved at all. When we finally hit the interstate, a wave of relief and confidence came over us both. I then mentioned to David that the poor thing must be hungry; he nodded.
We decided to stop in Mint Spring and treat Congo to lunch. Hell with what those carney people said, the gorilla has a right to eat and we just had to see him. We both agreed that our careers as gorilla transporters would end with this journey. We pulled into a Safeway parking lot and purchased a bunch of bananas and peanuts because that's what we saw gorillas eat in the movies.
We then drove down an old dirt road and carefully opened the back door. There he was huddled in the rear of the camper like an old ragged child, no great silverback, just a large, very frightened life form that was high up on the evolutionary scale. He picked up on the sense that we were friendly and had something to give him to make him feel better. Realizing he did not want to move, we gently tossed the food to him. He ever so cautiously gathered the offering and retreated back to his corner. He greatly enjoyed our offerings and seemed to delight in the fact that we were eating peanuts and bananas as well. He never moved from his spot in the rear of the truck. While most of the population of Mint Spring, Virginia, were turning the pages of their bibles and giving thanks to the Lord, two hippies and an old gorilla were on the side of a nondescript Virginia road communing with each other over a midday meal, all involved sensing correctly that they would never pass this way again.

Midwestern Culinary Faux Pas.

2005-02-21T10:25:00.000-08:00

Midwestern Culinary Faux Pas

Flying from Boston to San Jose, we made the usual stop in Chicago. I had one of these rare itineraries where I was to stay on the same plane. I felt that fifty minutes was too long to sit, so I took all my belongings and my boarding pass and ventured out into the exciting arena of Chicago O'Hare Airport.
I observed all the spawning and migratory beings making their way to all points of the earth. Ah, there's the gate to San Francisco and there are folks going back to the freezing cold Northeast. Oh, look at those happy ones boarding a flight to the Bahamas!

Observing humans in transit is a wonderful way to spend time at O'Hare, but hunger called and remembering the cuisine on American Airlines where sustenance consisted of plucking a little blue bag out of what can only be described as the food morgue, I opted for a quick airport chow-down.

Moving on past the Panda Garden, Pizza Hut and the always available $10.00 Martini I chanced on a stand that claimed to sell authentic Chicago Hot Dogs.
Ah indigenous foods, yes why not? Though I have gone beyond the wiener in my culinary evolution, I have indeed heard much talk of this fabled sausage creation of the Midwest.
I found a seat at the bar in the small bistro residing on a open corner between gates K4 and K5. On the other side of the bar was a very tall African American women with great hair and a wonderful chiseled face She opened her eyes leaned forward and said "Yes…"

I heard the cook call her name, it was Doris.
"I'd like one of those venerated Chicago hot dogs, but I must be sure I'm about to consume the real thing. After all, airports truly are full of illusion."
My host guaranteed me that this would be an authentic Chicago Dog and I would soon be part of a tradition I had only heard about but never experienced. She had a great face. I trusted her.
As I waited for my dog and beer, I observed the dozen or so people at the bar. No one making eye contact, most were fidgeting with their carry on bags, looking at their respective watches and consuming consumables in a most consumptive fashion.
My masterpiece arrived and I was perplexed. It was beyond any hot dog experience in my 50 plus years of eating.
First off, the bun was really thick and the pickle relish was placed across the dog, not up and down the dog. In other words, it went from bun to bun. Adding to the sausage mystique, there were tomatoes and cucumbers cascading around both the bun and the actual dog itself. Lastly, there were quite a lot of fries, all on the same very small cardboard plate. The fries were dipping over the thick bun and falling on my dog.
Although I had never spent much time in the Windy City, I knew that the proper way to consume this beef creation was to pick the whole thing up and somehow guide it down one’s gullet. Had I been alone, I might have tried such a feat.
With great apprehension I reached for the plastic bag that contained the little plastic knife, fork and spoon. Meanwhile, with the smallest corner of one eye, Doris was observing me opening the bag.
I then proceeded to start the consumption experience of my Chicago hot dog with a knife and fork. All the while, Doris' eyes got bigger and her cursory glances were morphing into short stares at me and the dog.
There was now not a doubt in my mind that I was committing an indigenous culinary faux pax. I knew it, and I knew she knew it, and I was sure she knew I knew she knew.
I sheepishly raised my eyes. I lifted my palms in the most sincere form of submission a weary airport traveler could muster. Our eyes met. A long silence was interrupted by my confession.
”Okay, okay” I said. “I know I have done a really uncool act by eating a Chicago Hot Dog with a knife and fork.”
Bowing my head even lower I continued.
“I was confused by the relish, the bun, the tomatoes, the abundance of fried potatoes product...I'm jet lagged , it's my primary Chicago Hot Dog experience and I don't have a manual.”
After more silence, Doris spoke. "Let me ask you this. Would you eat a pizza with a knife and fork?"
I assumed an upright position and replied, “Of course not! I'm originally from New York."
"New York!" Doris exclaimed - "I thought you were from Omaha or some small place in North Dakota, but now that I know you’re from New York, this is inexcusable."
We both tried as hard as we could to keep that smile away. This was really fun. We debated about bun size and tomatoes and hot dog customs at quite a high and excited volume.
Everyone on the counter got into it. Each person had his or her interpretations of the proper dog eating experience. People were lighting up like Christmas trees. Everyone stopped looking at their watches, cell phones were tucked away, people were looking at each other, all of us were escaping from our traveling isolation and just enjoying the moment.

It was agreed upon that no matter what the venue, the dog must be consumed without benefit of knife and fork, and I did promise Doris that on my return to their bistro, I would amend to the proper etiquette and culinary mores.

During the entire 30 minutes that I spent with Doris, somehow we knew we were great friends. We were conspirators in breaking up a boring reality. As short as it was, it was wonderful because we understood each other from the get go.
All that fun and all I had to do was to commit a small Midwestern culinary faux pas.

The Magic Dollar

2005-02-19T13:34:00.000-08:00

The Magic Dollar
or
The Hoosier Highwaymen

Gazing at my faded, limp dollar bill, I gave it a very small chance of success in the vending machine. Truly this was well-laundered money, as it appeared to have been through the wash many times. Isn't it a blessing that the powers that guide us mortals here on earth had the higher knowledge to make money washable.
There was a gravy stain right on the little Masonic eyeball above the pyramid as well as what appeared to be a red dot on top of President Washington's head.
The bill was so crumpled that the American eagle looked more like a wild turkey descending into a dark abyss. It was the last single I had. I'd spent my other dollar on the diet Pepsi in the adjoining machine.
Yes, a diet Pepsi and a large Snickers bar, my favorites on the interstate junk food highway. I have this mystical belief that the NutraSweet in the beverage cancels out the harmful fatty acids in the chocolate bar. I know it's a stretch, but so are many mystical manifestations of the universe.
As it says on the bill, "In God We Trust," and trust I did as I carefully placed this aged piece of currency into the slim metal receptacle of the machine. I then chanted a little junk food prayer as the bill slowly disappeared. The machine was pleased; it devoured the my aged Federal Reserve Note. I pressed E-3 and waited through those pregnant seconds until my extra large Snickers bar hit the bottom of the machine with a joyful thud.
As my happy hands were opening the flap to retrieve my sweet prize, my ears were treated to a most unusual electronic sound coming from the direction of the dollar slot. The machine was returning my bill, having set that Snickers bar free.
It literally spewed the dollar into the air and my eager hands captured it as it floated towards the pavement.
Could it have been the gravy stain over the mystic eye that set this dollar aloft? Or was there a bigger picture happening here--one that I was yet to understand.
I was shocked, elated, and puzzled. I looked at George; he still had a red mark on top of his head. The answer I was seeking was waiting patiently for me on the flip side of the bill.
Yes, of course, it was right there, written directly above the little gravy-stained Masonic eye. Annuit Coeptis from the classic Roman poet Virgil's Aeneid, written in the first century B.C.
Annuit Coeptis translates to "providence has favored our undertakings," and yes, favored I was by perhaps (if possible) the gods that watch over vending machines.
In my studies of the world's religions and mystic beliefs I will admit I have yet to come across any gods, goddesses, saints, or any deities for that matter that govern the relationship of humans and vending machines.
Ah, but yes, chocolate is "the food of the gods" and the word vending is from the French verb vondu, and the novel Chocolat takes place in France. Mais oui, this is no accident, this is providence speaking to me. For what does it say beneath that little Masonic pyramid on the back of the almighty dollar? Novus ordo seclorum. Once again from Virgil: "A new order of the ages." Yes, a new relationship between human and vending machines, and it's going to start right here off Interstate 74 on a hot and humid Indiana afternoon, and I, yes, I am the chosen one!
I straightened out my crumpled bill as best as I could. Doing my thing to appease the gods I choose a Mars Bar and placed my legal tender once again into the machine. Once again it was accepted. As I punched E-8 I did wonder if there was a video camera watching me as I pulled one over on this aged vending machine located between West Harrison and St. Leon, Indiana.
Boom, the Mars Bar descends to the pit and the dollar is once again vaulted out of the machine. Staying with my planetary theme my next choice was a Milky Way, and sure as you're born (they talk that way in America's heartland) it comes to rest with the Snickers and the Mars Bar, and yes, my dollar is back as well.
This was indeed a wondrous and exciting experience. No time to ponder the universe. It's 95 degrees and 90 percent humidity. I had to work fast. In time another good American might want the services of this generous machine. Should I go on?
Hmm, I thought, what other candy bars have names of planets or gods? Fifth Avenue, Goobers and Idaho Spud were not celestial names at all. and Nut Guddie, Salted Nut Roll and Sesame Snaps didn't make it to my wish list either. Ah, but what about Skor? I do believe there was a famous Danish astronomer with that last name. I pressed D-5 and Skor dropped down to rest with all my day's booty, and my magic dollar once again returned.
Oh here's a good one--Starburst, but it's only $.60. Oh what the heck, I thought, I'm five bars to the good. I'll risk it. Yes, the Starburst came down, the dollar came back, and $.40 dropped down into the change dish. This event brought an entirely new dimension to this ever so exciting episode.
Was I slowly crossing the line between misdemeanor and felony? Could this possibly lead to my incarceration in a small Indiana town? As there are no federal prisons in Indiana, my next choice was a Starburst Fruit Twist for eighty cents.
Yes, I'm $.20 more to the good, my dollar is back, and my candy stash is growing.
I decided Skittles sounded planetary enough, yet as I was busy funneling the greenback into the machine I did have what can only be described as not a pang of conscious but perhaps a ping. Am I committing an immoral act? I looked at the machine, and it was looking back at me . I thought of all those times I poured money into a vending machine and received nothing at all. That one in St. Paul that I had placed six quarters in, the Coke machine at the Hilton in Los Angeles, a coffee machine that delivered nothing in east New York. Then I thought of all my friends and all the vending machines around this globe that basically took their coins and returned nothing. I raised my head to the humid Midwestern sky and had a small epiphany.
This isn't just about me, It's about everyone on this planet who at some time in their lives tumbled their hard-earned silver into one of these machines and came up empty. When all is said and done these machines are conspiring against us all.
I'm not committing a crime. I'm helping to level out all the vending machine karma for all my friends. I am only a servant of all those whom I have loved and those who have loved me.
I estimated that if I kept going I could basically empty out the machine and clear $30 or so, but alas, that would take between two or three more hours.
And the possibility was there for getting busted. What would the charge be? Premeditated pilfering of a candy machine? What if the bill was counterfeit and I was sent to Leavenworth or another big-time federal prison for cleaning out a candy machine? I could just hear all the guys on the cell block making fun of me, "Hey look there goes Mr. Sweet Tooth." No, that wouldn't work at all.
It was time to end my life of crime here in America's heartland.
I took the Mars Bar and the Snickers and decided to leave the rest for some lucky kid. I waited around for a few minutes just so I could experience the joy of the finder of my stash, but as I did I started to feel like a suspect. So I hit the road, west on 74 to Bloomington with couple a candy bars, $2 in change and the lucky dollar resting ever so triumphantly in my pocket.
I found myself nervously looking in the rear view every few minutes as my tires rolled on down the asphalt. Perhaps a little old Indiana man was watching me through his little Indiana binoculars from his RV and called the state police. Every squad car in the Hoosier state is now on the lookout for the--what would they call me? Perhaps the legal authorities would give me a cool nickname like "The Sweet Tooth Bandito" or "Mars Bar Murphy" or better yet "Le Voleur du Chocolat."
I felt a little more at ease as I departed the interstate for 46 west, a smaller and more inconspicuous route. And I soon arrived in Bloomington, checked into my hotel, and got ready for the harp convention.
I was fondling my lucky dollar like a totem as I walked down the hall to the elevator, when, out of the corner of my eye I saw them. Six gleaming brand new vending machines. I could feel my dollar slither through my fingers like a snake approaching its prey. Hmm, I thought, these look a lot more state of the art than the that old one I knocked off back on the interstate. My brain said no, but my dollar said "Go, go to the machines, let me perform my magic once again. I will will bring you untold sugar-filled treasures from within the metal bowels of these icons of capitalism."
Well, as they say ,"money talks," and my magic dollar was saying it was once again time to let the genie out of the bottle.
Ok, I will start mellow with a one dollar bottle of water; the dollar agreed and eagerly slid into the slot of the gleaming new vending machine.
The water came down with a thud, the machine hesitated just like before, but, alas, it probably had a newer chip in it, one that could see through the gravy stain on the little Masonic eye and the red dot on George's head.
It did not bother this factory-fresh machine that my American eagle looked like a wild turkey, for it gobbled it up, and now the magic dollar was mine no more, resting ever so comfortably with all its brother and sister dollars in the Marriott Raintree Hotel in downtown Bloomington Indiana.
As I snapped off the top of my magic dollar's work, I took a long hard drink and I realized that my short Midwestern career in crime had come to an end.
(C) Gourd Music 2003