PhillySpeak.com

Since my early twenties I have always found the time between Christmas and New Year’s as an opportunity to evaluate my life and make some resolutions.

It is the time of the winter solstice when we say farewell to the dying light and are given hope for its return. Cold as it may be, as little sun as we may get, the days are growing longer, the sun coming more into our day to day.

Even in a city like Philadelphia, that has generally mild winters, the wind at night can blow cold. As you walk you feel your legs getting numb cold and the harsh wind lashes your face. A scarf up around your nose and mouth convinces you more of the icy cold as your glasses fog up and the warmth of your breath against the scarf begins to ice up. It is bitter cold and as I force my way towards home my mind wonders if it is this cold in the grave.

Better to become ashes, swirling around the universe or warm on some mantle.

Perverse thoughts for this joyous season. Yet, is it not true it is the threat of death that wakes us to the thrill of today?

In my warm home I wonder and mosey about these thoughts, as dark as the turning of the solstice.

Some traditions offer you an after-life sitting on a cloud and playing a harp. Others, praising a divine being forever and ever. Perhaps if I become one with the divine and have a full share in the glory of creating and being, it could be interesting. Creating a stream in a wood where a young person might discover a flower or fish from a bank could be enticing. But how many times can you do that?

It all seems so heavy. So much like a spelling bee in grade school. One you have studied for and still do not win. You came in second or third or lost because you did not say the word before you correctly spelled it.

Some traditions offer you the crap shoot of moving up or down the ladder until you reach perfection. If I am a snail I am not so sure moving up or down is going to be much fun.

So, during this time of new Christmas life and the start of a new year, I am thinking about the end.

I want to make some changes in my life. Not because of some possible after-life but because I just want to do better in 2009 than in 2008.

Any resolutions I have made about eating and weight loss have never amounted to much. But, in all honesty, I have made some changes that may have started with these kind of yearly assessments.

I no longer drink whole milk, salt plays a smaller role in my food, as does fatty foods. But none of that has lead to much weight loss.

People hungry in the world, starving in some countries, I have to think about this food stuff. Is it a curse or a blessing? For me, it is both.

The Mahatma did not like chicken, so he ate only chicken, in an attempt to get control of his cravings and taste. Eventually, after a year or so he learned to like chicken, a lot.

I have a Republican friend, honest to god, and he is always saying how he is not a victim and will not be a victim. But I would suggest having too much can make you as much a victim as having too little.

A treacherous balance we live in our wealth filled United States.

I write a lot in this blog about restaurants and things that are fun to do while visiting or living in Philadelphia. Do not think I am out each night and seek a party everyday.

Enjoying the wonderful opportunities this city and country offer is only good and sweet with the balance of the reality of others lives.

The resolutions with which I have the most success are non-food or weight related or exercise related things.

One year I resolved to read 12 books. That worked out pretty well and was challenging and fun.

My resolutions are not earth shattering. They will probably not change the world. But I am not seeking to change the world, just trying to improve myself. And really, just for myself.

I am not yet finished assessing this past year. I’m not sure what I want to attempt to change, try and make better or try something new for the coming year.

I do not even call them resolutions but goals. I know when making them I might not succeed or only half succeed, but one must try. And even if I do not succeed this year, maybe I will be given the opportunity to get better next year.

So this year, after writing and producing this blog, week after week, I am wondering if I need to become somewhat more insulated. I need to feed me a little more than you.

I also want to read more poetry. I think it would be good to memorize four poems this year. I also want to listen to the human voice reciting poetry.

I am going to continue to enroll in a Temple University non-credit course, ‘Books You Wish You Read.’ I like the people, the books, and it keeps me from becoming isolated.

I am going to continue to gather my family for Chowder Festival on L.B.I.

Barbara and I have to get away by ourselves for at least two weekends outside of Philadelphia.

Visit a museum I have not been to over the past five years.

I want to learn how to download family pictures onto CDs and maybe even learn how to integrate them with words and music. Have to do this.

Go to NYC for a day, at least, and visit a museum.

Gotta work day by day getting my home in order. Like my smart cousin Doc advises, you do it a box at a time, a day at a time. At the end of the year you have taken care of 365 boxes. Gotta love the simple wisdom in that.

I have to get back into fishing. My goal is to go at least three times during this year.

Some goals have already begun. We rejoined the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
My, our, goal is to go to at least six Friday night Jazz concerts, and visit each room in the museum at least once during the course of the year.

Go to a First Friday in Old City at least once. (That is always a good time.)

Visit a museum in Philadelphia, one in which I have never been.

For a Christmas present I got Barb and I a gift certificate for brunch at the Four Seasons. We have not treated ourselves to that most enjoyable of days in a few years.

Well, this is just the start of my list of goals. I will add at least ten or so more things to the list, getting together with friends, going to the race track and lots of other things. Too many to list here.

I feel positive about my list of goals for this year. Some I will complete, some I will start, some will be put off until next year.

Guess Iif I keep http://PhillySpeak.com we all could follow along and share the experience.

How Lucky Are We.

Each News Year’s Eve my family gathers at my sister’s home. We say goodbye to the old year and hello to the new year with some of the most important people in our lives- past, present and future.
Jean, Charlie, Brianna, Barbara, Joe, Joseph, Rachel, Douglas, Krysanna and Kevin.

Sure, there were years when we thought going out to dinner or a club, waiting for the year to end and a new one begin, could only be fun filled with a room full of strangers and loud band music, too many drinks, and the colorful entrapments of a pretend ending and beginning.

WHEW! WHEW! Girls and guys yelling…. HAPPY NEW YEAR…WHEW! WHEW!
KISS ME BABY!

Each of us in our turn and our experience came to realize the real fun of celebrating the end of a year and the beginning of a new one could best be celebrated with the people you mostly went with through the year, and would probably go with through the coming new year.

Boring but true. It sure as hell won’t be with the bartender or the guy you grab at midnight to play tonsil hockey with and wake up the next day with a cold sore on your lip. I hope it is a cold sore.

We gather around 6 pm and start playing board games as well as Wii games. In the background are songs from our past. There are laughs at past mistakes, stories about our past and hopes for our futures. Always some decent Champagne, good people, food we can eat while playing the family games- pizza, great lunchmeat sandwiches, (are there better rolls anywhere outside of Philadelphia?) gumbo, pulled pork.

We have learned to K.I.S.S.- keep it simple, stupid. We have become wise through the years and learned it is we that make the party and the drink, music and food are just the background notes to our song of life.
My sister Jean and I were taught and accepted this lesson from my mom, her sisters and brothers-in-law. We are privileged to have learned the lesson.
Our children learned as fast as ourselves about how to celebrate New Year’s Eve. Our spouses were graceful enough to see the wisdom.

I am a very lucky person to be among those I love, feeling comfort and joy, saying farewell to the old year and hoping for the very best in the New Year.

It is mostly we who bring happiness to any of our years, we who bring concern and sometimes sadness, and we who make our good times better and sad times less.

I am a very lucky person, year after year, for so many years, to ring out the old year and bring in the new with my sister Jean, my brother in law Charlie, my niece and goddaughter Brianna, my lover and best friend Barbara, my sweetheart Krysanna and my new son Kevin, my number one son Joseph, and my new daughter Rachel and my son and buddy Douglas.

It does not get any better.

Happy New Year, 2009.

How Lucky Are We.

There is nothing more frightening then losing a child in a big city shopping mall. You are looking at sweaters with the child at your side and all of a sudden he is no longer there.

You may have read in the local papers or heard on the news about four and a half year old Robert Achtog ( Bobby ) who was separated from his 61 year old grandfather at the very large and popular King of Prussia Mall, just outside of Philadelphia.

The ever vigilant mall police realized as soon as they saw the little mop topped child with tears in his eyes he was lost. They also realized and knew there was a parent in great stress about being separated from their child.

This is what being a mall cop is all about. Officer John Sterns and his partner, officer Lenny Portman, approached the child and convinced little Bobby they were there to help.

The two officers took little Bobby to the communications room, settled him down with ice cream and soda, and their professional training.

Slowly and gently they were coaxing the facts out of four and a half year old Bobby.

….”and who are you at the mall with Bobby?” asked officer Sterns.

“My pop-pop.” says little Bobby.

Hoping for a description the officer asks, “And what’s your pop-pop like?’

Little Bobby thinks for a moment, while he swings his feet under the chair and takes a lick of his ice cream.

Officer John, gently asks, “again, what’s your pop-pop like?”

Little Bobby looks at him and says in a clear voice,

“Pop-pop likes ‘Jack on the Rocks’ and girls with big tits”

This has nothing at all to do with Christmas or any other holiday. I do not even know if they are true but they should at least raise a smile. Can’t ask for more then a smile around the holidays. Enjoy.

These 12 are actual comments made on students’ report cards by teachers.
All teachers were reprimanded but, boy, are these funny!

1. Since my last report, your child has reached rock bottom and has started to dig.

2. I would not allow this student to breed.

3. Your child has delusions of adequacy.

4. Your son is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot.

5. Your son sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them.

6. The student has a ‘full six-pack’ but lacks the plastic thing to hold it all together.

7. This child has been working with glue too much.

8. When your daughter’s IQ reaches 50, she should sell.

9. The gates are down, the lights are flashing, but the train isn’t coming.

10. If this student were any stupider he’d have to be watered twice a week.

11. It’s impossible to believe the sperm that created this child beat out 1,000,000 others

12. The wheel is turning but the hamster is definitely dead.

These 16 were taken off actual police car videos around the country:
[these are some mighty ‘quick witted’ cops!]

16. ‘You know, stop lights don’t come any redder than the one you just went through.’

15. ‘Relax, the handcuffs are tight because they’re new. They’ll stretch after you wear them awhile.’

14. ‘If you take your hands off the car, I’ll make your birth certificate a worthless document.’

13. ‘If you run, you’ll only go to jail tired.’

12. ‘Can you run faster than 1200 ft/second? Because that’s the speed of the bullet that’ll be chasing you.’

11. ‘You don’t know how fast you were going? I guess that means I can write anything I want on the ticket, huh?’

10. ‘Yes, sir, you can talk to the shift supervisor, but I don’t think it will help. Oh, did I mention that I’m the shift supervisor?’

9. ‘Warning! You want a warning? O.K., I’m warning you not to do that again or I’ll give you another ticket.’

8. ‘The answer to this last question will determine whether you are drunk or not. Was Mickey Mouse a cat or a dog?’

7. ‘Fair? You want me to be fair? Listen, fair is a place where you go to ride on rides, eat cotton candy and corn dogs and step in monkey poop.’

6. ‘Yeah, we have a quota. Two more tickets and my wife gets a toaster oven.’

5. ‘In God we trust, all others we run through NCIC.’

4. ‘How big were those ‘two beers’ you say you had?’

3. ‘No sir, we don’t have quotas anymore. We used to, but now we’re allowed to write as many tickets as we can.’

2. ‘I’m glad to hear that the Chief (of Police) is a personal friend of yours. It’s good to know someone who can post your bail.’

AND THE WINNER IS….

1. ‘You didn’t think we gave pretty women tickets? You’re right, we don’t.
Please sign the ticket at the bottom.
———————————————————————-

One evening a Husband, thinking he was being funny, said to his wife, ‘Perhaps we should start washing your clothes in ‘Slim Fast’. Maybe it would take a few inches off of your butt!’

His wife was not amused, and decided that she simply couldn’t let such a comment go unrewarded.

The next morning the husband took a pair of underwear out of his drawer. ‘What the Hell is this?’ he said to himself as a little ‘dust’ cloud appeared when he shook them out.

‘April’, he hollered into the bathroom, ‘Why did you put Talcum Powder in my underwear?’

She replied, ‘It’s not talcum powder; it’s Miracle Grow’

Merry Christmas.

I hate writing about things political especially so close to the holidays, but when you get down to it everything is politics, and as one of my singer song writers wrote and sang, so I guess I’ll have to do it while I’m here.

So far in 2008 over 10,000,000 (10 million) are unemployed, about 6.7% percent of available workers. That number does not include those workers who have given up on finding work.

The numbers are expected to continue to rise.

Also in 2008, $700,000,000,000 (700 billion) was taken from the American taxpayer to prop up an ass-ortment of financial institutions who through their poor risk management and greed were about to wreck the financial systems of not only the U.S, but the world.

Had to be done, so said the powers that be.

But the same ones in charge take our money to give themselves a year end bonus.

I am not going to go through chapter and verse where and to who this money went- even the government does not know! You have to do your own research on this. A.I.G. used up $240 some billion and went on a tax payer holiday. Citi Bank drank at the trough and is using the money to sponsor the new Mets Stadium.

But, like I said, do your own research- it is your tax money, your children’s tax money, your grandchildren’s tax money, and your great, possibly great great, grandchildren’s tax money.

You might ask who got fired from the institutions that made the poor decisions. You might ask if they got golden parachutes.
You might look at your 401k assets. The one you were going to use for your retirement. You might ask if the company from which you retired is going to pay you what was promised. You might take a look at your IRA.

How ya doin’ so far?

$10,000,000,000 (10 billion) a month in Iraq, over six years, that comes to a bill for the American taxpayer- a conservative estimate of $720,000,000,000 (720 billion)

China is now our landlord and standing behind them is Saudia Arabia, and our other oil drenched friends.

From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli there is no one we don’t owe.

We have paid off the Masters of the Universe from Wall Street but now we have to do something about those pesky line workers of the UAW.

The men and women who had the audacity to ask for pay parity, as they put together the stupid cars, their bosses demanded to be made.

They seem to be the horse this government will whip. The nut turning, robot operating, on-the-line men and women, putting the stupid cars and trucks together.

Break that union and all will be good.

Southwest Airlines trades around $7.50 today. Many of its employees, 7,200 ground-crew workers, haven’t had a raise since 2005. Ten-month long negotiations with these workers broke down in October.

What happened to the free market enterprise, let ‘er rip, business is good and everything will work out in the end? The greatest story never told.

Our government took it over. The Republicans, no less, nationalized the banks and investment firms.

We are all getting trickled down on.

Privatize social security, no healthcare unless you can pay for it. We are not a socialistic country, schools cost too much, teachers just have part time jobs and deserve just part time pay. Unions drive up the cost of everything. Blah! Blah! Blah! Blah!

So, how you doin’?

Need an umbrella?

But you must remember this….while you and I may disagree on this or that, the lives of those in Congress, the lives of those in the Senate, the lives of those on the Supreme court, the lives of those on FOX, NBC, ABC, CBS, and their affiliates, the owners of the press, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, Time, New York Times et al. and that other estate, the leaders of churches, their lives and their families will be little touched by any of this.

This Republican administration has made it very clear. The rich take care of the rich. It is the American taxpayer that will be left to cleanup and then given the bill.

Will the Democrats do any better? I don’t know. I have hope.

What I do know is, it is you and your fellow worker that need to look out for one another. You better forget about Republican, Democrat, religion, race, etc. and be ready to stand together for each other.

Workers need to be united. There needs to be a strong government. There needs to be an independent media. There needs to be many churches, there needs to be a strong military, and there needs to be a strong and working, united middle class.

So, how ya doin’?

Went on a chilly December evening to hear the warm songs of Tom Rush and be among warm hearted people at the World Cafe of WXPN. Some of my favorite peple were with me, Joseph, Douglas and John.

Live folk music is becoming a rare experience. Yet as my son told me around age five, “it touches me”. He was and is a people person. Perfect to appreciate folk music.

Tom Rush is always good. Songs both old and new, played on guitar in a way that is becoming a thing of the past. He uses different tunings, Still uses a capo. Still able to use a glass bottle on his finger to make sounds most can’t. He uses tonic chords and plays guitar as a part of his total voice like few can. Like this.

Listening to the songs and the music as a whole reminds me of some good folks I have not seen for a bit but who are still in my thoughts and happy memories, Dave and Mac, Tom McDonald, and my fellow music makers John Colgan, and Gabe of “Uncle John’s Remedy”.

My friends that helped me make music. Very fond memories of a summer in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. I was washing dishes at the Pirates Cove, Molly, waiting tables, John pumping gas. Gabe back and forth to Philly neither here or there with his heart attached to the girl who sewed and made art out of everyday childrens clothing.

There was music practice most days and fluffernutter sandwiches. There was Marlene, who moved to Denver, Captain Beefheart, music practice, Gwen M, romps to the Maine coast, the Blue Strawberry, Kittery, Peace Naval base, York, and the music.

The stone walls were as Robert Frost described, as were the birch trees.

Most important was the poetry brought into my everyday life, my life in transition, my life in flux, my life off kilter, searching for a center, except for the music.

All of that stuff is still with me and a part of me, and informs my life today.

Live music, that was available, and inexpensive to get in and hear was very available when I was growing up. A guy or girl on a small stage, usually able to play a guitar and sing some songs from the folk and some they wrote, was a part of the everyday.

So was jazz, but that is another story.

At the Gilded Cage, run by Esther and Ed Halpern, ( now the site of the popular restaurant, ‘Friday, Saturday and Sunday’), from the stage of the ‘The Second Fret’, a small place on Sansom Street, where I first heard Phil Ochs and Dave Von Ronk and others, on the stage of the Christian Association on U of P campus, and from the the Main Point in Bryn Mawr, popular when this type of music was at the height of its popularity you could hear the music for just a few dollars and often for free.

Philadelphia Folk Song Society started the Philadelphia Folk Festival, which still goes on today.

Thing is, the music so complimented the lives we hoped to live and the dreams we wished to make come true it all became mixed up into our being. There was poetry and in the poetry were challanges, dreams and ways of looking at the world around us in a way we thought was better and different, and possible.

Yet many of the songs and poetry were quite old and the anthems of other youth of an older time.

Truth does not come with a date of experation.

Those songs touched us the same way they touched the people before us and the people that will come after us should they ever get to hear and listen.

They are the songs of the folk. They express the hopes, dreams, and failures of the ‘everyman’. They are the stories of the modern human race. The folks.

Not many venues today for singers of songs without a profit motive. Not many places for poets of song to share their gifts with other poor folks.

And please, a self indulgent song about how you felt when your cat died last week is not Folk music. It might be 50 or 100 years from now when poeple are singing the tune to their children but if not, then it was just a song you wrote about how you felt when your cat died.

If the stories, songs, style, and music of Folk Music, is not shared for free, or almost free, to all who will listen, is it still Folk music or does it just become a genre to be capitalized on by the Music Business?

What songs will you sing to your children that were sung to you. What songs will be sung to your children that were sung to your parents? What songs will we sing together?

Wxpn and Live at the World Cafe is one of the few places presenting diverse live music from around the world. Some of it makes money for them, some of it is for small audiences and some of it is for folk music and I can get there using public transportation.

Sometimes I don’t even have to leave my home or car because it is live streaming and on the radio. But being in a room with 200 other people and listening to the live music is best.
Downstairs at the World Cafe is a great room.

Tell us some places you go, to listen, to live music? Where are you finding the music and poetry to match your life of discovery?