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Screams in the Night

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It was the story I didn’t want to hear, but I’m so grateful that I did. As the years go by, I keep learning things about my late parents that amaze me. Of course, it’s not terribly surprising, since as kids we tend to worship our parents. We learn more about our folks as we move into adulthood and realize that they were just people, not superbeings who never knew fear or doubt, but mere mortals who were doing the best they could. A few years ago, my aunt told me that my mother had seen Frank Sinatra at the Paramount Theater in the 1940s. I always knew that she was a fan of Ol’ Blue Eyes, but I had no idea she had been a bobby soxer, the name of Sinatra’s virtual army of teen-aged fangirls who were known to wear the ankle high hosiery. It’s hard to imagine my mom shrieking “ Frankie! ” along with an auditorium full of her swooning contemporaries, but she wasn’t my mother yet. She wasn’t even an adult, so she had every right to enjoy this moment. I got such a kick out of this...
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Drop Zone

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"Envy is the art of counting the other fellow's blessings instead of your own." Did you ever wonder why paratroopers shout “Geronimo!” before they jump out an airplane? The question occurred to me while I was working on a story about golden parachutes, those hefty payouts that executives get on their way out the door. That name, by the way, comes from a 1961 attempt by creditors to oust Howard Hughes from control of Trans World Airlines. They provided Charles Tillinghast Jr. an employment contract that included a clause that would pay him money if he lost his job As far as invoking the name of Geronimo, that got started by U.S. paratroopers in 1940 who saw a movie about the Apache military and spiritual leader and yelled his name when they made that big step into the sky. I was thinking of working the Geronimo angle into my golden parachute story, but I didn't pursue it. However, while doing my research I came across a familiar name. We'll call him ...
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Golden Years

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Years ago, I offered my seat on the subway to an older gentleman who was standing close to me. He was using a cane and seemed to be having some difficulty, so I thought it would be a nice gesture to let him sit him down. However, he politely declined my invitation and then turned to a woman I presumed was his wife. “Do I look that bad?” he whispered to her. Now that I’m a senior citizen myself—ye gods—I’m starting to understand how this man felt. People aren’t hopping aside for me on the D train, (far from it) but one of my neighborhood businesses managed to irritate me. Now I have no trouble asking for senior discounts. Obviously, I wish I were younger, but since that’s not an option, then I will unashamedly demand my geezer markdown on my telephone bill, subway fare, even my car rentals on those extremely rare occasions when I rent a set of wheels. My supermarket has joined the fossil parade, offering a 10% discount every Wednesday to all people 65 years old and ol...
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Down These Meme Streets

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Boy, I sure hope I never see that guy again. This dude was so miserable and unhappy. Forever the victim, he couldn’t wait to tell you how he’d been wronged. The guy had a black belt in self-pity and a PhD in despair. It took a great deal of work, but I managed to push this fellow out of my life, and I don't want him coming back. Now this man wasn’t a former coworker, a neighbor, or a distant relative. No, I’m sorry to that his person was me. Specifically, I’m talking about the man I used to be years ago back when I was trouble with both my health and my career. I had gone through a bout of mononucleosis back in the Eighties and it developed into Epstein-Barr syndrome, where the mono-like symptoms would flare up repeatedly. People have some terrible times with this affliction; they’ve been forced to quit their jobs and severely curtail their lives. My condition was bad, but it paled in comparison to what these poor folks were suffering through. But nevertheless, I wa...
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On Borrowed Time

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Many years ago, I had this dream where my brother Peter died. I was in my late teens or early twenties at the time and the strange thing about the dream was that even though Peter was dead, he had somehow been given a few more hours of life. I was the only one in the family who knew what was going on and I remember sitting at the dining room table across from Peter while we both cried because we knew he’d soon be leaving us forever. It’s been so long now that I can’t begin to recall any incident that might have triggered this dream or why he had been given that lease on life. I tried writing a play about the dream, but I don’t think I ever got beyond a first draft. Peter died back in May, and I still feel this terrible gap in my life. I’ll see a story on the news or watch a TV show or movie, and I still have the urge to tell him all about it—until I realize he’s not here. I think the dream came back to me after my brother’s widow sent some photos of Peter. There’s a pictu...
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Art in Motion

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Well, that was pretty careless of me. I climbed out of the comfort zone last week by signing up for the Gowanus Open Studies 2025, which is billed as Brooklyn’s biggest celebration of local art and artists. The event features hundreds of artists across dozens of venues in the greater Gowanus neighborhood, who opened their doors for a look inside the old factory buildings that have converted to studios. I attended one of these open houses last year and I had a great time, but, of course, when the appointed day arrived, I found myself cranking out a litany of excuses for skipping the event and chilling out home alone. I’m happy to say that I had ignored the voices of defeat and headed down to the former industrial zone around the Gowanus Canal to join the other members of the Meet Up group. I have childhood memories of driving through this area with my father, before it had been yuppified, and I remember how dark and spooky the place looked. Our leader, Ron, puts together som...
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Waterworld

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The conditions could not have been worse. I rarely watch movies on airplanes, as I don’t think it’s fair to shoehorn a filmmaker’s work into those tiny screens in front of my face. And to be honest, I’m usually either so frightened of flying or so stoned on Xanax to appreciate what I’m watching. But during my recent flight home from Denver, I had just the right amount of narcotics in my system where I was calm without being comatose. I shelled out 8 bucks for a pair of headphones, checked out the cinematic bill of fare and came across Flow , an absolutely beautiful animated film that won the Academy Award for best animated feature, while also being nominated for best international feature—the first film from Latvia to do so. The film, which also won a Golden Globe Award, is a kind of visual poem that features no dialog as it tells the story of a cat trying to survive in some post-apocalyptic world that has been devastated by a great flood. The fact that I was able to lose m...
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