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A Heart Upon the Wall

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The Roman historian Tacitus once said the “unfair thing about war is that victory is claimed by all, failure one alone.” Nearly 2,000 years later, John F. Kennedy put a modern spin on the idea when he described the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion. “Victory has 100 fathers and defeat is an orphan,” he reportedly said. This little history lesson is brought to you—in a roundabout way--by my dentist, who inadvertently sent me off on a musical expedition while he was preparing to put a crown of my tooth. Last week was the second round on this biting tale and kicked off with me back in the dental chair, mouth pried open, suction tube going full blast and listening to the Sirius Sixties station while Dr. Joel worked his magic on my mangled molar. Name That Tune Once again, I heard some great tunes from my childhood, including “Mony, Mony” by Tommy James, “Kicks” by Paul Revere and the Raiders, and “You Got What It Takes,” a hit for Marv Johnson in 1959, but I think Sir
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Swimming With Sharks

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Many years ago, I applied for a job as an obituary writer for the Chicago Tribune . I was sharing this news with my oldest brother, who was living in California at the time with his wife and daughter. (They have since moved to Colorado.) My niece, Victoria, who was about 8 years old at the time, and, who, of course, was listening to in on the speaker, was appalled at the idea of my potential gig. "Writing about people who died? " she said, leaning heavy on the melodrama. "How tragic! " Writing about people who died, as she put it, may sound morbid, but the obit section is the most-read section of any newspaper. As my editor at the Pocono Record once told me, “Most people only get their names in the newspaper twice in their lives: when they’re born and when they die.” I read the New York Times obit page every day--and not just for the famous names, but I also check out the lesser known individuals. A well-written obituary goes beyond one perso
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Better Choices

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My dentist was all set to start drilling when he paused inches away from my mouth. “I promised you a little more numbness, didn’t I?” I nodded my head vigorously, yes, you promised me more Novocain, so please don’t go back on your word. He picked up a massive syringe, zapped my gums and went to work moments later, while The Jarmels came over the sound system to say that a little bit of soap will never wash my tears. I will be 66 years old in a few days and all the soap in the world will never wash away those years. I need all the numbness I can get. My dentist and I are in the same age bracket, which explains his SiriusXM channel selection, so as he chipped away at my battered tooth, I got to hear Richard Harris singing about McArthur’s Park melting in the dark, and the Four Seasons telling me to walk like man. Luckily my dentist is a craftsman, and I didn’t feel any pain at all—no Marathon Man cracks, please—but I was uncomfortable as hell as he drilled and drilled.
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The Immortal Elders

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“I can imagine no heroism greater than motherhood.” —Lance Conrad Back in the Seventies my mother had a parttime job teaching ceramics to learning disabled adults at a local facility. She loved all kinds of arts and crafts and really enjoyed working with these kids. Unfortunately, she butted heads with the buttheads who ran the operation and eventually she had to leave. I forget why the managers had such a problem with my mother’s teaching style, but one thing does stand out even all these years: they were idiots. Okay, obviously, I’m a little prejudiced here as she was my mother and I’m even more sensitive since today is Mother’s Day. It must have really hurt her to lose her class, but she did stay in touch with one of the kids, Willy, and she arranged for him to visit our house once a week to work on various pottery projects. And bear in mind that she wasn’t getting paid for what amounted to private tutoring sessions. Working with Willy was all the payment she needed
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Building Castles High

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“Art is to console those who are broken by life.”—Vincent van Gogh I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. I had planned a full day on Saturday that included writing, cleaning, and decluttering my apartment. Anxious to clear up my To Do list, I promised myself that I’d stick around the house and work on my various projects rather than take off with one of my Meetup groups. It was an ambitious plan and I really thought I could pull it off. But the hours went by, the sun came out and I ended up sitting on a bench in Shore Road Park watching three absolutely adorable children chasing after bubbles. In my defense, it was a beautiful day, and these kids were just so darn cute, running around every time one of their parents sent out another wave of bubbles. It didn’t occur to me until later that sitting on a park bench watching children play is a real senior citizen move. And even though I am one, I probably shouldn’t give in to the stereotype. I got such a lift watchin
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Snip Decision

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I keep looking for the clock. For years I’ve been checking the time by the digital clock on the cable box that sat on my TV stand. It was there to let me know when to go to bed, when to go to work and how much goddamn TV I was watching. That thing was the main timepiece in my home, but I had to give it up now that I’ve finally severed nearly all ties with Spectrum and gone the streaming route like the nearly 5 million households that dumped cable last year. I say “nearly” because I retained the landline phone service since I don’t want to rely only the cell phone and, as a child of the Sixties, I’m reluctant to cut that particular cord just yet. This event has been years in the making, or, more accurately, years in the talking, as I have threatened to cut the cable for several years without taking any action. But it took a rent increase and my spiraling grocery bill to make me finally realize that my cable bill was too damn high—like $232 a month high. Spectrum w
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Knock on Any Door

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In 1959. Alfred C. Fuller, founder of the Fuller Brush Co., published his autobiography, A Foot in the Door . The title described the salesman’s technique for prolonging a conversation with a potential customer in hopes of turning the encounter into a sale. In today’s America, however, a foot in the door is liable to result in a bullet to the head. The Great American Shootout continued last week with a young woman being shot to death after she and three others accidentally turned into the wrong driveway while looking for a friend’s house in rural upstate New York. Then there was the teenager who was shot after ringing the wrong doorbell in Missouri; the two Texas cheerleaders who were shot after approaching the wrong parked car; and the six-year-old girl who was shot—along with her parents—by a neighbor after a basketball rolled into his yard. Today Fuller’s book would probably be called Death of a Salesman—and Anybody Else Who Knocked on the Wrong Door . I think of all the
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