The Captain, The Witch and The Writer

The first time I saw her, she had a green face, a long, sharp nose that looked more like a weapon, and she told Dorothy, “I’ll get you, my pretty. And your little dog, too.” She was a witch and she scared me. I almost dropped my box of Jujubees. Fortunately she eventually melted into a puddle with only her pointed hat resting on top.

The next time I saw her she was sitting in a chair, sans green face and  hat, talking to Captain 11. That was in the studio of Channel 11, next door to the Chase Hotel. I worked there at some lowly  writing and producing job for $40 a week. Minimum wage. Twenty years had passed and I was meeting Margaret Hamilton, the Wicked Witch of the West. This was probably 1961.

I had forgotten all about this event until I came across a couple of old photos in an envelope recently, while attempting to “organize” my stuff. Hercules had an easier time with the stables. (My lone, pathetic reference to Greek mythology). Margaret was a charming, graciouis guest and still making movies, though I don't know what she was doing in St. Louis.

The Captain was Harry Fender, a former St. Louis detective and host of a late night radio show from the Steeplechase Lounge of the Chase Hotel. His claim to fame was that he had turned down an offer from Florenz Ziegfield to appear in the opening of a new musical on Broadway when he was just a boy. The show was “Showboat.” 

Now Harry wore a white wig, an ill-fitting sea-captain’s uniform, and did his best to entertain little kids on the daily TV show, which was “live” and showed old Dick and Larry cartoons, and Three Stooges shorts.

The program was “Captain 11 and JoJo,” and his partner was Joe Cuscanelli, a young man with a beautiful operatic voice who had taken the part of Captain 11’s foil just to pay his bills. He disliked children almost as much as Harry did.

Margaret, of course, held the children spellbound. As she did me and everyone else in the studio, including Harry and Joe. After all, this was one of the great villains of the day, maybe even of the century. I didn’t get her autograph; I didn’t have my picture taken with her. I just shook hands, said "hi," and stared at her, surprised at how young she was. 

Maybe I was still afraid of her awesome power, that she would turn the flying monkeys loose or strike me with a bolt of lightning. I think I would have preferred meeting the Cowardly Lion. Now he was a funny guy.

A Case for Dooley Downs

We all know the economy is in grim shape. Revenues are down, expenses are up. What’s a fella to do? Well, in the case of Chuck Dooley, the answer is simple: cut your expenses. I learned that in Accounting 101. Which I got a D in, by the way. The other method is to increase income. I’ll get to that part. 

Dooley, in case you don’t live in The City by the Arch, is the County Executive for St. Louis County. 

Doctor Dooley intends to remedy the situation by closing several St. Louis County parks. We’ve heard lots of news coverage on that one. Angry letters to publishers and media and websites. Vocal opposition en masse. “Don’t close our parks,” they say. “We need our parks.” Well, maybe “yes,” maybe “no.”

It would be helpful to look at it from the other side. You know, walk a mile in my shoes, or something like that. So here I am walking in Dooley’s Cole Haan slip-ons, and I’m thinking, “Hmmm, close the parks. Maybe close a whole lot of parks. We’ve got too many anyway. Empty land just sitting there. Think of all the money that’ll save. And I seldom have time for a picnic.”

So I’ve come around to Professor Dooley’s point of view. He’s right. Close ‘em up. Lock the gates. But he doesn’t take the idea far enough. He needs a bold vision, a significant and non-retractable stroke to shape the future. Well, here it is -  my bold vision to address the lack of monetary balance in the County budget right now. First, we close ALL the parks. Lay off all those people who keep the parks clean, cleared, trimmed, patched, accessible and whatever else they do. But don’t fire the folks at the top. The ones who tend to the parks from their desks. Keep them on your administrative staff. Maybe even add some staff (More about that in a minute).

Let’s face it, who needs parks? They just use up a lot of space. Who needs to walk or sit or run or bike, have a picnic when the weather’s nice? Crazy stuff like meditate and write poems and feel closer to whatever is out there or up there. That’s lazy stuff, isn’t it? No productivity in that.  And what we need now, more than ever, is productivity. I’m sorry, but walking your dog on a beautiful spring day, looking at new leaves emerging from winter, hearing the twitter of little birds and the rustle of a slight breeze.... what kind of income do you think that actually produces? “Not a feeble farthing,” as Dickens said.

So, Mr. Dooley, here’s my vision, and you can have it. Free. Close all the parks. Cut down all the trees. Sell the lumber. (estimated income: $3.76 million). Rescind any charter or agreement that holds the parks sacred and protected, and sell the land to real estate developers. But with a codicil in the public interest: Only “green” construction. (estimated income: $568 million). Levy a tax on the construction there: condos, retirement centers, malls, sports arenas, casinos. (estimated annual income: TBD but huge).

There you have it, Mr. Dooley. More money than you ever knew what to do with. And what do you do with it? Why, that grand plan to build Dooley Towers in the heart of Clayton. A 45-story building to house your administrative staff. Even add a few people just to maintain a sense of self-respect and to reward some political allies. A building worthy of Dubai, with your name in neon at the very top. With plenty of money left over.

That leaves all those people... and, really, just how many are there? .... who want a place to walk or wander or sit around. Just like the song in West Side Story says, “there’s a place for them.” Use all that empty space that was once parking lots for abandoned Wal-Marts and Targets and Shop ‘n Save and Builder’s Square and Circuit City. Paint paths on them, add an occasional PortaPotty, stick a few folding chairs around for those that insist on sitting, and maybe hang some stuffed robins and blue jays from the parking lot lamp posts. 

Call them Dooley Downs. 

See how simple that was? Dooley Downs. Followed by Dooley Towers. It proves if you just apply that old American ingenuity, no problem is too big to overcome. 

A Pasta Thanksgiving

Some traditions are meant to keep, others to be - if not broken - slightly revised. So it was with our Thanksgiving. We kept the tradition of "family" alive by meeting our daughter and son in New York City over the weekend. Holly lives there, Gregg flew in from Chicago. As one cab driver told us, in his melodious mix of Chinese and English, "Thanksgiving is for families, Christmas is for staying home." Not once did he mention "shopping."


Thanks to a friend of Holly's, we watched the Thanksgiving Day Parade, aka Macy's Parade (speaking of shopping), from the 25th-floor rooftop of a condo building on Central Park West. The Tradition continued. Here's what it looked like.

After all, what's Turkey Day without Kermit, Ronald MacDonald and Spiderman? Talk about tradition: there was no Shrek or Buzz Lightyear or even a Twilight-style Vampire. Some lines you just don't cross. This was the first time I'd seen this event in person. Years past, I watch about 10 minutes on TV until the football game starts or I go back to sleep, usually the latter. I much prefer it in person, with my family, from the top of a building, away from the riff-raff, on a mild, sunny day with a Central Park in color transition across the way, the towers of Manhattan stacked to the south, and 3 days ahead of me in The Big Apple or, today, The Big Drumstick.

Well, not really a drumstick. This is where the tradition ends. We gathered for Thanksgiving dinner at a marvelous little Italian restaurant near The Village, picked out by Holly. Pepolino is one of those small, cozy, family-run restaurants that have no ambition to enlarge, add-on, modify, improve. It's perfect as-is. Our waiter did the Italian thing beautifully, heavy accent but clear enough to make out the important words, like "specialty," "delicious," "vino," and "here's your bill."

We all had pasta. Home-made. I remember my veal lasagna; never had anything like it and want it again. You know what? I did not miss my usual turkey leg, dressing, yams, and pumpkin pie. I can always get that at Denny's.

A final note on Thanksgiving: Small's. A small, downstairs jazz club in The Village, which featured a progressive quartet, led by a young bald guy on bass and a balding, older guy on tenor in an unattractive long-sleeve shirt decorated with bass (fish, not instrument), with a mother of a piano player and hard-swinging, tasty drummer. Small's, as in "small world." The owner went to the same high school I did, U. City. Only he graduated three decades later. Some things just happen, right? How did we end up talking about high school in a jazz bar in the Village? That's a story for a different time.

Yes, it was a Thanksgiving for the books, traditions and all. 

A Pause Before the Turkey

It's been a tough year, right? And it's not over yet. But looking back over the past 11 months, there are a few things I will not give even a small "thanks" for. 


Let's start with the weather. In a word, it sucked. Except for a stretch of 3 or 4 weeks in late summer/early fall. But how about those tornadoes? I used to think it'd be cool to see one, for real, not on the weather channel or a high-budget sci-fi flick. No more. Anytime the skies begin turning green, the wind picks up, and distant sirens wail, I'm going to head for the basement and watch a stack of old movies on my hand-powered DVD player. 


Autumn was colorless, thanks to lack of rain. Winter hurt. Especially at 10 at night when my dog expects a walk. This winter I'm training her to use the flush toilet. And think of the plastic poop bags I'll save. 


The weather has become as unpredictable as the stock market. 


Onward to the Economy: Jobs. Demonstrations. Greed. Madoff Fall-out. China. The new four-letter dirty words: Bank. Debt. Rams. And a St. Louis County Executive who thinks the answer to balancing the budget is to close up County Parks, at the same time he's hiring administrative staff. An advanced case of muddled priorities. 'Nuff said.


Politics. The End of Bipartisanship. Ugly undercurrents. Nasty sound bytes and angry faces. Don't get me started. 


So here is what I give thanks for. My wife, my kids, my dog, my health. Good friends. My brother. The Cardinals. The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. An occasional good movie and even some good TV, as in Dexter, Homeland, and the new Woody Allen doc. Good jazz available on a limited basis, the St. Louis Symphony, the blues (hear 'em, not have 'em), a right shoulder that still lets me serve and hit an occasional forehand winner. Sumatriptin (if you get migraines, you know what I'm talking about). And the joy of writing, which I don't do nearly enough of but enjoy when I do. Like this one.


Happy Thanksgiving.

The Talk We Need - A Veterans Day Thought

There's a lot of talk these days everywhere you turn. Sometime taking a position, giving an opinion, analyzing a situation, criticizing someone. On TV and radio, on cell phones. Even cartoons, if you believe that. An article in the NY Times says cartoons these days are loaded with dialogue while lacking movement. They're right. Road Runner doesn't talk, neither did Tom and Jerry. They moved, we laughed. Then of course there's Charlie Chaplin who made the world laugh and cry without saying a word.


So what's the point of this diatribe? Veterans Day. Today. Look back more than six decades ago, to World War 2. A lot of our troops never came home. Sadly, tens of thousands died in Europe and the Pacific. Most of our men came home though. But there's a sadness in that as well.  Because so many of them never talked about what happened there, what they saw, how it affected them.  And what they carry with them now, more than 60 years later.  It’s not easy for them to talk about their experiences, especially to their families.  But isn’t it a shame that these men who earned the right to talk have chosen to keep it all in?  Tim Russert of “Meet the Press” said they possess a “quiet eloquence.”  I like that.  Quiet eloquence.

I used to play senior softball with a guy named Charlie. He’s 85 years old now. I told him about a book I had read, called “Flags of Our Fathers.”  It’s the story of a young man who learns that his dad was one of the six guys who raised the flag on Iwo Jima in 1945.  He found out about it after his dad had passed away.  Charlie said, “Gerry, I was on Iwo  too.”  He surprised me.  I knew he was a Marine, but not much else.  I asked him if he’d ever told his wife or his kids about what he went through.  He said, “They never asked, they didn’t seem interested.  Anyway we were just doing a job.”  Quiet eloquence.  Still, I could feel there were undercurrents in his life he didn’t want to acknowledge.

I wonder how many stories and memories are locked up.  How many sons and daughters, and grand children, will never know what Pop or Grandpa went through.  Time keeps on moving.  The older we get, the faster it moves.  I hope there’s time for these men to bring their families into their past.  I hope they talk about it.  It’s the kind of talk we need.

Whole Lotta Chewin' Goin' On

Watching the Cardinals beat the Brewers last night, I was struck by three things. First, how far the Birds have come since August, when they had been counted out. (I was among the counters). Second, how exciting it was to have a World Series again in St. Louis. Forget the fact that Standing Room tickets on StubHub are going for $400, so if you want an actual seat, you'll need to check on your home equity line of credit. And third - and the reason for this post - is how many guys were chewing bubble gum. Did you see them? Grown men, getting millions of dollars a year, dressed in spiffy uniforms, blowing the big pink orbs, popping them on camera. I can't say bubble gum was in the majority. An awful lot of guys were spitting sunflower seeds on cue. (An aside: Who's the guy that comes in after the game and sweeps up all those shells. And does he sell them on eBay?)


Here's my big wonderment: Why are there no bubble gum commercials in the games? Talk about product placement, you couldn't ask for better. It's almost as prevalent as bottles of Bud in a bar scene. So I spent a little Google time on bubble gum. I thought, there should be an official bubble gum of Major League Baseball. Well, surprise. There is. No, not Dubble Bubble or Topps. It's Big League Chew. Made by Wrigley. Invented, in 1980 by two teammates on the Portland Mavericks. Rob Nelson and Jim Bouton. According to Bouton, he saw Rob chewing bubble gum, and Rob said to Jim, "Too bad they don't sell this kinda stuff." And Jim, a go-for-it kinda guy, said "Great idea, Rob. I'll put up the money if you make it." The rest is chewing gum history. They made their bubble gum, took it to Wrigley, and now, 30 years later, one-half BILLION bags have been sold. 

I just wonder how many more bags they'd sell if they advertise. Unusual business move here: Wrigley sold the distribution rights to Ford Gum and Machine Company, of Akron, NY, in 2010. And now for the change-of-pace. It's made in Mexico.

Here's what it looks like, just in case you want to try a "chaw." Big League even has a theme line. "You're in the big leagues when you're into Big League Chew."

In case you're wondering if only baseball players chew Big League, take a look at this. I'm going to run over to Walgreen's and big me a bag.

AUGUST 18

Several years ago I found myself in a second-hand bookstore in Independence, Missouri. A small, storefront kind of place on the town square, within shouting distance of Harry Truman's home. I wasn't looking for anything in particular. A used bookstore just seemed the right place to be in a town with as much history as this. 


In between the shelves and stacks of books, shoved against a faded brown wall, I saw a couple of bins of old photographs. I'm fascinated by those old black and white shots. They carry an innate power that transcends the decades, as though the people and places still exist in some other realm. I flipped through one bin, stopping occasionally to examine a face or a building. Then I noticed that the other bin held some panoramic photos. The long kind, taken with a special camera. I took more time to look at these.


That's when the line of doughboys stopped me, held my attention. Here was a picture of a company of American soldiers about to embark for Europe and the bloodletting of World War One. The date on the photo was August 18, 1917. America was entering the war, about a year before it ended. I bought it.

When I got home, I framed the picture. It hangs on the wall in my office, where it's been for the past 15 or 20 years. I remember the date. It's today. A special day for me. Today the picture carries more meaning than ever, because I have just finished reading a new history of WWI. "To End All Wars" by Adam Hochschild. Powerful stuff, beautifully written, important. 


One of the poets to write of the War was Siegfried Sassoon, who served valiantly in the British army. Here is the final stanza of his poem "The Troops": 


"...And through some mooned Valhalla there will pass
Battalions and battalions, scarred from hell;
The unreturning army that was youth;
The legions who have suffered and are dust."


And I wonder how many of those beautiful young men from Company A, 1st NY Infantry, at Utica, NY, all smartly uniformed and fit and ready to fight, I wonder just how many came home, sound of body and mind. That company of men all in a row on that special day. August 18. My birthday.