The Killing Shelf

Some books seem to spawn sequels like trout in a stream. Or a pond or lake or wherever the hell trout lay eggs. I'm not a fisherman so I don't know and really don't care. The subject here is books. For instance, Dummies. I don't know how it started, but now there's a Dummies book for anything you need or want. I was at PetSmart yesterday and saw "Ferrets for Dummies." Seriously. And there was a large ferret standing there, leafing through the book. No, I'm kidding.

The Chicken Soup books have just about taken over the literary world. Every possible age group, event, situation, holiday and emotional need now has a Chicken Soup book. My personal favorite is "Chicken Soup for the Athiest's Soul." Again, I'm kidding. But you get the idea.

So anyway, I was at Barnes & Noble the other day, a rare occurrence for me. While waiting to check out, I saw three books prominently displayed, all by Bill O'Reilly. They were: Killing Kennedy, Killing Lincoln, and Killing Jesus.

Which gave me an idea about the next book I'm going to write: Killing O'Reilly. (Note to the FBI, NSA, BTAF and Fox News: Don't investigate me. I'm not even thinking about killing Bill. This is a joke, albeit a bad one.) Imagine the cast of characters in this one.

Beyond that, I began to consider other possibilities for the
"Killing" series. There are the obvious choices: Killing King (as in Martin Luther); Killing Bobby (Kennedy);  Killing Julius (Caesar that is); Killing X (that's Malcolm); Killing Milk (think Harvey); Killing Lennon; and Killing Gandhi.

They'd all make good stories, being major figures enmeshed in the flow of history and the fortune of nations, at least to some degree. However, once you get to Jesus, as O'Reilly has done, everyone else is kind of in steerage, lower down on the guest list. "Oh, yes, we may have a table for you. What's that name again?"

The category of "killing" has bigger dimensions than this, however, as we have seen with Dummies and Chicken Soup. For instance, how about a book called Killing Bambi's Mother?

This could be rife with intrigue. What part did Thumper play in her death? Is Flower the skunk really so cute and innocent? And what about the gunshot we hear? Who is that? Elmer Fudd? That's an incredible twist, a Warner Brothers character works his way into the Disney realm.

While on the subject of Disney, we need a book Killing Gaston. He's the guy in Beauty and the Beast who ends up impaled on a cluster of spikes when he falls from a tower. Gaston provides us with the opportunity for some back-story. Why did he grow up the way he did? He leads an angry mob to do away with The Beast. The book would personalize some of the people in that mob, and their relationship with Gaston, and if The Beast threatened his masculinity. Of course he didn't just fall from the tower at the end; someone pushed him. We need to know.

Finally, and not to belabor the point nor bore you any further, I want to read a book called Killing Jimmy. Here we peek behind the steel curtain of the Teamster's Union and get the real story of what happened to Jimmy Hoffa.

The events that lead to the decision to get rid of him, who gave the final thumbs down or "sleeps with the fishes" pronouncement. He was last seen outside a restaurant in the Detroit suburbs. Maybe the restaurant owner poisoned him because he was a lousy tipper. Maybe it was really an accident because he had a platter of spoiled oysters. Maybe it was more in the Teamsters' style involving a back-hoe, a cement mixer ("putty putty") or an acetylene torch. The president of the U.S. at the time of the killing was Gerald Ford. For 25 years, Ford served as the Representative from Michigan's 5th Congressional district. That includes Detroit. Hmmmmm.

And so the proliferation of titles goes on and on. If I were a biographer, I would jump on any of these possibilities. But I'm not. I'm must a lonely blogger with the world at his fingertips considering the possibilities.

Which brings me back to Bill O'Reilly. Maybe it's time to start another book.

Our Town, Our Lives

Thornton Wilder wrote the play in 1938. It doesn't have much of a plot. Not much happens. There are no great conflicts, few soaring emotions and even fewer surprises. Yet the play is rightfully considered a Great American Play, consistently performed over the past 75 years. 

And for good reason. It has never lost its meaning, its power. If anything, it has gained in relevance, as those simple, quiet days of the early 20th century in Grover's Corners recede further into the distance of time and memory.

I saw a wonderful production of "Our Town" last night, presented by The Insight Theatre Company in the beautiful theater of Nerinx Hall in Webster Groves. The talented cast understood their roles to their very core. The third and final act still hits me in the gut and leaves me lingering in my seat long after the house lights have come up.

What happens in Grover’s Corners? Not much. The first act is a day in the life of the town. Much like our lives. We wake up, brush out teeth, fix a pot of coffee, a bowl of yogurt or Shredded Wheat, throw on a pair of jeans or shorts and a tee, move through the day. And suddenly it's 11 at night, we're brushing our teeth and getting into bed. 

Just as quickly, it's Friday again. And summer is over. And you're attending your 40th or 50th or 60th high school reunion.

Think back on your yesterday. Or day before. What do you remember about it? Chances are, not much. What about last week? Last month?  We pass through our days as though we’re on a float trip, daydreaming, watching the trees and shore pass by, and we're suddenly close to the end of the trip. Thornton Wilder understood how fleeting it all is, and how we never arrive at a satisfactory answer as to what it was all about.

Near the end of the play, a young woman says to her mother, pleads with her mother:

    "But, just for a moment now we're all together. Mama, just for a moment   we're happy. Let's look at one another." The young woman has died and has been permitted to return home. Her mother can't see her. Their time together has passed.

That's the point. The time has passed. As it does all too quickly for most of us. How seldom we don't "look at one another." We take for granted there will always be another day. Most of us take life for granted, seldom stopping to appreciate just how precious it is. Even as I write this, I know that an hour from now I'll be right back in that stream, letting it slip by unnoticed. But maybe if I just force myself to consider what "Our Town" meant to me, I'll remember a little more of what makes this day, and the next, and my life, so extraordinary. 

It's amazing what two hours in the theater can accomplish.

Going, going...but not gone

I couldn't let this moment in history pass without pausing to look skyward.

The article, from the Associated Press, was in today's paper on page 11. The headline read "Voyager 1 probe has left the solar system." Left the solar system!! That's not the kind of event you read about every day. NASA actually thinks it might have left our solar system a year ago but they couldn't be sure until now.

That's the kind of event I used to read about in short stories and novels, a long row of books that sat on the shelf in my bedroom. Stories by Heinlein, Van Vogt, Asimov, Clarke, Bradbury, Leinster, and others. Stories set in some distant time and place.

But now, in my lifetime, something had been sent from Earth and was now moving through interstellar space. The article states, "...the spacecraft has escaped the sun's influence and is now cruising 11 1/2 billion miles away in interstellar space."

That's a great word. "Interstellar." I can just hear Ray Bradbury saying, "See? I told you." 

So where is it going? you might ask. According to some experts, it's headed for Alpha Centarui, the nearest star. That should take about 40,000 years,  which will be about the same time the Cubs win the pennant. 

When Voyager 1 lifted off and headed for space, the year was 1977. Aboard was a gold-plated record which contained, among other sounds, some representative music of Earth. So whoever finds the ship, in whatever galaxy, in whatever eon, and unforeseen dimension, will have to have a turntable. If they do, they'll hear Bach's Bradenberg Concerto #2 in F (just the first movement. Too much Bach is not a friendly gesture); Chuck Berry singing his classic "Johnny B. Goode;" Louis Armstrong and his Hot Seven with "Melancholy Blues" - not sure why they chose that tune - and Blind Willie Johnson with "Dark Was the Night." 

No rap, no Pit Bull, no theme song from "The Sopranos." See how far we've come in the past 36 years? 

Next time you look up at the night sky and see the stars - assuming you can see through the urban haze - think about Voyager 1.

Imagine this cold, metal disc hurtling through the space between the stars. A hopeful hand reaching out from Earth, perhaps eventually to tap some alien life form on the shoulder and say, "We're here with you." Then, with a stroke of luck or technical ingenuity, that distant being will put the disc on a turntable, drop the stylus into the groove, and hear Chuck Berry's opening guitar licks as he moves into Johnny B. Goode. 
And that being will say, "Cool. I wish I could play like that.
"Chuck & "Johnny B. Goode" on Soul Train 1973

All Those Yesterdays

Yesterday has been following me.

From 1972 and 1953 and 1947. Decades ago.

Not merely yesterday.

This weekend - it started today for me - is attempting to pull me back in time.

Faces and events seem to be gathering like wind-swept leaves from an October maple and swirling about me.

Colorful but fading. Patterns but scattered. (Sorry about the trite metaphor but it’s the best I could come up with)

It began today with a large gathering for lunch at Mike Duffy's in Kirkwood.

The occasion: to celebrate the life of Ellie Ohrn. We don’t mourn death anymore. We celebrate life. 

You probably didn’t know Ellie. I barely did. She was an established writer, close to legend status, when I first worked at D'Arcy Advertising from 1972 to 1975. I was busy trying to make a good impression, come up with incredibly original creative concepts. Ellie was a writer in the group but I didn't get to know her well. My loss. After hearing what friends and family and co-workers had to say about her today, and the obit in today's Post-Dispatch, I missed the opportunity to connect with someone quite special.

So, at the lunch today, were faces from my D'Arcy past, men and women I hadn't seen in a long time, many widows now, several with walkers or canes, stooped and struggling to remain vital, deal with losses brought by aging. Yet, they were there. And several who looked remarkably well. Sun-tanned, erect, bright-eyed, sharp and gregarious. How, I wondered, did they view me?

It was a visit to yesterday, 41 years ago. No game like the ad game; no stories like those told by the men and women who fought in the trenches for market share.

The leaves of time will continue to gather over the weekend.

Dragging me back 60 years, to 1953, when I graduated University City High School.

You guessed it. Saturday and Sunday, 60 or 70 of us (including spouses) gather for our 60th Reunion. Six decades doesn't begin to blur my memories of Mr. McKinney's chemistry class. Because of him, I decided to become a chemical engineer. That got shot down after two years at Wash. U when I ran headlong into Physics and some advanced math class I have since blocked out. I still have nightmares about those two years. He was just one. There were many others. I even remember where I sat in their classes. 

I still see the long, locker-trimmed halls, smell the aroma of wax, feel the comforting warmth as I entered the school building on a frigid winter day after walking several blocks. 

High School, in retrospect, pushed me into corners of acceptance I had no interest in. Good grades, polite friends, avoidance of cigarettes and booze, engineer boots and turned up collars to be cool. Joni James and Kitty Kallen and the Four Aces and even Spike Jones. For me it was not a time to break out and announce myself, but continue the long, gradual incline to self-improvement and acceptance. And pleasing my parents.

Those faces of my U. City classmates, fortunately with name tags attached, await me this weekend.

One more significant date. Sunday. August 18th.

My birthday.

They don't mean much these days, markers I'm glad to reach but have no cause to celebrate. Dinner with my wife, a movie in a theater (not hi-def TV), a walk with our two golden retrievers if the weather stays nice. That's birthday time. No, my thoughts don't go back to the day I was born. I know I was there. The rest is legend. But I remember the apartment on Leland in the Delmar Loop when I was four. The house on Midvale across from Flynn Park, when I was six. And a goldfish I pulled out of a bowl and watched it flop on the rug until it died. I might have been two or three then. My first experience with death, though it had no name. 

So the days continue. I played softball this morning. A great morning. Hit two singles, a double, a triple, and pitched. We won, easily. The back is a little sore, but it'll feel fine tomorrow. And today will be yesterday with fond memories of that game.

What's the lesson? Adele knows what it is. I interviewed her a couple of months ago, for a video project. Adele is 101 years old. Very sharp, both mentally and physically. She lives in an assisted-living facility. "So, Adele, what's your secret?" She smiled, nodded her head. "I don't have one. I just don't think about my age."

That's the secret. And I share it with you. So even if and when those fragments of the past occasionally come skittering your way, you'll know what to do. You'll know to enjoy those times, appreciate "old friends," learn as much about yourself as you can, and then get on with your life. Just don't think about how old you are. You have better things to do.

Tomorrows in the Key of C

His name is Alex.

My reason for writing this is to ask you to do something important for him.

I first met Alex when he was 12 years old.

At the time I was host of a cable TV show called "Living Well." It ran weekly on HEC-TV. I think the total audience was 53. But the show gave me the opportunity to interview some rather interesting people, most of them seniors, because that's who the show was meant for.

So what was I doing interviewing a 12-year-old kid? Well, he was quite a kid.

Turns out Alex had a burning interest in World War II. It began when his dad took him to France and showed him the beaches at Normandy. Now Alex had made a hobby of collecting items associated with the war, even seeking out veterans. Not long after my meeting with him, Alex produced a documentary called "Six Heroes," a series of interviews with six men who had landed in Normandy on D-Day. It was an impressive effort, good enough to win him Best Documentary at the St. Louis International Film Festival that year.

Like I said, he was quite a kid.

I wish I could tell you this story has a happy ending. It doesn't.

Alex went on to better things, became a positive influence on many friends and younger people, went to college, gave his parents much pleasure. And some concerns. Alex had a tendency to drive too fast. And that's what ended part one of his story. As his parents said, "He was a meteor who shot across our skies."

That was a little more than three years ago. 

And now a new story has begun.

You see, his dad, Tom, has established Pianos for People as part of the Alex Townsend Memorial Foundation. Their mission is to put out-of-work pianos with young households, children's centers, shelters, the elderly, and everywhere that music should exist, but doesn't. 

Tom plays piano. I play piano. We both love jazz, blues, and the New Orleans stew of rhythms and harmonies. So music is one of the common bonds between us. When Tom told me about his Piano Project, I asked if I could help.

You're reading it.

I'm asking you to do a couple of things. First, if you have a piano you don't want anymore, or know somebody who does, contact the foundation. There are a lot of used pianos out there that go wanting for someone to appreciate them. Yes, pianos have souls. 

There's one more thing you can do. Pianos for People is a finalist for a grant from Monsanto. The money would help them refurbish more pianos and get them to more people. All you need to do is vote. You can do it once a day through this Monday, May 20th. Voting is not limited to just St. Louis. Wherever you live, you can vote. Here's the link:

https://www.facebook.com/growstlouis/app_515609858503649

Music has been a huge part of my life, from the time I began taking lessons at the age of 8 (yes, they had pianos back then, not just  harpsichords) until today, when I enjoy listening to Rachmaninoff's Second, Meade Lux Lewis' boogie, Peterson's songbooks, and Benny Green play with twenty fingers, or so it seems.

I know of Tom's love for music. I know what music can mean to help shape people's lives. Pianos for People is an inspired concept. Join the chorus.

That takes me to two quotes I'd like to leave you with. 

The first is by Plato.

“Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination

and life to everything.” 

The second one is by Heinrich Heine. 

"Where words leave off, music begins."

Time to cue the music.

Listen To This

They call it "Inner Jazz." The subtitle is "Exploring the Landscape of the Soul Through the Transformative Spirit of Jazz." 

It's the Jazz thing that caught my eye. It's the Inner thing that promised to add a new dimension to the proceedings. Maybe I'm just looking for more meaning of life as the months pass all too rapidly. As Maggie Smith said, when asked how it felt to be 78, "Every meal is breakfast." The email came from Carol Beth True, superb jazz pianist, teacher and friend. She was going to be part of a jazz thing at Kirkwood United Church of Christ in Kirkwood. I made a note in my calendar. Five o'clock on a Sunday is usually wide open for me. That's four hours before Mad Men and Game of Thrones come on. And with DVR, it doesn't really matter anyway, except for the ritual. Probably a throwback to "the old days" when Thursday night was Star Trek Night, Tuesday night was Dick Van Dyke night, etc. Okay, I'll go back to Sunday night being Jack Benny night on the radio. Remember radio?

Sunday afternoon church is foreign to me. In fact, church anytime is. To say it's not even on my radar screen is an understatement. Still, the confluence of jazz and some sort of soul searching sounded appealing. I went. I listened. I let my thoughts wander. The music reached deep, starting off with "Equinox" by John Coltrane and some fine tenor sax work by Cliff Aerie. The program progressed with original tunes by him and fine solo work by Carol Beth and Cliff and Dave Troncoso on bass, Kevin Gianino contributing some very tasty work on drums. Plus a young vocalist named Arianna Aerie adding her sterling voice that delicately filled the church. The last tune was one of my favorites, "Afro Blue" by Mongo Santamaria.

There's something about "live" jazz in a church that I find very moving. Especially when coupled with a message about Our Earth. 

According to the Reverend Betsy Happel, this mingling of jazz and meditation will continue once a month. I'll probably be back there next month. A different jazz group will perform. But the spirit will be the same. The program they handed out contained several quotes, two of which I especially like and repeat here. 

John Muir: "When you tug at a single thing in nature, you find it attached to the rest of the world."

Buddha: "To live a pure unselfish life, one must count nothing as one's own in the midst of abundance." 

 Sometimes you just have to stop and listen.

The Writer I'm Going To Be

I thought I was a writer, until I heard Richard Ford speak last Friday night at the St. Louis County Library as part of their Read St. Louis Program. This, however, is not a review of the event. (I’m not a critic, though I tend to be critical at times. Ask my wife.) I’m just a guy who likes to write. I've written a few things, some of which I'm happy with, others that I can never get right, most of which I know can be better. Which leads me to often wonder what it must be like to spend time with a great writer, listen to him talk about his writing and mine, hear him read what he’s written, then apply it to what I’ve written or, better yet, what I could be writing.

I’ve never taken criticism easily, but if it were Ford, I would make an exception.

I sat with Peter Carlos. He was sitting on the aisle when I got there, empty chair next to him, and I knew I’d enjoy talking with him. In the half hour we had before Richard appeared, we talked about making movies and videos and writing and editing and teaching. He does all those things. The last time I saw Peter was when I participated in a video program called “Fade Up,” which he produces at Lindenwood. It was a conversation with Mike Wall about “Tillie’s Punctured Romance,” Charlie Chaplin and my novel.

So there we were, these two bearded guys talking creative stuff while waiting for this esteemed writer to enter the packed room, which was growing warmer by the minute. The place was electric with anticipation. I’ve been to other author events there, but this one seemed to achieve a higher level of excitement. After all, Ford has won the Pulitzer and the PEN-Faulkner award.

John Dalton, himself an excellent novelist, introduced Richard with well-chosen words. (How else would you introduce a great writer?) Richard came up to the mic, talked softly, very softly, to the point that the first short story he read was almost lost to the audience. Someone suggested he talk into the mic more directly, which he did after explaining that he talks softly, which we had all figured out, and he launched into a short story he had written some time ago, called “Reunion.” It had its roots in St. Louis and takes place in Grand Central Station in NY. Then he segued into the opening pages of his latest novel, “Canada.” I’ve read the book. Listening to him read that short segment made me want to read it again. A Q&A followed.

Here are a couple of things Mr. Ford said during the evening that struck home with me. He said every writer’s duty, during the course of his writing life, is to put everything down on paper that is important to him. That doesn’t mean opinions and self-focused thoughts, but the things in your life and your world that have meaning to you and you want to say something about. Someone asked him if he’d thought about writing a children’s book or a YA book (young adult). He essentially said “no.” He said it’s not what he’s good at, nor what he wants to write. It would be strictly a “show-offy” thing, as he called it. He knows his strengths and passions, and that’s where he wants to be. He writes every day for 4 hours in the morning and 2 hours after lunch. Every day! In a little shack/hut/cottage down the hill from his home in Maine on the edge of the water - either a lake or the ocean. Doesn’t really matter. 

Richard’s from Mississippi originally but said he doesn’t write about the South because so many others have done it better than he ever could. He mentioned Eudora Welty and William Faulkner and a couple of other writers, one of whom lived in his neighborhood. “In fact,” he said, “I wasn’t even the first one on my block to win the Pulitzer.” So he moved to Michigan, to get out of the South where his non-racist attitudes were at odds with his neighbors. 

Richard maintains a wonderful sense of humor, a strict writing discipline, and the ability to see deeply into people and relationships. I’m not very good at relationships; writing about them anyway. It takes effort. Lots of it. He’s able to capture in a few carefully chosen words what it can take me a paragraph to even get close to. One of the things I could have used along the way was a mentor. Someone who would look at my work and tell me how to improve it. It doesn’t come from open mic nights. It doesn’t happen with friends. Maybe it happens with on-line writing seminars, though I don’t believe it’s personal enough. It’s a long way from the ideal: a placid retreat amidst tall, stately trees and expansive stretches of lawn, a lake or the ocean within strolling distance, and a group of people interested in writing, brought together by men and women who “have done it” and can turn a piercing eye to my pages and pinpoint the excess, the vague, the missed opportunities, as well as the strengths, the occasionally sparkling phrase, the well-developed character. 

That muse calls to me now. “Gerry, move to Greenwich Village. Be 27 years old again, catch Basie at the Vanguard, write all night, drink espresso with unshaven guys and long-tressed women. Or find that cottage in Maine, just a stone’s throw from Richard’s hut or Stephen King’s house. Or maybe discover that cozy cottage near Carmel overlooking the Pacific that needs a caretaker in exchange for rent. There’s a place for you, somewhere a place for you.”

The voice is tempting. What I plan to do, in a more realistic frame of mind, is to buy a trailer and park it on the banks of the River Des Peres, facing west. I’ll have a stack of spiral notebooks and lots of pens and pencils. I’ll also have a laptop but no internet connection. I will escape from the demands of Facebook and Twitter and YouTube and Groupon, and deliver my written masterpieces by hand, in a binder, to an agent or publisher who has been eagerly anticipating their completion. Then, as I await the royalties and reviews, and movie offers from small, independent production companies, I will return to my trailer, pour a half-tumbler of Woodford Reserve, sit in my plaid folding chair and watch the sun set over the river while listening to Bill Evans play “If You Could See Me Now.”

Then I’ll raise my glass to Richard Ford.