It has been a long time, but I do remember when I used to show up at my son's preschool, or even his elementary school as a surprise, and his eyes would go wide as he realized that daddy was there. I cherish those memories of the connection we share, specifically those that brought him across the room in a rush for a big hug. He's going to be seventeen next week. He's not rushing across the room anymore.
Not in public, anyway. And certainly not in front of his peers. This past weekend I went to see the play for which he was doing some very impressive tech work. I stood with my wife just a few feet away from where he was chatting up his fellow techies and preparing for the closing night's performance. I waited for that recognition, which finally came not from him but from a couple of his friends. I can't claim to be shocked by this change. I've been aware of it over the years and I have become increasingly aware of his at-school persona as he has made his way from grade to middle to high schools. I know what social death awaits any high school student who would race across the auditorium to embrace their parents. I get that. It doesn't keep me from dying inside, just a little.
That's because I remember what it was like to have my parents around when I was busy trying to become whoever it was that I was trying to become in high school. My parents were Band Parents, a fiercely loyal and hard-working bunch who showed up early and stayed late, sewing up uniform pants and loading vans full of equipment. My father got himself put in charge of the concession stands for home football and basketball games. I saw him almost as often as I saw many of my friends. My friends all thought he was great. He was so funny. He was so cool. Which would have been great if A) those weren't the exact things I was trying to be and B) he was my father. This generated a distance between my father and I that neither one of us ever fully understood or talked about, but it persisted until I graduated from college.
In both cases, my relationship between my son and with my father, I never doubted how close we were and how much love we shared. That foundation was laid a long time ago, and even when I can't get eye contact from my son, I know that he knows what my father knew: we are bound together. It would be indiscreet to talk about the hugs I still get from my son and the affection that is only visible when we don't have to worry about that distance we both know has to be there. I know that my father went to his grave with a kiss and a hug that I gave him at the airport just before he took his last flight. I don't mind anybody knowing that. Now. It's been a long time since I was seventeen.
Wednesday, May 07, 2014
Tuesday, May 06, 2014
The Daily Mirror
“The U.S. is a living hell as elementary rights to existence are ruthlessly violated.” Pretty tough words, especially when one considers the source: North Korea. The Korean Central News Agency report cites examples such as racial disparity, misuse of political
funds, gun violence, and widespread unemployment and poverty. Ouch, and or touche.
Of course, this is coming from the country with a record so bloody that an official United Nations inquiry recently compared its practices to Nazi war crimes. It's also the country that, just before pointing its finger in the direction of the Untied States, pointed at South Korea as holding the “world’s poorest human rights record,” topping an article that deduced the poor situation was “a product of the U.S. colonial rule,” in which “its people languish in unemployment and poverty.” Ooo, Kim Jung Snap!
But enough about them, let's get back to the whole Faux News, North Korea bureau version of things: “Its chief executive, Obama, indulges himself in luxury almost every day, squandering hundred millions of dollars on his foreign trip in disregard of his people’s wretched life." Like when Glenn Beck stirred our own conservative fervor via a sketchy and eventually proven false Indian news report that President Obama’s visit was costing two hundred million dollars a day and utilizing a fleet of thirty-four warships.
And it's not just Glenn foaming at the mouth in the service of the North Korean propaganda machine. Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee told a summit in April, “I’m beginning to think that there’s more freedom in North Korea sometimes than there is in the United States.” Careful there, Mike, you might end up putting members of the KCNA out of work.
Of course, this is coming from the country with a record so bloody that an official United Nations inquiry recently compared its practices to Nazi war crimes. It's also the country that, just before pointing its finger in the direction of the Untied States, pointed at South Korea as holding the “world’s poorest human rights record,” topping an article that deduced the poor situation was “a product of the U.S. colonial rule,” in which “its people languish in unemployment and poverty.” Ooo, Kim Jung Snap!
But enough about them, let's get back to the whole Faux News, North Korea bureau version of things: “Its chief executive, Obama, indulges himself in luxury almost every day, squandering hundred millions of dollars on his foreign trip in disregard of his people’s wretched life." Like when Glenn Beck stirred our own conservative fervor via a sketchy and eventually proven false Indian news report that President Obama’s visit was costing two hundred million dollars a day and utilizing a fleet of thirty-four warships.
And it's not just Glenn foaming at the mouth in the service of the North Korean propaganda machine. Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee told a summit in April, “I’m beginning to think that there’s more freedom in North Korea sometimes than there is in the United States.” Careful there, Mike, you might end up putting members of the KCNA out of work.
Speaking of that work: “The U.S. government has
monitored every movement of its citizens and foreigners, with many
cameras and tapping devices and even drones involved, under the pretext
of ‘national security,’” KCNA writes in reference to the NSA
surveillance scandal. It doesn’t mention that North Korea has apparently
purchased more than 100,000 closed-circuit surveillance cameras to
monitor its citizens with over the past few years. As the recent UN
assessment notes, access to information technology in the notoriously
insular country is severely restricted and censored.
Even when it's the pot calling the kettle black, like when the report points out that more than two million U.S. citizens are kept as prisoners, “the highest number in the world,” it stings just a little bit. That pot is North Korea, after all. Thanks for the lesson in humility, y'all.
Even when it's the pot calling the kettle black, like when the report points out that more than two million U.S. citizens are kept as prisoners, “the highest number in the world,” it stings just a little bit. That pot is North Korea, after all. Thanks for the lesson in humility, y'all.
Monday, May 05, 2014
Watching Your Watch Him
That's the name of one Eric Hutchinson's big hits: "Watching You Watch Him." It's also how I spent a great deal of time as I stood on the floor of San Francisco's famous Fillmore. I did gaze adoringly at my wife, as I do from time to time, but mostly I was watching the fans of Eric Hutchinson watch him.
I was given this gift of slight detachment because I won tickets to see the guy. I was briefly aware of some of his music, but I could not be categorized as an Eric Hutchinson Superfan. But I did have a very delicious opportunity to observe the Northern California Hutchead in their native habitat. Many of them were recognizable by their omnipresent smartphones. These were held aloft at regular intervals in order to take murky, shaky video of the show that they had no doubt eagerly anticipated for months. Now they were in Eric's physical presence and they wanted to be sure to capture the experience for nearly immediate uploading on Al Gore's Internet. This allows the more distant or unlucky Hutcheads to witness in low fidelity all the fun and excitement that their bandwidth would allow.
Don't get me wrong: I danced. I laughed. I sang along. I sang along even though I wasn't privy to the lyrics of Eric's entire catalog, as some around us were. As many around us were. I was just keenly aware of the distance between my wife and I who had gone out on a lark and those who were there on a mission. I enjoyed myself, but not in the same way I would at, say, a Bruce Springsteen show. Hutcheads would be aghast at my over-the-top behavior at an E Street Band concert. I've embarrassed myself, family and friends at those events, so why should I be so judgmental about a crowd of twenty-to-forty-somethings hopping and bopping to their Crocodile's rock?
I suppose it came down to this: I won these tickets for knowing the title of an obscure Nicolas Cage film and having access to a phone at seven fifteen in the morning. I had a couple apples from the tub near the door and a Reuben sandwich at the cafe upstairs before the show. When I went downstairs, we waited just a few minutes and milled with the rest of the throng until the lights went down and Eric hit the stage with his band. I had fun. I will probably buy a few more songs, bringing my Hutchinson Hit Parade to nearly a full album. But I won't be doing what my wife suggested we do as we walked up Fillmore, the street, at the end of the night. Spying a slightly used RV by the curb, she asked me if I wanted to quit my job and follow the band across the country. No, I told her, but I did buy a T-shirt.
I was given this gift of slight detachment because I won tickets to see the guy. I was briefly aware of some of his music, but I could not be categorized as an Eric Hutchinson Superfan. But I did have a very delicious opportunity to observe the Northern California Hutchead in their native habitat. Many of them were recognizable by their omnipresent smartphones. These were held aloft at regular intervals in order to take murky, shaky video of the show that they had no doubt eagerly anticipated for months. Now they were in Eric's physical presence and they wanted to be sure to capture the experience for nearly immediate uploading on Al Gore's Internet. This allows the more distant or unlucky Hutcheads to witness in low fidelity all the fun and excitement that their bandwidth would allow.
Don't get me wrong: I danced. I laughed. I sang along. I sang along even though I wasn't privy to the lyrics of Eric's entire catalog, as some around us were. As many around us were. I was just keenly aware of the distance between my wife and I who had gone out on a lark and those who were there on a mission. I enjoyed myself, but not in the same way I would at, say, a Bruce Springsteen show. Hutcheads would be aghast at my over-the-top behavior at an E Street Band concert. I've embarrassed myself, family and friends at those events, so why should I be so judgmental about a crowd of twenty-to-forty-somethings hopping and bopping to their Crocodile's rock?
I suppose it came down to this: I won these tickets for knowing the title of an obscure Nicolas Cage film and having access to a phone at seven fifteen in the morning. I had a couple apples from the tub near the door and a Reuben sandwich at the cafe upstairs before the show. When I went downstairs, we waited just a few minutes and milled with the rest of the throng until the lights went down and Eric hit the stage with his band. I had fun. I will probably buy a few more songs, bringing my Hutchinson Hit Parade to nearly a full album. But I won't be doing what my wife suggested we do as we walked up Fillmore, the street, at the end of the night. Spying a slightly used RV by the curb, she asked me if I wanted to quit my job and follow the band across the country. No, I told her, but I did buy a T-shirt.
Sunday, May 04, 2014
Good Sport
There's a lot of talk out there about what it takes to be the owner of a professional basketball franchise. Currently, there are eight prime candidates for that job in the Los Angeles area. The Clippers, of the National Basketball Association, are looking for a few good men or women who would like to pay a whole boatload of money to be able to sit wherever the heck they want in the Staples Center. These seats will be nowhere near those of Donald Sterling, who like Elvis, has left the building.
Back to the qualifications of the next owner of the Clippers: Number one should be a certain amount of racial and cultural sensitivity. Mister Sterling seemed to be missing this particular quality. Number two would be the ability to fake that racial and cultural sensitivity, in a pinch, something that Mister Sterling was able to do. He had the NAACP pretty well fooled. Number three, if you've got a predisposition to offensive rants against large groups who happen not only to make up your fan base but your own team, try and keep them private. This goes back to the boatloads of money mentioned previously. If your wallet is fat enough to spare a few million dollars for limousines and fines of various kinds, save a little aside to pay off the guys from TMZ who happen to have access to the tapes made by your disgruntled girlfriend who just happens to be a part of that same group that you were busy defaming just a couple of sentences ago.
How about Floyd Mayweather Jr.? He's an athlete, and he has about a kerjillion dollars to spend, so he looks pretty well suited to the job. More than Frankie Muniz, who looks to be a big fan but maybe not as superrich as we might expect from the time he spent with Walter White. And he's white. Magic Johnson is not. So much so that Donald Sterling was particularly incensed by his girlfriend's connection to the living legend that is Magic. And he's almost got Diddy money. Why not go straight to the Diddy then? Sean "Peanutty Goodness" Combs claims to be a Knicks fan, but business is business.
I could go on and on, but if it can't be Oprah. She's got Diddy and Magic money. She gets apologies from racists. And last I checked, she knew how to keep her girlfriend happy. But here's the bottom line for me: I just don't want Donald Sterling to make any money off of this. That's why I'll be happy to take the job. I don't have Oprahdiddy money, but I will promise to not reward that pinhead Sterling with anything but my Subway Eat Fresh Club card. Which is probably more than he deserves.
Back to the qualifications of the next owner of the Clippers: Number one should be a certain amount of racial and cultural sensitivity. Mister Sterling seemed to be missing this particular quality. Number two would be the ability to fake that racial and cultural sensitivity, in a pinch, something that Mister Sterling was able to do. He had the NAACP pretty well fooled. Number three, if you've got a predisposition to offensive rants against large groups who happen not only to make up your fan base but your own team, try and keep them private. This goes back to the boatloads of money mentioned previously. If your wallet is fat enough to spare a few million dollars for limousines and fines of various kinds, save a little aside to pay off the guys from TMZ who happen to have access to the tapes made by your disgruntled girlfriend who just happens to be a part of that same group that you were busy defaming just a couple of sentences ago.
How about Floyd Mayweather Jr.? He's an athlete, and he has about a kerjillion dollars to spend, so he looks pretty well suited to the job. More than Frankie Muniz, who looks to be a big fan but maybe not as superrich as we might expect from the time he spent with Walter White. And he's white. Magic Johnson is not. So much so that Donald Sterling was particularly incensed by his girlfriend's connection to the living legend that is Magic. And he's almost got Diddy money. Why not go straight to the Diddy then? Sean "Peanutty Goodness" Combs claims to be a Knicks fan, but business is business.
I could go on and on, but if it can't be Oprah. She's got Diddy and Magic money. She gets apologies from racists. And last I checked, she knew how to keep her girlfriend happy. But here's the bottom line for me: I just don't want Donald Sterling to make any money off of this. That's why I'll be happy to take the job. I don't have Oprahdiddy money, but I will promise to not reward that pinhead Sterling with anything but my Subway Eat Fresh Club card. Which is probably more than he deserves.
Saturday, May 03, 2014
Nothing Personal
As I was walking away from the mailbox, leafing through the day's correspondence, I was surprised to see the phrase, "June 21st isn't just like any other day." For just a spare moment, my heart leapt. What were the chances that the friendly folks at NEA Insurance Operations would be promoting the First Day of Summer, which by the most tired of coincidences just happens to be my birthday? What are the chances that these people would just happen to be sending out some sort of promotion that coincided with the date of my birth?As it turns out, the chances would be one hundred percent.
Before I opened the envelope, just to be certain that this wasn't some sort of eerie confluence of events, I considered the possibility that this company which is associated with teachers and their school-related calendars might have picked this date as the kickoff to Summer Vacation. This would provide me with that additional layer of connection which would make this whole junk mail interaction just a little more intimate. Once I had peeked inside, I was greeted with the enthusiastic pitch: "It's not just your birthday, it's also your chance to lock in $100,000 NEA coverage for 15 years for $23.08 a month." It made me feel all warm and special for a few more seconds before I rejoined the reality that was already in progress.
They weren't sending me out a special notice just for me. Their data bank spit out this invitation based on information that I had given them way back when I had first signed up to be a teacher and become part of the team that would deliver the finest education to the students of America as well as periodically be reminded of my advancing years via fill-in-the-blank missives sent to me in hopes of my further contributions to the profession: Life Insurance.
I'm not getting any younger, and there are plenty of institutions out there ready and willing to take the opportunity to remind me of my age and station in life. Every time I put my name and date of birth on a form, written or on Al Gore's Internet, I was inviting this kind of kind attention. I also explains the other envelope that came along with my NEA offer, only this one didn't have my name or birthday on it. This one came with "cards enclosed," making it ever so much easier to become part of AARP. The American Association of Retired Persons had already been rebuffed by me a couple of years back, and at that time they had even done me the service of getting my name right. This one came to someone named Dk Caven, which I recognized as a twist of initials and name that must have come from one of those electronic forms that was completed in a rush in order to sign up for some "free service."
There's still a month and a half or so until my actual birthday, and until then, I will steel myself with the resolve that those envelopes that come postage paid, even if they mention that all important date, shouldn't be taken personally. But it would be nice to get an actual card from the NEA, even though they were nice enough to include a 2014 calendar magnet as their special gift to me. What a shame the year will be half over before I can feel good about using it.
Before I opened the envelope, just to be certain that this wasn't some sort of eerie confluence of events, I considered the possibility that this company which is associated with teachers and their school-related calendars might have picked this date as the kickoff to Summer Vacation. This would provide me with that additional layer of connection which would make this whole junk mail interaction just a little more intimate. Once I had peeked inside, I was greeted with the enthusiastic pitch: "It's not just your birthday, it's also your chance to lock in $100,000 NEA coverage for 15 years for $23.08 a month." It made me feel all warm and special for a few more seconds before I rejoined the reality that was already in progress.
They weren't sending me out a special notice just for me. Their data bank spit out this invitation based on information that I had given them way back when I had first signed up to be a teacher and become part of the team that would deliver the finest education to the students of America as well as periodically be reminded of my advancing years via fill-in-the-blank missives sent to me in hopes of my further contributions to the profession: Life Insurance.
I'm not getting any younger, and there are plenty of institutions out there ready and willing to take the opportunity to remind me of my age and station in life. Every time I put my name and date of birth on a form, written or on Al Gore's Internet, I was inviting this kind of kind attention. I also explains the other envelope that came along with my NEA offer, only this one didn't have my name or birthday on it. This one came with "cards enclosed," making it ever so much easier to become part of AARP. The American Association of Retired Persons had already been rebuffed by me a couple of years back, and at that time they had even done me the service of getting my name right. This one came to someone named Dk Caven, which I recognized as a twist of initials and name that must have come from one of those electronic forms that was completed in a rush in order to sign up for some "free service."
There's still a month and a half or so until my actual birthday, and until then, I will steel myself with the resolve that those envelopes that come postage paid, even if they mention that all important date, shouldn't be taken personally. But it would be nice to get an actual card from the NEA, even though they were nice enough to include a 2014 calendar magnet as their special gift to me. What a shame the year will be half over before I can feel good about using it.
Friday, May 02, 2014
Affordable
I didn't go out shopping for a Vega. It found me. When I was a sixteen-year-old sprout with visions of automobile futures, I went in search of a Plymouth Arrow. I knew I was going to buy a used car. I just wasn't clear on how used that car was going to be. I mowed a lot of lawns to raise the nearly one thousand dollars that I intended to spend on the car of my dreams. After a brief flirtation with the idea of owning a Chevy van, with Star Wars graphics painted on the side, I landed on this idea of an Arrow.
Why? Because it was the name of Oblio's dog. From Harry Nilsson's animated classic "The Point." Also because I became aware of the price differential between a Chevy van and any "small car" I might be able to afford. It was 1978, and the gas crisis of just a few years back weighed heavily on my mind, as did the gas crisis I was about to face. That is to say that paying for my own gas was going to be a crisis.
As it turned out, there wasn't a used Plymouth Arrow anywhere on the lot. At least not one that I could afford. That's when my eye and mind began to wander. It didn't help that I was a teenager standing on a used car lot with his father who was no help at all when it came to salesmen who really desperately did not want me to drive away with my father. "What do we have to do to get you into this baby today?" That sort of thing.
All they really had to do was meet my price point. The car I bought, the 1972 Vega hatchback, was eight hundred and eighty dollars. That meant I had a little more than a hundred dollars left over for tax, licensing and the aforementioned gas. I tried to kid myself into believing that I was getting a Camaro. Same great styling from the same great company: Chevrolet. I was not getting a Camaro. I was not getting a Chevy van. Nor was I getting a Plymouth Arrow. I bought the car that I could afford.
I bring this up because I keep having conversations with my son that start like this: "Hey dad, I'm thinking about using some of that money in my Bumblebee account to buy a car." The account is called that because long ago he decided that he might like to buy himself a yellow Chevy Camaro just like the one they used in Transformers: The Movie.
"You've got about four hundred dollars in there." I know that he has no real designs on a Camaro at this point.
"Yeah, a friend and I are thinking about buying this four hundred dollar car and fixing it up." I understand he has plans. I also understand that he will eventually own the car that he can afford. And the one that his mother and I can afford to have him driving around the highways and byways of California. What we all can afford.
Why? Because it was the name of Oblio's dog. From Harry Nilsson's animated classic "The Point." Also because I became aware of the price differential between a Chevy van and any "small car" I might be able to afford. It was 1978, and the gas crisis of just a few years back weighed heavily on my mind, as did the gas crisis I was about to face. That is to say that paying for my own gas was going to be a crisis.
As it turned out, there wasn't a used Plymouth Arrow anywhere on the lot. At least not one that I could afford. That's when my eye and mind began to wander. It didn't help that I was a teenager standing on a used car lot with his father who was no help at all when it came to salesmen who really desperately did not want me to drive away with my father. "What do we have to do to get you into this baby today?" That sort of thing.
All they really had to do was meet my price point. The car I bought, the 1972 Vega hatchback, was eight hundred and eighty dollars. That meant I had a little more than a hundred dollars left over for tax, licensing and the aforementioned gas. I tried to kid myself into believing that I was getting a Camaro. Same great styling from the same great company: Chevrolet. I was not getting a Camaro. I was not getting a Chevy van. Nor was I getting a Plymouth Arrow. I bought the car that I could afford.
I bring this up because I keep having conversations with my son that start like this: "Hey dad, I'm thinking about using some of that money in my Bumblebee account to buy a car." The account is called that because long ago he decided that he might like to buy himself a yellow Chevy Camaro just like the one they used in Transformers: The Movie.
"You've got about four hundred dollars in there." I know that he has no real designs on a Camaro at this point.
"Yeah, a friend and I are thinking about buying this four hundred dollar car and fixing it up." I understand he has plans. I also understand that he will eventually own the car that he can afford. And the one that his mother and I can afford to have him driving around the highways and byways of California. What we all can afford.
Thursday, May 01, 2014
What's The Good News?
My wife hates it when I wake her with news stories about death and destruction. She very much prefers the good news, the stories that generally fit in between the murder and dismemberment. That's why this one is dedicated to you, honey.
A teenager was arrested on Monday after he brought a loaded assault rifle and two handguns to his high school and said he had a list of demands he wanted to read over the intercom. No weapons were fired and no injuries were reported in the incident at Madison High School. The student's parents had initially notified the school that their son was missing early Monday when they found he was not at home. After realizing that three weapons were missing from the home, they went to the campus to find him. They found the student at the school and found two handguns in his backpack. They specifically asked him where the third gun was, and that weapon was found hidden in a restroom. Again, no shots were fired.
What makes this story even better, to me at least, what that it happened in San Antonio, Texas. And it didn't take a "good guy with a gun" as so many firearm fanciers have suggested in the wake of what has become an epidemic of school shootings in our country. It took concerned parents who tracked their kid down and made sure that he didn't do any harm. I'm not certain that this will win them my vote for Mom and Dad of the year, since somehow they did manage to let their somewhat emotionally disturbed son make it out from under their watchful eye locked and loaded. Did I mention "no shots fired?" It's not a story about drunken elephants, but it will have to do.
A teenager was arrested on Monday after he brought a loaded assault rifle and two handguns to his high school and said he had a list of demands he wanted to read over the intercom. No weapons were fired and no injuries were reported in the incident at Madison High School. The student's parents had initially notified the school that their son was missing early Monday when they found he was not at home. After realizing that three weapons were missing from the home, they went to the campus to find him. They found the student at the school and found two handguns in his backpack. They specifically asked him where the third gun was, and that weapon was found hidden in a restroom. Again, no shots were fired.
What makes this story even better, to me at least, what that it happened in San Antonio, Texas. And it didn't take a "good guy with a gun" as so many firearm fanciers have suggested in the wake of what has become an epidemic of school shootings in our country. It took concerned parents who tracked their kid down and made sure that he didn't do any harm. I'm not certain that this will win them my vote for Mom and Dad of the year, since somehow they did manage to let their somewhat emotionally disturbed son make it out from under their watchful eye locked and loaded. Did I mention "no shots fired?" It's not a story about drunken elephants, but it will have to do.
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