A Christmas Music Miracle

We all know that music can be a very age-specific experience.  What was fresh and new and powerful to one generation usually bugs the shit out of the one preceding it.  What is calm and serene and hushed to the youngest generation is ridiculously noisy and painful to the older crowd.  There are the groups and sounds that seem to last forever, and run alongside each new generation allowing them to feel like the horribly downtrodden, ignored, and misunderstood geniuses they all are.

But sometimes, music just reaches people because it rocks.

I've been a fan of the group, that according to their frontman was never meant to be a group, since 'Big Me' was everywhere on MTV (you know...the days way back when MTV played music).  My oldest son, now three, sings and screams and drums along with Dave, Taylor, Nate, and Chris to a half dozen of their songs.  We'll watch their videos on TV or the lovely computer that brings you this strange blog from time to time, and the boy is there with me, dancing, asking where Taylor is, shouting, and loving every second of it.

So, cut to a few days ago.  The video for 'Wheels,' a new track from their final album is available, and I turn it on.  The drums start pounding, the guitars crackle and slide to life, and my youngest son, now seven months old and comfortable on my lap spins to the TV.  His mouth opens, the pacifier falls, he starts bouncing on my lap, and it happens.

He smiles.  He looks at me, then back to those fellas making the beautiful noises and laughs.

The Foo Fighters are legends in our house.

The Sky is Falling

(the views expressed herein are not necessarily the views shared by the author's management and subsidiaries, whomever they may be)

The Apocalypse is close.

But not really.

The 'End of the World' phenomenon seems to spread like wildfire and cause nearly as much damage.  It leeches onto the film and television industry first, seeking the widest audience possible by including as many attractive people avoiding explosions, aliens, diseases, and famine, all the while wondering what they could have done to prevent this tragedy.  If they had only watched the television a bit more and heeded the words of Nostradamus, the Mayans, the Atlanteans, Merlin, or Chicken Little maybe there would be a logical way out of this nightmarish future of death and decay.  Some more recent examples of a world facing destruction:

-The Terminator series future
-Bedknobs and Broomsticks (just kidding. this movie makes my skin crawl)
-Independence Day
-Deep Impact
-Armageddon
-The Happening
-2012
-The Road

I've certainly left quite a few off; these just came to mind.  Earlier examples would include The Day the Earth Stood Still, Mad Max, and others of that sort.

I could be mistaken, but of recent memory this topic seems quite cyclical.  Several years of normalcy, puppy dogs and ice cream, followed by a year or two of everyone going batshit crazy.  I remember news footage of piles of burning animal carcasses teeming with Mad Cow Disease, the Y2K mess, numerous Mayan, Incan, or Egyptian calendars telling us our turn was over, global pandemics, shortages of the Tickle-Me-Elmo doll, killer bees, and nuclear war if Matthew Broderick couldn't beat the computer at Tic-Tac-Toe.

I think we're all going to be fine.  The theme plays so well in fiction due to the fact that it allows for the emergence of heroes, love, and humanity.  It entertains the cliche that even the smallest, forgotten characters can make a difference in preventing the world from splitting in two and letting the planet's tasty cream filling ooze into the cosmos.  As a people, we've made it through real pandemics, built bunkers during the cold war, and watched the sun rise on the morning of January 1st, 2000.

Things might get weird, or downright scary.  But ultimately...I think we'll be fine.  Blind optimism, you may say.  That's fine with me.  You can wring your hands and line the bunker with another layer of lead, but I'll be inside with my lemonade wondering what is keeping the Nuggets from a legitamate shot at an NBA title.

(But I already know the answer to that.  The Black Mamba.  Maybe he'll retire one of these days...)

Christmas Heroes (continued):

2.) Clark W. Griswold

A sentimental favorite that I thought long and hard about placing in the top spot.  Clark was the one hero who suffered through the worst of the Christmas horrors: lighting disasters, ruined dinners, sewage explosions, tree incinerations, the squirrel, the elitist neighbors, and the throngs of cranky or meddlesome family members.  However, in so battling, Clark realized that as much as he tried to make everything perfect, being with the ones he loved on Christmas was the true gift.

Lastly...

1.) Ebenezer Scrooge

Portrayed here by George C. Scott (my favorite film version of the character), Ebenezer Scrooge stands atop the list due to the magnitude of his personal journey, as well as the cultural impact he would have on all Christmas tradition that followed.  Originally seen in 1843, I'd venture that there are few people who haven't heard the name 'Scrooge.'  Guided by ghosts on Christmas Eve, his journey inward forced him to shed the life of avarice, solitude, and pessimism that was slowly killing him.  At the story's conclusion, Ebenezer rediscovers the meaning of charity and love, and awakens on Christmas morning to a new life.

Christmas Heroes

Christmas has been pulled from the maw of destruction many times in my life by many different people.  The list can be exhasutive, and the films are all an indelible part of many family's traditions.  Linus VanPelt, George Bailey, Kevin McCallister, Kris Kringle, John McClane, and Scott Calvin were some of the brave few that have held the spirit of Christmas together in spite of the curmudgeons hell-bent on ruining everything.

However, there five individuals whose sacrifices and battles have made them gods in the Christmas tradition (please note that this list is not a ranking of which film or story is the best...just which heroes are more legendary):


5.) Ralphie Parker

 

He battled tirelessly against a belligerent squad of elves and their dismissive Santa, Scut Farkas and Grover Dill, soap poisoning, and "the soft glow of electric sex in the window," all of which threatened to steal his focus from acquiring the greatest gift he would ever receieve.  The weapon that would keep the rest of us safe, and sustain our hopes for the perfect Christmas.

4.) The Grinch

Naturally, any line delivered by Boris Karloff sounds more majestic than any voice we can conjure while reading the print version of the story.  And so, we get one of the most iconic lines from any of the heroes on the list:  "He puzzled and puzzled till his puzzler was sore.  Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before!  Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store.  Maybe Christmas...perhaps...means a little bit more."

3.) Buddy The Elf

While Buddy initally focused on finding his father and learning how to cope in the chaos of the human world, the dark magnitude of his true battle wasn't felt until late in the film.  Perpetually hopped up on a diet of candy canes, candy corns and syrup, Buddy realized that he wasn't trying to inspire his father to get back on the the 'Nice List,' but to return Christmas Spirit to those jaded, cranky New Yorkers.

The final two spots will be revealed later, neither or whom are Francis Xavier Cross or George Bailey.  Who could it be...?

In Rockville: The Fight

Much to his mother's dismay, the boy was in the poolhall again.  It wasn't that she didn't want him to play, she was just perpetually nervous about him playing there.  His father introduced him to the game, the hall, and the men who frequented the tight, smoky place last year, and her son was immediately enraptured.  He didn't give a whit about the meandering conversations of the adults, nor the beer that was served in the dim light behind him.  His father told him that anything that happened there other than pool was none of his business, and that was all he needed to know. 

His heart was given over to the plush green felt of the pool table and the smooth, glassy finish of the smallest cue on the rack.  He was prone to pet the table before he began, a boy hopelessly devoted to his puppy.  And even then, years before high school, the boy was good.  Damn good.  His vision was sharper than any adult, his stroke was smooth and certain, and he smiled to himself the entire round.  The men would gather and watch him blaze through a round of nine-ball, and shake their heads as he embarrassed someone at the snooker table.  His prowess at the table and whispers from his father most certainly kept him shielded from anything crude or dangerous in that place.

It wasn't until he didn't see a fight that he realized that there was an entire world that stood at his back, watching him play.

It was a Friday night when the men from Monegaw Springs stumbled into the poolhall.  The boy labored at a game of straight pool with the only man who could provide good competition.  He was in his early sixties, bald, and the largest man in Rockville.  He wore denim overalls without a shirt during the day when he worked his fields, so his skin was a taut chestnut leather.  He grunted and smiled as he played the boy, his ferocious gray eyes following the movement of the balls, and he rarely spoke.  People called him Boss.

Boss was in mid-stroke when the door slammed open.  Three young men stood in the doorway, one of whom staggered mightily.  He shuffled and crashed and barked his way to the bar for a drink while his two friends lingered in the entrance, embarrassed.  Boss stood and watched the man, and the boy followed his friend's eye.

The bartender wasn't giving the man a drink, and The Man From Monegaw was not happy.  The curses that slogged from his mouth were thick and wet, and the boy was immediately nervous to hear the threat of violence that accompanied those words.  The man slammed his hand on the bartop, and spun around to face the customers.  "I can whip any man in Bates County," was what he said.  The boy remembers the encounter precisely, but not for the young, drunk intruder.  He remembers it for what happened next.  Boss laid his cue down softly on the table and shook his great tanned head at the boy.

Boss spoke.  "That's taking in a whole lotta territory."

The drunk's eyes glinted and he nodded at the old, bald man.  Boss moved to the door, and the group disappeared behind the door into the night.  The boy noticed that the poolhall was silent and the men looked at one another and shook their heads with the terrible knowledge of what was to come.  The boy flinched suddenly at the sounds in the alley behind the hall.  Muffled grunts, a chuckle, and a thump against the wall of the building that shook the cue rack.

Boss stepped back through the door, pointed for a beer.  Outside, a car door slammed and the engine howled as it sped away.  Boss placed the knuckles of his giant, meaty hand against the icy mug and moved back to the table with the boy.  He smiled.  "Your shot, kid."

The boy didn't remember seeing the Man from Monegaw ever again.

More From 2009

(To continue from before...)

Movies:
There was a time when I was able to see a movie each week, so I had many more to choose from for a list such as this.  Alas, seeing a movie a week is no longer the case.  I'm not a cynic that thinks mainstream cinema is getting progressively worse, but it is getting progressively more expensive...thus the massive cutback.  So, the lists follow for several catergories.

Top Five of 2009:
"District 9"
"Zombieland"
"I Love You, Man"
"Funny People"
"The Hangover"

Absent from my list are the year's "art" films, period pieces, and overly depressing stories that, to be honest, I have no patience for.  That, or the independent theatre is too damn far from my house or too damn expensive.  But of the list above, I was very thankful for those five films, for I enjoyed them all immensely.  I'm not going to give a comment for each, as I really don't want to bore the hell out of anyone.  But maybe I already have.  Damn.

The Two Worst Movies of 2009:
"He's Just Not That Into You"
"The Men Who Stare at Goats"

Not much to add here.  Both were painful.

The Four Movies That I'm Looking Forward To In December, Of Which I'll Hopefully See One:
"Invictus"
"Crazy Heart"
"Avatar"
"Sherlock Holmes"

Best Food That I Finally Tried And Now Love:
Avocados.  What in the hell was I thinking?  I always shied away from them due to being mildly afraid of their texture because I was a pansy.  Now, however, whenever they're an option they're on my plate.  I'm still a bit nervous about guacamole, though.  I've tried nibbles of it, but the whole thing looks like a big gob of vomit.  Maybe next year.

Magic

(This may sound a bit...preachy.  But whatever.  It's important.  My space, my rules.)

Seeing the little girl beaming as she stepped towards Santa at the mall today made me happy.  I noticed others watching as well, smiling and whispering to each other.  Maybe they whispered at the girl's joy, or how their children acted when they met him for the first time, and maybe they watched it all through a thin film of their own Christmas memories.  Or perhaps they whispered of magic, and how it felt to believe in it again...if only through this child's rapture.

This is not a new request.  Not by any means.  Yet, I still feel compelled to ask you all to have the courage to believe in magic.  Suspend your disbelief when your mind urges logic, examination, and open your heart to the possibilities of that which cannot be possible.  And by magic, I mean it in any and all forms we've been exposed to: Santa Claus, dragons, David Blaine, Harry Houdini, superheroes, vampires, werewolves, fairies, God, the existence of a piece of cheescake that can make your entire being shatter it tastes so good, the Tooth Fairy, Love...it's all out there, waiting for us to accept it completely.

Believe in the impossible.

"The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see.  Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn?  Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there.  Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world."

-Francis Pharcellus Church, "Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus"

Thanks and No Thanks

The Thanksgivings of my youth were not atypical.  There were usually swarms of family and naturally we couldn't all fit at one table, so many of the diminutive folk were shooed to the rickety blue folding table.  The goddamned Kid's Table.  They always tried to make it sound special and unique and fun, dress it up like the other tables, but the rickety-ness was never corrected, and we were never out of eye or earshot of the Others.  And damn if they didn't try to cram as many of us into the square thing, thereby resulting in something spilled or broken, hurt feelings, and glares from the Other Table.

Though we were banished, two small consolations had been implicitly granted by the governing Others.  We could put whatever we wanted on our plates, and we could play Raise Your Hand If.  Therefore, my plate usually looked like this:
-rolls
-whatever Jell-O concoction was present
-some shreds of turkey, but not so much as to take up valuable roll space
-mashed potatoes with a small pond of gravy in the middle
-more Jell-O
-rolls

We all learned to whisper our questions, lest we become too noisy and attract unwanted attention.  "Raise your hand if you like the cranberry thing."  "Raise your hand if you like John Elway."  "Raise your hand if you want to go outside and build a fort after we're done."  "Raise your hand if you think the kid's table is stupid."  Strangely though, there was usually one adult who sat with us.  At first I assumed that they had broken some sacred pact with the Other Table and were thereby reduced to our pitiful status.  It was only a few years ago that I learned the truth of the adult-at-the-kid-table phenomenon.

The adult table is lame.

They just...eat.  And pass and clink things.  We actually got to eat what we wanted without getting weird looks, and playing Raise Your Hand If is just incredible.  So, here's to the Kid's Table this Thanksgiving...all you at the Other Table can just mind your own business, thank you very much. 

Some additional items for which I am thankful this year, and some I'm rather not thankful for...
Thanks:
-Dinner rolls
-Fried turkey, so long as a house is not burned down in the process
-Nice Thanksgiving weather that allows us to play football, whiffle ball, or climb the sleeping trees
-My family and friends, of course
-Maintaining the mashed potato wall so the gravy doesn't spill out and get on everything else and ruin my entire damned plate
-Hope
-Generosity
-The Macy's Parade
-The magical, seemingly instantaneous arrival of the trees in the Christmas Tree lots
-Someone who is loved more than they will ever know
-Non-stop Christmas music on the radio for the next four weeks
-Hopefully seeing people fight and slap each other for something trivial on Black Friday
-Dinner rolls

No Thanks:
-Deviled eggs that ruin the otherwise beautiful assortment of food
-Any potato salad that ruins the otherwise beautiful assortment of food
-Pointless football games that involve the Lions that I still feel compelled to watch
-Surly family members who need a slap in the teeth
-Glaring at the Kid's Table
-Black Friday sales that begin any earlier than 6am
-That mad rush of people to form the food line when it's time to eat
-The chocolate French Silk pie
-The pie with the meringue that slides off like a snot when you touch it with a fork

Best Things (continued)

Comics:
I placed three single issues above just about everything else this year.  There are some wonderful continuing series that I'm attached to, but I wanted to keep this section from rambling too much.  And yes, they're all from DC because I enjoy their product better.

-Northlanders #20: Sven the Immortal
One of my favorite characters defending his family and his legacy.  This also happens to be one of the best continuing series out there.
-Green Lantern #43: 'Blackest Night' prologue
Rare is the issue that genuinely creeps me out.  Writing, art, pace...everything here is perfect and disturbing.

Grand Prize Winner Due Mostly To A Single Page:
-Superman: Secret Origin #1
Another re-working of an icon's beginnings that works wonderfully.  Scene:  Clark runs through the Kent's cornfields sobbing and terrifed when he learns of his true home and family on Krypton.  Jonathan and Clark find one another and embrace on a page that was done so incredibly as to make me catch my breath.

Best Top Secret Information...
...is to be shared sometime after Thanksgiving.

Best Legacy Moment:
Comcast On-Demand is a magical thing.  A random search resulted in my oldest boy falling in love with a group of heroes which makes me intensely proud:

Yeah.  He sings the intro, acts it out with his Sword of Omens, uses Tygra's bolo whip, and even makes the 'shew-shew' sounds of magic bursting through the air.  His coolness reached a new peak this year.

Yet Another Subjective Best Stuff List

There are countless sites putting together vast, shiny, well-documented and well discussed "Best of 2009" and "Best of The Decade" lists right now.  Some of the better ones have several contributors to the lists in order to more accurately view the landscape that has passed, and others are simply compiled by one, well-known and respected author.

Regrettably, this is neither.

The lists or choices that follow are simply my own, subject to massive disagreement and vitriol, and are not necessarily contained to 2009 or the decade.  More simply put, what follows is the best stuff that I encountered this year, regardless if it was new or not.  I'll most likely add to this as the year moves closer to an end because I won't remember everything.

Books:
This category gets more complicated because I don't read bad books.  If I happen to slog through half of a book that is objectively terrible, I have no need to seek completion to a chore begun; I stop and move on to something else.  Some of the more wonderful books consumed this year:

-Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield
-The Life of Pi by Yann Martel
-Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
-Luckiest Man by Jonathan Eig
-Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman
-Beyond the Black River by Robert E. Howard
-All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

As good, or even majestic (as is the case with anything Robert E. Howard wrote) as some of those may be, there was one that surpassed the others, and I urge anyone who hasn't picked it up to do so quickly:

Best Day of 2009:
The easiest decision of the bunch.  On May 15th, my exceptionally happy son Jack Arthur made his grand entrance.

TV:
Strangely enough, television can be quite a polarizing subject.  Those people who are above such a mundane exercise as the watching of TV have a tendency to make the rest of us feel like terrible, soulless, unimaginative slobs who are hopelessly chained to the downfall of simple, honest, clean living.  I do my best to ignore such folk.  They're creeps.  And they usually have some irritating scent floating about them that makes actual conversation a bother.  Some of the most watched or enjoyed television of the year:

-The Office
-The Biggest Loser
-Scrubs (reruns or new episodes)
-Hell's Kitchen
-Rockies baseball
-Cash Cab
-Sunday or Monday Night Football When The Game Actually Mattered
-Man vs. Wild
-Baseball's Golden Age

I've never had HBO, thus the omission of whatever goodness they have going on there.  Nor am I a watcher of the massively successful Mad Men...though I don't know why.  However, I am proud to say that I am part of the greatest show that has ever been created!  And shame on all of you who disagree with me:

More 'Best of' nonsense to come later...

That Time of Year...

I saw the decorations in Wal-Mart the day before Halloween, snuggled back between the flimsy costumes, party favors, and orange exterior lights.  There, lined up in tight rows like a shipment of sarcophagi were the pre-lit, pretend Christmas trees.  The following afternoon, my television told me that Christmas cheer is available with Glade candles, and the new animated version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol was being released on November 6th.  Naturally, that question we all hear so frequently danced in my head:

Good heavens.  Isn't it a bit too early to begin the Christmas fanfare?

The answer:  Hell no.

I'd actually prefer to have a perpetual, year-long celebration of Christmas.  You all know the moment that exists at the edge of the Christmas morning magic, as much as we all try to battle its arrival each and every year:  That we'll eventually have to move our presents into our rooms and put them away.  That effectively ends the whole damn thing.  The food starts to look a bit off, the tree is now a nuisance, and someone has to get the ladder out and take the damn lights down.  Arguably, the only thing remaining is the egg-nog.  It still looks good.  It always looks good.

No more of this "Twelve Days of Christmas" nonsense.  Let's commit and make it the "Twelve Months of Christmas."  A year of making others smile and hopeful, being cheerful and generous, eating good food, listening to the 24-hour Christmas Carol radio station, being with your family, the smiles, the lights...it's a damn good time if you ask me.  The Christmas decorations, commercials, and music can never start soon enough.  If we could only get our grocery stores to stock egg-nog year round, all would be right with the world. 

Additionally, the Twelve Months of Christmas would make it much easier to identify the truly cranky people sulking about out there.  Should you encounter any of them in your Christmas adventures...smile big at them, wish them an extra-happy Christmas, and give them a big hug if you're brave enough.

They hate that.

In Rockville: The Old Woman

He returned to Rockville some years ago with his mother and sister to see what fragments of his memories yet remained, and his family followed.  We knew the trip was his, and we were to be curious bystanders as he walked down the storefronts, wondering which memories would persist after the trip.

The town was hollow and frail.  Pale walls sagged, patched roofs crumbled, and weeds clutched the broken cement and splintered wood, pulling it all further into the cold ground.  The air was still and heavy, and there was no sound anywhere.  All that remained of this place, it seemed, were the grain silos and the family that lay claim to them.  Yet even there, behind and around the silos, there was no sound, no motion.  Nothing was happening.

The man said little as he moved down main street, looking up at the empty facades of the stores there: The billiards hall, the hardware store, the East Side Grocery, all of them ghosts.  The town jail was a pile of gray stone in the grass.  Doors were missing, dangling from the top hinge, nailed shut, or warped and tapping against the weathered frame.  The man stopped as a cat, raggedy orange and wary, hopped from his path on the heaving sidewalk to commune with three others in a copse of grass across the street.

Our eyes followed the tabby across the street, and the man turned to us and said, "Jesus.  Look out there.  They're everywhere."  They bounded with one another in the grass, howled and spat in the road, and spilled out of a darkened store ahead.  It was impossible to count the feral host, for they twined and moved and pulsed over everything, and scattered as we moved along the sidewalk towards the front door of the residence.

There was no door, jagged pieces of glass perched in the gaping windowframes, and the afternoon sunlight splayed along the floor and sliced through the black of the building.  Dust motes and mosquitos and fleas danced in the warm yellow light.  Cats padded out of the room and moved between our legs, while some sat within and stared at the intruders.  Some danced to a darkened corner to lay beneath what looked to be the ruined front door, resting on cinderblocks.

It was only when we looked atop the door-and-cinderblock bed that we saw the ashen, tattered woman sleeping there.

The man turned to his mother.  "I don't remember this.  Who's place is this?"

She reached up and patted his shoulder.  "She didn't always live here.  She used to live around the corner.  She didn't use to have as many cats..."  At that, she tightened her lips and shook her head in frustration at the ancient soul within, and called to it.  "Dony.  Come out, hun.  You know me."  The figure on the wood turned its head slowly and stared out at us, unblinking.  The skeletal hands scraped against the wood as she rose and shuffled out to meet us.  The feral horde moved as one with her.

She wore a threadbare pink nightgown, her white hair was cut very short and curled about her ears.  Her nails were yellowed, and she had no teeth.  She raised one sharp arm to shield her eyes from the glare of the light and peered at the man, his sister and his mother, who now stood resolutely in front of us all.  The words creaked and crawled from her mouth, and her eyes widened with familiarity.  "Well, my goodness.  That pretty face is a lovely sight!  If I knew'd you'd be comin' I'd a put on somethin' nicer that mah gown."  She looked down at the fading fabric and shook her head sadly.

The man's mother smiled and stepped forward.  "It's okay Dony, hun.  We're just passing by to see things again.  You remember my son and daughter, don't you?"  She crept out of the store to stand on the sidewalk to look over those faces from her past and in the full light looked very small and very alone.  Dony gave each of them a hug, and the group stood for some time talking.  She would wave her arm at a part of town, point with her curled, arthritic finger into the past at different places, and everyone's gaze followed.  She smiled, chuckled, and once stooped to run her hands along the back of a dirty gray cat that passed her way.  It smiled.

Soon , they were saying their goodbyes.  "Sure was kind of ya to stop and see me."  Her eyes glistened a bit as the tears began to creep in.  "I'm feelin' a bit tired, I'm afraid...I need to go lay down for a bit."  The man and his mother and sister rejoined us as the old woman turned and moved back to her bed in the darkness with the cats.

We moved through the town for another ten minutes, and no one spoke.

(Photo borrowed from www.raccoonvalley.com)

The Dream Child Adventure

A Nightmare on Elm Street V: The Dream Child  was released in 1989, and I had to see it.  Nevermind how cumbersome the title was.  The poster looked beautiful and terrible and exhilarating.  I was nine, and I knew that my only realistic chance of going was to convince to my brother to take me.  He had to.  He was reliable.  In the previous years, I had sobbed and pleaded for him to take me to two other epics of widespread critical acclaim:  The Wraith in 1986, followed by The Garbage Pail Kids Movie in 1987.

The Wraith was some sci-fi mess about a kid who was murdered by a gang of ruthless bikers and returned from the grave as a mysterious, black-clad racer with an invicible car with a glowing ghost engine.  Or something like that.  And there my brother sat, shaking his head throughout the experience, muttering "This is ridiuclous."  But come on, brother!  That car's engine is glowing!  And it's invincible I think!  An IMDB search turns up some character names.  With bad guys the likes of Packard, Skank, Gutterboy and Rughead, how can you go wrong?  The next movie I would scream and throw a fit about was only a year away, and by then, I'd be so much wiser in my choice.

Alas, my mind was none the sharper, and the TV Guide review summed it up quite well:

"A stunningly inept and totally reprehensible film...Haphazard scripting and editing give the movie a jumbled, confused feel.  Apparently the public concurred about the film's repulsiveness, for outraged parents forced the distributor to pull television commercials for The Garbage Pail Kids Movie off the air, and the film died an incredibly quick death at the box office."

I remember being utterly confused at what was going on, and now feeling slightly bad for forcing my brother into this farce.  However, a mere year and a half later, the pleas, tears, and convulsing would redouble when Freddy Kreuger made his triumphant return.


Yes, I was allowed to go to an R-rated horror movie when I was nine.  I was familiar with the series from the VHS library of a neighbor, and we watched the third installment, The Dream Warriors, once a week.  It was funny, horrifying, and clever, and Freddy always got the piss beat out of him in the final showdown.  The following days in school, those who didn't know about Freddy during our lunchtime rounds of 'Raise Your Hand If' were a pitiful lot who had no idea how many astounding things they were missing.

My parents always warned that if these movies gave me nightmares, and came shrieking to them afterward, I wouldn't be allowed to watch them anymore.  Needless to say, I suffered in silence.  Freddy terrifed me.  But, when talk of Part Five of the Greatest Movie Series Ever began, I informed my friends that I was going to see it.  So there.


In retrospect, my brother must have been getting paid for this.  I can't imagine he would agree to my nonsense a third time of his own volition.  It was a weekend afternooon, and we entered the Cooper Five theatre as the previews were coming to a close, and everything was already dark.  We found our seats in the oddly sparse side theatre ("Why aren't there more people here?  They're all missing the best thing ever!").  The music started, some credits rolled, Robert Englund, Wes Craven, etc., etc.

Come on.  Who needs exposition and conversation?  Let's do this thing.  Blood and claws now, please.


It couldn't have been more than ten minutes into the film when Random Jerk Athlete was on his motorcycle, and the bike comes to life.  Hoses spring out of it and start burrowing into his skin, sharp things start grasping and stabbing at him, and he's fused with the speeding machine, covered in blood.  And that was it for me, thank you very much.  I started screaming and sobbing, and my brother (smiling, of course), ushers me out of the theatre to the bathrooms to wash my face.  He patted me on the back as we walked up the ramp, consoling me as we passed the three other viewers.  He really was a good guy.  He was on my side, despite another failed venture to the movies.


I splashed water on my face and stood shuddering over the bathroom sink.  He went into a stall.  I was drying my hands, and it happened.  My brother exacted his revenge on his pitiful, quivering sibling with poor taste in film.


"Uhh...Josh?"  It was a nervous whisper.


I turned.  His head poked around the corner of the stall.

"Did you hear--"

A hand burst from behind, coiled around his neck and ripped him back into the stall and he was screaming like a madman.  Tears and snot exploded anew, and I was rooted in place, screaming for my brother's life, screaming at Freddy to stop.  The were a scrabbling, and a chuckle, and my brother strolled out of the stall unharmed.  Smiling.  I was an utter mess, and he was quite pleased with himself.


This was all Freddy's fault.  What a dick.

A Marvelous Man

Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig by Jonathan Eig left a considerable imprint on me.  It was one of the more powerful books that I have read of late, and left me completely awed by the strength, honor, and selflessness of one of the greatest players of all time.  From a letter written by Gehrig for Liberty magazine concerning his opinion of his life at 30:

"Maybe we're missing something, but I can't help thinking that people who see life through a train window must be missing something too.  They're going too fast to get anything but a fleeting glimpse of what it's all about.

I'm not rich in the accepted sense of the word, but what millionaire can buy my serentity?  What king can live exactly as he wishes, with an obligation to nothing except his conscience?  In fact, I have yet to meet the man who can look backward over his shoulder as he passes his thirtieth birthday and say, as I do:

It's all been worth the while."

Thank you for an incredible account of Lou's life, Mr. Eig.

An Important Re-discovery

A green dragon lived in the first library of my memory.

She rested in a loft set in the corner of the Children and Young Adult section and her serpentine neck routinely slid over the railing to better see the tiny creatures scuttling between the rows of books below.  She'd uncoil and test the air with her thin obsidian tongue, tick her front claws against the wood rails that bordered her pillow-and-beanbag lair, and swing her maw down over her visitors to ensure they were maintaining an appropriate voice level.  I never actually saw it happen, but I heard in later years that there was one poor bastard who failed to recognize the dragon's authority in that place, acted a fool near the Choose-Your-Own Adventure books, and was swallowed whole--curly orange hair and all.

I spent many days there with my mother, beneath the warm eyes of the great beast.  We'd pull random books from the shelves to examine the illustrations or subject (Harry Allard, James Marshall, Garfield, superheroes, and Beverly Cleary being among the more common selections), amble quietly back to the tiny round tables that smelled faintly of antiseptic and begin reading.  Ma would occasionally wander over to the opposite side of the library to look through that other junk, The Thick Books Without Pictures of Any Sort.  We'd pick out a good pile of books, check them out, drive home, and return the following week.  It was the greatest of places.

My high school library was far less whimsical.  It was cold, compartmentalized, and lonely.  Privacy desks were honeycombed througout the place, and one could disappear easily in them.  I'd smuggle my food, homework, and shitty attitude in there to commune with the high school spirits of yore, Misunderstood and his brother, Smart-Mouth.  There was no majestic dragon in this library, just a frumpish gray ogre who wouldn't stand for any ballyhoo.

The college library was apporpriately vast.  Books everywhere.  Never the one that was needed.  Irritation wafted along the shelves and mixed with the panic of those students racing to finish their papers, mid-term or final exams.  Indignant professors who sputtered to the stonefaced Reserves attendant, "Don't you know who I am?!  I work here!  I'm a big deal!"  At times, it was a frustrating place to be.  There were days, though, when I could find a quiet corner or chair, settle in, read a bit, and sleep.

The college days ended, as did my visitation of any library.  Bookstores became the supplier of words for me, and they eventually all came to a dusty rest on my bookshelves.  Last week, I culled many of them and traded them in at a local used book store for a pile of new books for my son to enjoy.  And I ventured back to the local library.  It was incredible and I was overjoyed.  It was quiet, full of thick chairs and couches, clean tables, privacy, and coffee.  All that was missing was the dragon.

In Rockville: The Hydrox Cookie Episode

The sun slid between lavender rainclouds and fell into the distant grasses and hills and the boy stood at the front door window of the East Side Grocery watching his father walk home through the thick Missouri air, one hand in his pocket, the other swinging keys against his hip.  Air hissed through the seams of the cracks in the window that was broken the night before and was now patched together with cardboard and tape until the replacement glass arrived the following morning.  Someone broke in last night with a jagged piece of cinder block, unlocked the door and made off with the store's thick, leaden receipt box.

East Side's customers routinely paid for their purchases exclusively with credit, and receipts of their purchases and total debt was accumulated within the slate-colored box.  The box was found early that morning, three miles away in a culvert off Rockville road, receipts and ledger intact.  Presumably, the thief stopped to revel in his earnings only to find his hoard consisted of a pile of paper and scribbled notes, and was not, as he had hoped, a Cashbox.  The box was found upended and closed amongst the tall stretch of crabgrass, none the worse for wear.

Once the boy's father rounded the corner, he turned and set to sweeping.  He started at the back doors and worked forward, in a bit of a rush to get home in time for dinner and The Shadow, but not in such a rush that he didn't do a thorough job, lest he be confronted with his father's glare the following day.  As he bent to the dustpan, the sound of paper crinkling skittered around a corner.

He turned.  His white Converse squeaked on the smooth linoleum.  The sound stopped, started again.  He stood and moved to the front of the store, wary of the cat that was bound to burst from whatever the hell it was doing and race for the door.  The crinkling redoubled, toppled, and spilled along the floor.  Packages of Hydrox cookies slid from the aisle, and the boy paused to cursed at this new damn mess.  He stepped over the few packages and turned the corner to the aisle and the fallen Hydrox display.

To this day, he still hopes that when he rounds that corner in his memory the Hydrox Destructor is a cat.  But it wasn't.

Amidst the shiny tangle of plastic packaging, one entire package of cookies was held fast between the jagged ivory fangs of a demon that seemed belched forth from some twisted, horrifying rodent hell.  Nearly the size of a small cat, the rat stood and stared at the boy, steadfast and evil in its ownership of that pile of cookies.  The boy stomped the floor and pounded the cookies with his broom, shouting threats at the titan, and yet it remained, defiant to this pitiful human's display.  The boy was out of his depth and had absolutely no idea what to do about this marauding rodent.  Setting a trap at this point seemed pointless, nevermind that you were putting your limbs at risk whenever you attempted to set one of the damned things.  The setting of the rat traps was a job he left exclusively to his father.

He looked about the store hurriedly for something, anything that may help.  Then, it moved.  It moved forward, at the boy, and the boy stepped back.  This contest of wills was over, and they both knew it.  The rat turned and headed along the aisles to the back door and the grain silos from whence it came, the package of Hydrox hissing along the floor as it passed into the gloaming.  The boy watched it pass in muted horror, righted the display, and finished his sweeping.  He hung his apron on the hook inside the front door, locked up, and set for home.

He walked a bit quicker that evening.

A Reason To Smile

The Rockies secured their position in the 2009 MLB Playoffs last night in a 9-2 thumping of the listless Brewers.  Additionally, they set a club record with their 91st victory, having clawed their way out of a 19-28 finish to the month of May.  Anecdotes and stories of their resurgence have been printed elsewhere ad nauseum, so I'll cut this post short with the following:

Thank you, Skip.  You've given us all a reason to smile again this season.

 (photo used from Realsportsheroes.com)

Days Gone By

There is a place called Rockville, Missouri, and the road into town looks like this:

According to the census numbers taken in 2000, it had a population of 162.  At its peak, some 50 or 60 years ago, it was a city of approximately 400.  The small-town life of Rockville was akin to countless other places across the country, almost stereotypical in its relative isolation.  There was a schoolhouse, a grocery store, a church, a pool hall, and a creek.  There was humidity, bugs, grain silos, fireworks, and rats.  The barbershop and post office were ten miles to the south in a neighboring town.

An association of simplicity is too often attributed to these towns, in those days gone by.  Life in a small town was no less difficult than life in a metropolis.  People rose early, went to work and school, came home, ate dinner, and slogged off to bed.  The stress of responsibility, finance, and the unknowable future weighed just as heavily on the sunburnt heads and shoulders of the townsfolk of Rockville as they did upon the suited, hurried salesman in St. Louis.  The difference between Rockville and Elsewhere, USA was a simple one:  It was my father's home.

Stories from Rockville will be presented here at my leisure, and in no particular chronological order.  Many are important and unique moments from his childhood, and are therefore important to me.  The stories may not be delivered in a timely fashion, but they will presented without embellishment.

Most of the time.

A Tale of Two Teams

In 2007, the Colorado Rockies incinerated their opponents in the month of September and were the National League's wild card representative in the playoffs.  The streak continued through the divisional and championship series, sweeping both the Phillies and Diamondbacks, respectively, but were then promptly put out to pasture when they faced the Red Sox in the World Series.  Some statistics from the 2007 regular season (all numbers taken from www.baseball-reference.com):

-Their primary position players (excluding the pitching staff) posted a team batting average of .300, with Matt Holliday leading the way at .340.
-Six players reached double-digit home run totals, again with Matt Holliday leading the way at 36.
-The team had two pitchers post double-digit winning seasons: Jeff Francis with 17, Josh Fogg with 10.
-The six listed starting pitchers for the season posted a combined 4.47 ERA.

In comparison, the 2009 Rockies (I'll leave the 2008 season out of this, thank you very much) currently have the National League wild card, with a three and a half game lead over the San Fransisco Giants.  I'll offer the same statistics, with the differences in bold.

-Their primary position players (excluding the pitching staff) have posted a team batting average of .277, with Todd Helton leading the category at .318.
-Eight players reaching double-digit home run totals, with Troy Tulowitzki leading the category with 27.
-The team had four pitchers post double-digit wins, with Jorge de la Rosa and Jason Marquis both at 15 wins.
-The five listed starting pitchers for the season posting a combined 4.07 ERA.

One final stat to note for the 2009 season:

-There are 15 games remaining.

Some Rules

The progression and development of this blog has been admittedly slothful quite simply because it remains very...open-ended. So, both for the benefit of the author and reader, I'll occasionally put down some rules for the content and enjoyment of this space:

1.) Author Harold Bloom refers to "The Anxiety of Influence" as the struggle that poets have in becoming Timeless, for he suggests that there are no new ideas. Great was the poet who could, in fact, create something truly original, but many are left struggling with a new way to interpret an older, established idea.

Thoughts or comments that I have may appear here, but please understand that they may not always be strictly mine. I'll cite the source whenever possible, but some things may appear that resulted from massive amounts of media that are ever-circling around and through our heads. Or from a conversation I had when I was ten about Metroid or Thundercats. If, on the off chance that I think I have discovered a completely different Idea or Perspective, you'll know about it. Everything will be highlighted, italicized, and in thick, bold print.

2.) You will never see a post begin with something along the lines of: "You'll Never Guess What Happened To Me Today!" I don't want this to be a diary of any sort. A big, sharp pile of oddly random thoughts and discussions, sure. But you'll not hear about how not having any milk for my morning oatmeal or Cinnamon Toast Crunch has completely ruined my day.

3.) I've become a baseball statistics fiend. So, occasionally, there will be some of that going on here.

4.) My brother once laid down what he thought to be a very important social contract regarding good behavior with strangers, which I shall be following. "You should never talk about Religion, Politics, or UFOs." He may have been all of nine at the time, but even then, a sage.  So, I'll steer clear of that...unless it's something really important. I can't promise that should the Pope ever be abducted by aliens wearing Jimmy Carter masks that I wouldn't mention something about it, even in passing.

Good things for those left waiting

This is troublesome. The entrance into the magical realm of People Who Compose Web Logs, or The Bloggers, seemed so much more exclusive than this vast empty page below. Also, I was admittedly hesitant to ever begin one of these for the following reasons:

1.) Neither my wife nor myself possess the necessary technology to become a regular member of this community. We don't have cellphones, we don't use Facebook or Myspace, Twitter is anathema to us, and our television doesn't have those three fancy A.V. jacks on it.

2.) I don't know enough people to make this exercise beneficial.

3.) No one really gives a damn. They're just bored, or humoring me, or accidentally wound up here due to some Internet Mishap. But more than likely, they're bored.

At any rate, I'll do my utmost to keep this somewhat topical and updated. I'd hate for the one person with the Internet Mishap to get here and not find something clever or puzzling to look at. The Blog may full of empty, pallid, nothingness for some time until I figure things out a bit more, but I will make one promise to anyone reading this:

I will strive with each and every post, update, or comment to not be that guy that people huddle and whisper about when he leaves the room, claiming, "That guy doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground."