Post #4: Ah, those wonderful high school memories

Teenage boy. Underwear. High School Classroom.

Innocuous enough on their own, these three things become quite the dilemma--and cause for humiliation to any awkward adolescent-- when they are somehow, inextricably  grouped together.

So it’s a Sunday afternoon, and I’m at my friend’s house for some late Spring swimming fun: we dive in the pool catching rubber balls (emulating shortstop heroics), have underwater hold-your-breath contests, and engage in general tomfoolery. It’s a wonderful, stress-free weekend event. But little did I know that I was sewing the seeds of absolute mortification that would spring up just 24 hours later. You see, I had brought my bathing suit in my school backpack (which often served as my out-of-school all purpose bag—carrying stuff around the mall, tucking my mitt inside for baseball practices, etc.) , and upon arriving, and switched out of my t-shirt and shorts (and, umm… my underwear, of course), cramming the clothes in the recesses of my backpack. As it turns out, I just stayed in my bathing suit for the rest of the day (a habit that seems particular to tropic-heat, wet-clothes-to-dry [poof—like magic!] South Florida kids), went home in the early evening, took a shower, put on a new set of clothes… and, forgetting they were there, left my original clothes in my school backpack overnight. 

No big deal. So there are some dirty clothes buried behind my algebra book, my psychedelic-patterned Trapper Keeper (ah, the 80’s!), and my first baseman’s glove. No big deal. So they sit there, unbeknownst to me, through three periods of school that Monday. Whatever. So I go to my fourth period class—American History, if I remember correctly—where I happen to be sitting right in front of a cutie, quirky Drama Club girl whom I’ve had a crush  on since 6^th grade, and haven’t said a word to beyond a muted “here” (as I passed back quizzes and such) despite being planted within five feet of her for the past seven months, sitting there listening to some lecture about the Underground Railroad or somesuch, while the undies lie unknowingly in the bag at my feet. Not a problem. So class is coming to an end, and the teacher asks to collect homework, and I fish out my aforementioned tacky three-ring binder to get out my paper on Frederick Douglass. Yadda yadda. So the slightly-used underwear, still there from yesterday, totally forgotten in my hectic school schedule rat-race, flops right beside my desk, as I pull out the binder. Hmm. So I grab it hastily and put it back in before—maybe-- anyone sees it (crisis averted?) EXCEPT, I suddenly realize, looking over my shoulder, one person did see it—youknowwho. Gulp. So the cutie girl I was too shy to ever talk to, make my identity and personality known to, now has basically one piece of information about me—that, for some reason, I carry my whitey tighties in my backpack. BIG DEAL. BIG PROBLEM. 

Ah, the joys of awkward adolescence. A silly, mundane moment that feels like your pants falling down on a stage at a public assembly.

But let the real lesson be known: the undies on the classroom floor is not the problem. The clumsy reaction, the typical teen solution, is the problem. Had I just chuckled, turned around, and offered an easy, casual explanation to the girl as to the cause of my pair of underwear draped on the floor between us, it would have been no big deal. Heck, it might have been the “opening” I desperately needed to actual talk to her, share a silly, human moment, demonstrate my humor and my mellow temperament and (most crucially) my comfort-in-self. Maybe we would have dated, or at least become friendly acquaintances, fellow-travelers on the storm-tossed, gut-wrenching journey of adolescence. But the problem, of course (truly the defining problem of many of us in our teens), was that I didn’t have that aforementioned comfortable-in-my-own-skin brand of poise. And so, I did what any gawky, insecure teen boy  was destined to do—I turned beet-red, I put my head on my desk, I did everything I could to shrink from the scene besides crawl --right with that underwear--into my backpack. And I never spoke a word to that girl (not even “here”) again, assuming she thought of me as the king of dorks, or worse, some kind of creepazoid.

Ah, but as they say, our difficult experiences help us grow into adulthood. And we can laugh about it when we’re adults, when we’ve (mostly) figured out not to take too many things seriously, especially OURSELVES.

 But, ye gods, if I could just have that moment back!

Post #2 (2012)- The Area of MY Expertise!

One doesn’t have to be a sports fan to appreciate the craftsmanship of a professional batsman: watch a hitter like Ichiro display the remarkable fineries of his craft in a crucial, gut-wrenching 8^th inning at-bat. Watch him battle off three 98 MPH Verlander heaters with last-millisecond foul tips (the clumsy plunk of the bat sending the ball dribbling foul, a “lose- the-battle, win-the-war”, stoical sort of victory for the proud batter), biding his time, staying cool as he can (as cool as anyone staring down a firing squad can be), before honing in on that eventual curveball (a knee-buckler, a humbling whiff if you’re geared up for the Heater, if your macho goal is power-against-power and launching it over the fence), and with an eagle-eye, a predatory focus, and a quick flick of the wrists,  serving that Uncle Charlie into the right field corner for the game-changing. momentum-flipping hit—from strike number three, out number three, rally averted, to plating the tying run from second and cruising into scoring position as the go-ahead run himself (keep the line moving boys, keep it moving). In this way (and hundreds of others)m Ichiro is a fine example of all the skills that the best hitters must have—instincts, careful preparation, poise under pressure, bodily mechanics and balance as consistent and precise as a calibrated super-spy watch, and hand-eye coordination that combines Zen-like restraint, raw strength, and samurai reflexes.  Boxing is termed, “The Sweet Science”; perhaps the fine art of baseball hitting should be called, “The Graceful Gift.”

 In 2005, the USA Today conducted a poll in which they asked professional athletes, “What is the hardest specific skill/ task to perform in sports?” The #1 choice-- ahead of handling a NASCAR racecar, pole vaulting twenty feet in the air, and hitting a long, straight tee shot-- was hitting a baseball. As sportswriter Gary Mihoces puts it, “Considering that a major-league pitch can reach speeds more than 95 mph, hitters have only 0.4 seconds to find the ball, decide where the ball is going and swing.”

Or to put it another way: imagine standing in a narrow box, within the range of your front door to your mailbox, and watching a miniature Ferrari kicking from 1^st to 5^th gear in a heartbeat, and perhaps cutting at a 45 degree angle,  towards you or away from you (or not), and the object at a density of a heavy stone, and, not just ducking for cover, not watching in wonder as you would a jet plane that whizzes across your plane of sight at an air show, but in fact attempting to swing a heavy piece of lumber, starting from behind your head, and with time enough to react and maybe think half-a-word (like “slid-“ ), and aim right at the object, like target shooting at a hummingbird across your shoulder, and not just make contact—no, that’s just the tip of the iceberg!—and not even make solid contact, but in fact guide the object with a velocity, direction, and angle that gives you a fighter’s chance of putting it somewhere on the field away from the nine players who are carefully positioned in a way to best minimize your chance of doing so. And the players, nay the daredevils, who do this best, who become legends of the sport, still only do so at a one in three clip! Imagine measuring success in any other challenge or competition (free throw percentage? school grades? military victory?) as being well under 40% of the time!

Ted Williams hit .406 in 1941--  a God among men. Ichiro hit over .350 four times in his MLB career (including .372 in 2004)-- no player in that period has done the same.  Let us stop and admire the dexterity of such batsman, if not as sports fans, than for the awe of this purest, most precise of physical abilities.

Post #1 (2012)- "Stranger in a Strange Land"

So I was raised Catholic. That means that as a child, in accordance with thousands of years of (stifling) (soul-stultifying) hierarchical tradition, church--to me-- meant sitting quietly in an uncomfortable wooden pew for an hour every Sunday morning, pondering things like what new GI Joe accessory I could purchase to affix to my Cobra Command Station, or why those kids were so intent on denying that Lucky Charms rabbit just a little bit of simple pleasure, while the monsignor, bedecked in his flowing violet cape layered over the classic (as classic as a red Mustang Convertible or floppy-eared Basset), princely ol’ black shirt and white collar, droned on gravely about my sins and Christ’s magic powers and whatnot. I do remember some candles burning and a bell ringing. Also we would kneel for like 15 minutes towards the end. Finally (mercifully), we’d go eat the wafer, hear the church bulletin highlighting the weeks’ potlucks and bake sales, the holy “word of the day”, and at last be dismissed, to enjoy the rest of Sunday afternoon with family get-together Sunday supper, and maybe a wiffle ball game in grandma’s backyard.  

So church was boring to me. Obligatory. Not exactly spiritually uplifting.

And then, years later, as a grown-up boy, an Italian-Irish Catholic WHITE boy, with a wife, a career, and an embedded set of religion/ church service presumptions,  I went to a church service of a different sort. Still Christian-- but that’s like saying a cat and a leopard are  both felines--  it was a rural Baptist church, entirely (not largely, not mostly, but ENTIRELY) congregated by black people—and thus we were the ONLY whities that Sunday (or any Sunday, I would imagine) soaking up The Good News. You see, my wife’s co-worker, an African-American gentleman, was the pastor of the church, and he had invited us out to attend their “Friends and Family” day. We graciously accepted, assuming that it would be a predominantly back congregation, and something a little different than our religious experiences; we could not, however, anticipate the absolute culture shock we would undergo, as people raised under the influence of the “stuffy white church” paradigm.

And indeed what a THRILL it was to see people embracing their faith with gusto, celebrating the joy of their worship, singing, dancing (and I mean SINGING AND DANCING—mouths agape, arms akimbo, rocking the little churchhouse like a Springsteen concert (and yes, I know how white that reference is!) ), responding to the preacher’s homily in the time-honored, populist  call-and-respond tradition (“THASS RAIGHT”, “PRAYYYSE BE”, “JEEEESSUS” ), up on their feet, stompin’, clappin’, ENRAPTURED by the Word. And the outfits! From my Catholic childhood, I remember being stuffed by my mother into a pair of dress pants and a button-up shirt (and if she could pin me down long enough, a pair of penny loafers in lieu of the Nike Airs) right before mass, but these folks at the Baptist church put the three-squared into the phrase “Dressed to the Nines”: men in three-piece suits, woman in wedding-formal gowns, make-up and jewelry as immaculate as a Costume Ball. And the HATS! Lawdy, the hats! Never mind you the traps of stereotyping, let it be known that old black ladies genuinely know how to sport those elaborate church hats! Colors, shapes, patterns that’d make Salvador Dali drool. Finally, lest we not mention the full devotion of worship on this day, there was the length of the service. An hour passes—six or seven songs, two or three pastors speaking—and we’re still going strong. Two hours pass—the collection basket has been around at least three times, the elderly folks have gotten up to use the john once or twice—and we’re still going strong. Two hours and forty minutes—and now we’re winding down,  having experienced a whirlwind of worship and devotion, expounded energy akin to running a marathon.  My wife and I say our farewells to the pastor, to our welcoming seatmates and spiritual well-wishers, having just stood and smiled awkwardly (and maybe once in a while putting our hands together out of deference to the music)  for close to three hours, sticking out like a sore thumb—no, more like a sore elephant tusk—and, despite the awkwardness of it all, absolutely inspired, enthralled, made better by the experience. The phrases “cultural exchange” and “melting pot” certainly get overplayed in our country, our increasingly globalized modern world, but without a doubt, this experience taught me that it is VITAL to branch out of your comfort zone once in awhile, to discover that there are worlds absolutely foreign and exotic and enriching just a few steps, and a knock at the door, away from our prescribed, comfortable, stifling routes.

I thought about this as my wife and I departed that humble black country church on this Sunday morning, and then I realized as we pulled away that the congregants were just breaking for lunch, on the picnic benches outside, before returning into the church for another three hours of Worship. 

Post #3- "Italian-American"

“Don’t upset yawh mutha, Jay. She deserves yawh absolute respect.”

“Jaaaaaay, yawh granmaw would really like to heah from ya. She luvs to heah yah voice.”

“Family, Jason….. that’s the mowst impawtint thing. Family.”

These are the mantras that most Italian-Americans hear from infancy all through childhood. (Heck, I just heard that middle line three days ago.) My mother was the first in our family born in America: fostered in the ethnic pockets of Brooklyn, NY, supported by immigrant parents with thick Italiano accents who paid the bills month-by-month (and sometimes right up to 31^st of each) by filling the blue–collar labor gaps of a growing city with expansive, burgeoning social demands—barbering, dressmaking, bootlegging.  As with many, or all, of the immigrant cultures in our “Land of Opportunity”, they left their homeland, left everything they knew (their comfort zone), and braved the unknown, to broaden the horizons of their children and their grandchildren (ME); in many ways, they accepted the burdens of the past and present in their lives to insure a lighter load for the future, for their progeny.

And of course, it’s not a fluid transition, a traditional culture auditioning for a new role in a new play. The past clings to you (embraces you?), the quirks of your heritage shape you whether you want them to or not. As any “ethnic” person does, there are some stereotypes I resent—the mafia, the mamma’s boy, the guido, the greasy hair, the loudmouths and the expressive hands and the tacky jewelry. (But you know what? As they say, stereotypes are usually derived from some truth—and believe me, I’ve got some jabronis in my family!!!) But beyond the clichés, we also know (we ALL know) that the inherited values of our family and our heritage  are sacred, and ultimately universal: knowing where you come from, knowing that family is the bedrock in our lives, knowing that we all dream of a brighter future for our children.  The experiences of “Immigration” and “Transition”—the dramatic nature of physical and emotional up-rootedness-- merely serve to highlight what are fundamental HUMAN truths.

Post #2- "In-Betweener"

I’m an in-betweener-- I’m a southern-friend Yankee. I love the city: the energy of Washington Square and the glamour of Fifth Avenue and the rush of the #9 train and the stateliness of the skyscrapers and the splendor of Central Park and the chic youthful energy of Williamsburgh, Brooklyn and the majesty of the Statue of Liberty as you pass the island from the Staten Island Ferry (my hometown)—this is the city of dreams, the gateway to the Land of Hope and Plenty, the boisterous, dreamlike, scruffy wonderland NYC.

And yet. New York has its reputation (its denizens, its scenery)—definitely pretty gruff, pretty aggressive, entirely coarse. This place (these people) will run you over if you don’t’ step aside, will knock you down if you’re not alert, not sharp, not rough-around-the-edges. I’m too sensitive for this world, sometimes. Partially it’s my natural demeanor, but certainly it’s also a reflection of having spent my last 20-some-odd years in the South. The leisurely, genteel south. The summer-porch, sweet tea, soothing South. The laid back, mostly polite, good-natured charming South. The atmosphere certainly feels less hectic, the people certainly bark less and chortle (rather than snicker) more. And oh my, those creamy cheesy grits!

So I live in both worlds, not quite a full member of either but comfortable enough to meander, interact, appreciate the rhythms and cadences of both. I’ll take the tumultuous sights and sounds of NYC, the raw energy of a metropolitan splendor, if I can also have (in delicate balance) the wisteria and white-moss clad oak trees, the gentle midnight cricket hum of ol’ Gainesville.

Post #1: Response to "Moving Water, Tucson"

We stared up at the sky, into the distorted, hazy early morning sun, numb to the reality of what lay above us. One of the defining features of our city, the two jutting fingers, the concrete french fries that were recognizable anywhere along our southern skyline-- anywhere in the world, really, on televison screens and movie stills-- were engulfed in flames and smoke.

We could still see the entrypoint of the plane in Tower 1- -the first plane, that signalled a rousing, thundering transgression to our regular. humdrum Tuesday work morning-- a cartoonish imprint of thrusted wings two-thirds of the way up to the heavens, although most people didn't see the actual impact, but instead listened in baffled wonder as the few eyewitnesses (happening to spot the rapidly descending steel creature in the top corner of their eyes as it barreled towards the skyscraper) exclaimed, "That was a plane! A plane just flew into the Tower!" A startled, confused, and yes, fascinated murmur reverberated through the crowd: A plane? Was it an accident? Was it intentional? Does this have something to do with those trucks parked in the WTC lobby a few years back?

And so, with the attraction of action-movie theatre-goers (better than Independence Day , better than any fantasy FX), we stared and stared, our necks sore from the straining, like children at a planetarium, and we all saw the second plane, and the murmurs turned to shouts of terror. We all wondered to ourselves, and aloud: What's going on up there? Will those people get out? Isn't my cousin on the 42nd floor of Tower 2? My neighbor's wife somewhere in Tower 1? Isn't that the location for the Bank of America office? And tears starting rolling silently down cheeks, like glaciers melting slowly, emotions thawing from wonderment to horror, of many of the gawkers down below, long before any of us could start to see ant-sized bodies flying from the windows, or the tower starting to rumble, than tumble, or the dense clouds of smoke and ash and human skin started to envelope us like a horror movie, like an alien invasion, sending us scurrying away, horrified by choking breath and soot-covered body but devasted by what it meant for Those in the Towers.