free milk

Traffic building on Hiawatha. Cars pooling out of Destiny. Streaming on to Solar. Dairy farmers are giving away 7,700 gallons of milk. Giving away, as in FREE MILK! 2p to 6p. 2-gal limit. A frenzy is fermenting. Gotta have it. After all, it's FREE. Watching the parade of vehicles, I am moved, touched, by this communal gesture. It's a feel-good story. I push to the side any thoughts such as: fancy car, you need milk? take your time, don't cut in; do you even ever drink milk?! Let's not cry over spilt milk. It's an uncommon act of generosity, beyond the economic drivers it entails. And who am I to decipher who needs or wants milk or doesn't? What's it to me? I salute this liquid courage, this solid charity.

I myself don't need any milk right now. I thread the needle through the intersection and continue my drive out to North Syracuse for a cheesesteak with Utica greens. To go.

What is it about free shit, anyway? I mean shit literally. Not "literally" the way people mean "figuratively." If it's free, folks can't pass it up. It's FREE1 Free shit? Shit, I'll use it for fertilizer. I mean, it's free! Can't pass up free shit.

Broken Windows and Silver Doorknobs

Bad neighborhood. Sketchy. Rough area. Borderline. Ghetto. Have you heard any of these descriptions, however offensive they may strike you? Have you heard either more negative terms or their euphemistic replacements?

Come, take a walk with me.

No. Right now. Don't be afraid.

Observe this block. Schuyler Street. Take in the parade of two-story, two-family houses, built in the 1920s and '30s. Lawns manicured, adorned with daffodils, mulch, shrubs, trees. No litter. Structures not thirsting for paint or carpentry. Across the street, much the same: different architectural styles, smaller, more modest. Up the block, historic Myrtle Hill Cemetery. Graves dating to the 1800s, including that of a Civil War Congressional Medal of Honor recipient. Several blocks distant, over on Milton Avenue, a house overrun by fallen maple limbs and uncut grass, by weeds, a house choked by its longtime neglect, its metal fence interweaved by sprawling hedge branches, an empty pack of Newport 100s, a discarded Brisk ice tea, a crumpled invoice for car repair, a lone latex glove. An official notice of condemnation posted on a window and door. Blue recycle bins, tires, broken trikes, and split-open trash bags on Herkimer and Emerson. And up the hill, on Pharis Street, overlooking city and suburbs, a pristine lawn with a sign warning against having your dog use the lawn as a private bathroom, in front of a pristine Arts and Crafts bungalow freshly painted yellow, brown, and black, with a shock of red on the door.

Care and neglect coexisting. Pride and privation. Gain and loss. A fabric of multicolored threads and textures, sewn and patched, stitched and shored up. Some more than others, some less, some not at all.

Let's walk some more, keep pace, stretch your stride, down the hill, toward the creek. Oh, you'd rather not, this is a "bad neighborhood"? Be brave. Suck it up. Trust me. Really.

True, that broken, rusted pickup in the driveway looks unsavory, so does the mosaic of tossed Burger King wrappers and soda cups. An eyesore. It makes my eyes sore.

But look across the street, that Victorian painted lady, emerald and cream with surprises of vermilion. Do you see its new siding, every storm window sparkling new, the shiny metal roof? The rebuilt porch? That house could pass for brand-new if you didn't know better.

I am sure this is obvious, but I can't help noting it: we are not dodging bullets, street-corner hustlers do not catch our eye, wondering if we covet their gaze and proffered wares.

Form your own conclusions, as you will. 

In my Age of Coronavirus walks, the gods and goddesses of surprise have been my tour guides.

Surprise, surprise.

If we look for broken windows, they appear. If we search for silver doorknobs, we find them.

p.s. Ever hear the expression "my mind is a bad neighborhood"? (It's popular in wellness and recovery circles and can possibly be traced to an Anne Lamott quotation, but its provenance is uncertain.) As with the physical neighborhoods described above, be careful what you look for. As Leonard Cohen suggested, "look among the garbage and the flowers." You never know what you will find.

lockdown

They've locked down the toilet paper. It sounds like a line straight out of "Desolation Row," right after "they're selling postcards of the hanging." Same cadence and mood. In this case, who are "they"? They are the owners, managers, or maintenance staff of the building housing a coffee shop I occasionally frequent. (Let me get away with the oxymoronicness of "occasionally frequent.") I happen to know one of the owners of the building; have known him for decades. He confirmed my suspicion that the lock placed on the toilet paper dispenser seeks to prevent the theft of toilet paper. He added that they (a different "they" than in the first sentence) were losing a significant amount of "bath" rolls every week from the various "bath"rooms with public access. Permit me to clarify. The lock does not prevent you from taking a sheet, two-ply or whatever-ply, from the roll. It's not like that. If you were so inclined, or obsessed, you could unspool a stream of sheets, hundreds. You can still steal sheetly. In that case, you could steal one roll of toilet paper, and it would then be your choice as to how to surreptitiously transport it out of the restroom. Presumably, re-creating the roll shape would be both awkward and too visible. Without a cardboard tube as a core, would it even be possible? No, you would probably want to neatly fold layers of the thin paper, forming a book, as it were, which could be slipped into one's pants, underwear, briefcase, knapsack, or backpack. The toilet paper dispenser lock we are talking about is a lock on the receptacle or holder that holds in the roll. Typically, a second roll drops down by gravity when the first roll is depleting. Most likely, the toilet paper thieves were taking one or both rolls. Clearly, they were toilet paper thieves, not borrowers. Borrowed toilet paper that is returned? Ewwww. Gross. 

In some cultures, this wouldn't make much of a difference. The toilet paper dispenser would not be locked because there would be no toilet paper. Restroom "customers" would employ other means of cleanup other than toilet paper, a topic I'm not willing to explore right now. 

At first glance, toilet paper theft might evoke a response along the lines of, "Are you kidding? Locks on toilet paper? They don't even do that at Penn Station! What's next? Locks on water fountains?" On further reflection, you might think: who are the toilet paper thieves? I suspect it's homeless people. But that might be a biased conclusion, however tentative. We can't rule out needy college students, large families, sufferers of diarrhea, the mentally ill, hoarders, or eccentrics. (These are not mutually exclusive subgroups.) Whoever, he, she, it, or they are, can you blame them? The bathroom is in an urban setting. Users punch in a code to use it. Despite efforts to limit use, it gets a lot of traffic from a downtown urban population. Since "drugs" are often mentioned as a cause of civic woe (they don't mean drugs; they mean illegal pharmaceutical substances; again, another different "they"), we can pose this question: how much does a roll of toilet go for on the street? Is it enough for one to get or maintain a high of any sort or a purchase of that other drug, alcohol, or a single loosie cigarette? I don't know. 

I am curious, but only mildly so, about the success or failure of this preventive gesture. Had someone been caught in The Act? Not the act of taking a shit; the act of making individual a bit of intended communal property. Wait! It's a unisex bathroom. Did you assume it was a male thief? Maybe not. Maybe female. Is there not arguably a greater female need for this product? Maybe not. 

As for preventive measures, could there have been a community forum to address this issue? (I almost wrote "tissue.") How about a pay-it-forward initiative? At one local coffee shop, customers can buy medallions for coffee or bagels. The medallions are placed on a wall, and people can cash them in if they can't afford it a coffee or bagel. Could something like this be done for toilet paper? (Why stop there? Consider how transformative this practice would be on a community scale for an array of social needs. Consider how radical this is.) 

What charge would the thief or thieves face if apprehended, red-handed, as it were? The penalty for conviction? I know: community service. 

Cleaning bathrooms. 

thank you for not sharing

In January 2017, Dammit Dave and I hit the road north. On a Saturday morning, we threaded our way through the needle's eye of potential lake-effect whiteouts, landing in Kingston, Ontario, for lunch. Why not? On the night before, I floated the concept as a small clutch of friends yucked it up. I liked the notion for its brazen spontaneity, shock value, and merry foolishness. Dammit Dave was up for it. So was I. On the ride up, we talked ceaselessly about our personal histories, buffered with a few cross-currents of editorial comment. I wouldn't say we delved into our fears; after all, we're men.

We had lunch at Curry Original. Very fine food with a view of Lake Ontario outside our window.

For dessert, we repaired to Balzac's Kingston on Princess Street. Coffee and pastries.

A sign said: "Table sharing is kindly encouraged. #makeanewfriend #communaltables"

Dammit Dave and I found a spot near the back, a table to ourselves. I was tired. I was ready to head back to Syracuse. If the coffee did its job, we'd be alert enough for driving back.

Table sharing.

It depends.

I wasn't in the mood for it, though often I don't mind. Many coffee shops depend on such a code of occupancy; they need to keep the place filled. They need to sell products. Otherwise, there'd be no business, no tables to share, no seats to sit on.

There's a time and a place for communal space.

This wasn't it for me, not quite, though, being a social animal, I traded remarks here and there with Canadian strangers, if only to ask about the location of the restrooms.

When I worked in New York in the Eighties, it was not uncommon for me, or intimates of mine, to engage in deeply personal conversations over lunch, at a restaurant, a cafe, a cafeteria, a food court, or a pocket park. New York conferred an automatic shield of anonymity and resulting privacy. It was like the cone of silence on "Get Smart." The people at the nearby table (sometimes at a shared table) could be talking about bestiality or beatific visions. No matter. Zone it out. Not my business.

That was then. Perhaps in a "hear something, say something" world, things have changed.

I've observed that privacy protection via anonymity is harder to come by in a small town or a modest-sized city. They listen in, pause before the fork hits the mouth. Or maybe that's my bias untested by the evidence of ample experience.

And cultural factors are at play, too.

Dammit Dave and I swapped no secrets, revealed no scandals that Saturday....unless he reads this and corrects my subjectively skewed memory.

Honoré de Balzac would have been disappointed in our conversational blandness as blank and small as a finished espresso.

Community Values

The TV is on in the Community Room. The community is undefined, but presumably it means the people who live in the building’s 40 apartments, and their guests or friends. The community is entitled to use of the room for family events: birthday parties, wedding or baby or baptismal or confirmation showers, graduation galas, family reunions, divorce or annulment commemorations, book signings, candidate kickoffs or pronouncements, landlord-sponsored and –contrived get-to-know-each-other gatherings with pizza, wings, and soda and coffee, and post-funeral gatherings. We’re in a basement. At the top of one wall are windows facing up at grates on sidewalk level. The opposite wall features glass walls and doors with venetian blinds. The blinds are typically closed. When the TV is on, it most often is tuned to the local Time Warner Spectrum channel with its endless, night-or-day loop of local weather, stories of death and mayhem or small-town thievery or depravity, the scores of high school teams, their success or failure in the sectional championships, the regional marching band competitions, the stray murder or rape, the drunk driver rocketing the wrong way on the Thruway, the statement from the sheriff’s office about the latest suspects, the mug shots of the young and accused with their surprised, scarred, and scared or defiant faces.  All to be repeated again after an appointed duration that viewers are trained to expect, such as “news on the nines” or “weather on the ones.” I walk by in the hallway outside the Community Room. As a resident, count me as a member of the community. No one is in the room. The blinds are drawn. The lights are off. The television is on, the newsreaders’ voices solemn and barely audible to a passer-by. I walk in and pick up one of two remotes sitting on the firm, faux leather chair. I click the O/I power button. Nothing happens. Someone once told me O/I stands for Out of Operation and In Operation. That does not seem plausible three decades later — if that is what I was truly told. Time was, we saw Off / On as the choices. It couldn’t be O and O, for off and on, could it? Too confusing. (I am pausing here to let you Google this modern-day mystery on my behalf. What did you discover? Thanks for coming back to finish reading.) I click the O/I on the other remote, and the massive screen on the wall goes blank, fades and cracles to black-but-not-quite-that-color, accompanied by a palpable silence. The local voices are silenced. The hearth is doused. No smoke puffs toward me or up a chimney. The electronic hearth with its comforting chatter and hum is snuffed out. The Community Room’s temperature is lowered by 1.7°F. I walk out. I do my laundry. When I return to the hallway by the Community Room, its lights are out, its blinds still drawn. And the TV is on again. I keep walking.

Reading Second Skins

We sat in tiny chairs at tables made for kids. In the school library, the tops of tables and the seats of chairs were closer to the floor than what adults typically experience. We paired off, a dozen adults and a dozen first and second graders. We were reading. We read to each other. The adult would say a word that the child stumbled upon. The child would repeat it.

Some children wrote letters on erasable white boards. One could hear the mysterious soundings-out of letters and their combinations, the gentle coaxings and coachings that shed light and pattern. Sight words, flash cards, stapled pages we called books. Voices blending. Encouragement. Ears yearning.

One boy, an eight-year-old second grader, reached out to touch my gray hair, grown over the ears in wintertime, straight and thinning. The boy, polite and energetic and eager, seemed baffled and amazed at my hair's texture, its novelty. Then he looked at my hand. This was not our first encounter in the school library; this was after a few months or more of reading sessions that were not quite reading yet but were tilled soil for later bloom. He observed the veins in my aging hand, noticing the blue riverine pattern on these hands holding the stapled pamphlets we use as books.

"My hand is a different color," the young fellow stated matter-of-factly.

The way he said those words, their surprise and frankness and tenderness, caught me off-guard. It arrested me. For a few beats, I didn’t know how to respond but feared no response would be a missed opportunity — for what I was not sure.

"Yes, I see that. Isn't it wonderful?" I quickly managed with a blend of his matter-of-factness and my mildly suppressed enthusiasm. We then turned to tackle another pamphlet, a level C or D “book.” The chorus of learning filled the room.

Upon much later reflection, I was grateful to my young reading partner for his honesty, authenticity, and directness. I recalled a moment decades ago in high school. Our teacher, a Catholic priest of the most progressive leanings, was commenting on Jesus’ oft quoted, “Suffer (allow) little children to come unto me and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” The only lesson I can summon some fifty years later is that Father Giuliani underscored and celebrated two qualities of children: simple and direct.   

Simple and direct. Yes indeed.

“My hand is a different color.”

A child’s uncomplicated observation of fact laden with a history unknown to me, just as mine was unknown to him.

Had I missed a deeper and more cogent opportunity? I knew the two of us were not about to engage in a candid discussion of Race in America. And I sought to avoid either preachiness or stilted speech. (Truth be told, I thought none of this. I had no time. Such considerations — and zillions more — rocketed through my brain before I uttered words.)

Those who parse such encounters might take me to task for these musings; they might posit a racial construct in my very questions.

So be it.

It’s what I had at that moment. In a country whose citizens rarely converse across racial lines, one to one, over bread or coffee or wine, it’s all we had.

The poet W.H. Auden wrote, “Love your crooked neighbor with all your crooked heart.”

It’s all we’ve got.

and this is America . . .

We sat in tiny chairs at tables made for kids. In the school library, the tops of tables and the seats of chairs were closer to the floor. We paired off, a dozen adults and a dozen first and second graders. We were reading. We read to each other. The adult would say a word that the child stumbled upon. The child would repeat it. (Incidentally, this is the sort of quiet volunteering that Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland has done for many years, but that's another story. Or is it?) Some children wrote letters on erasable white boards. One could hear the mysterious sounding-outs of letters and their combinations, the gentle coaxings and coachings that shed light and pattern. Sight words, flash cards, stapled pages we called books. Voices blending. Encouragement. Ears yearning. One boy reached out to touch a man's gray hair. The child seemed baffled and amazed at the hair's texture, its novelty. Sometimes a child would navigate a whole book, maybe twice. And at other times, the adult and child would mirror each other's narration or take turns in some improvised manner. Perhaps they'd discuss the new words or the plot or the informational content. The boy remarked on the veins in the old man's hand. "My hand is a different color," the young fellow observed matter-of-factly. "Yes, I see that. Isn't it wonderful," replied the man. They turned to tackle another book, the chorus of learning filling the room.

if you can read this...

You've probably seen the bumpersticker that says "IF YOU CAN READ THIS, THANK A TEACHER," or a variation on that. True enough. But also thank your parent(s) or step-parents or guardians; other relatives such as grandparents, aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters; your peers; your culture; your heritage; your physical and mental capacities; your neighbors and friends; your place of worship; local and school libraries and librarians; literacy volunteers; local businesses; government agencies and people with them; nonprofits; teaching assistants; reading specialists; mentors; civic leaders; educational researchers and leaders; legislators; and on and on. Did I forget anyone? Perhaps. Not intended. The point is: it takes (and took) legions of people, close and far away, to make you a reader. As you were READING this, you might have taken for granted that you can read. You might also have taken for granted the silent and complex and sophisticated array of people, forces, and factors that culminated in your ability to read this word, the next word, and all that came before and will follow. And to do so with ease and enjoyment, as if it were second nature!

We have a literacy crisis.

We need to wake up.

It takes a whole community.

Today.

Tomorrow is too late.

spin cycle

Doing my laundry at Colonial Laundromat, I was taken aback, a little, seeing a young couple, in their early twenties or younger, come in with a little girl. It was around 8:30 p.m. I get annoyed and dismayed when I see parents or guardians out and about with their kids when, in my view, it is bedtime. Worst is seeing a whole family traipsing through Wegmans or Tops at 11 p.m. of a school night. Inexcusable, in my old-world view. This wasn't that late, yet I did muse to myself, "Now? You have to do your laundry now?" But as I extracted my clothes from the dryer, I noticed the father presenting reading flash cards to the girl. He was patiently helping her sound out words or try to decipher sight words. The woman looked on, not saying a word or joining in. My head had a lot of questions about these roles, but I seized on positive aspects of this observation, and I did not want the moment to pass.

I approached the young man. "I applaud you for doing that. For reading with your daughter. Good for you. It's important."

"Nobody did that for me," he said. "I don't want her to be like me. They had to read the questions to me when I took an exam. I'm trying to help her."

"Well, good for you. It's never too early. How old is she?"

"Six," the girl interjected.

"You like to read?"

She scrunched her face up.

"You will. You'll get to like it. I read every day."

I'm not going to lie. I was lifted by this simple act.

And then I was deflated. Shortly after our little conversation, another guy walked in, with two girls, presumably his daughters, maybe slightly older than the six-year-old who was working on her reading. These girls might have been twins. It was now closer to 9 p.m. No books. No flash cards. Just laundry. No bedtime story, from a book or from memory. Not in the laundromat. Not tonight.

if you can read this . . .

. . . thank your genes and lucky stars, your neural pathways, your sense of sound and sight, your phonemic awareness and phonetic phrasings and particular parsings. And don't forget gratitude for the mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends who read to you before words were friends, before the printed page sang hymns and lullabies to you. Sing praises, too, to teachers, librarians, and the kindness of strangers who coaxed, nurtured, cajoled, and fostered you so one day you could call yourself a reader, and be proud of that triumphant title. If you can read this with pride and pleasure, thank the heavens and the earth and the people therein. Do not take it for granted. Share the wealth and spread the word, one word at a time, one page at a time, one child at a time. Together we are readers.

'Time' Is On My Side (Yours, Too!)

So. You've heard. Time Magazine has named me Person of the Year 2006. And you.

And also you.

And you. You too.

Yup, it celebrates the blogging community and the World Wide Web (some call it Web 2.0) and all its creative and collective and collaborative (and alliterative) and communal chaos and connectiveness.

Yay us. Yay me.

I admit to being conflicted over this. I carefully pored over Time's announcement and did not see one mention of The Laughorist. At all.

And, to be honest, the essay praising us did not mention you either.

Or you either.

No mention of The Wonderful World of Nothing Worthwhile, Meloncutter Musings, or These Are Me Thinks, or the Not-So News, or The Pole Affair, or To Love, Honor, and Dismay, or Odat's Mumblings, or The Bestest Blog, or Ron Bramlett, or I'm Sorry World, or Flip This Body , or Dafathsdays, or Sheila's Thoughts of the Day, or Natalie, or HeartsinSanFrancisco, or JR'sThumbprints -- all right already. You get the picture. (The Shangri-Las: "Yes, we see.")

Alas, no specific citation of A Chuisle Mo Chroi, or Eat Your Young, or Dating Profile of the Day, or LaughMoreLoveMoreFearNot, or Monicker either.

What about the reliably and humorously observant Mist1? Not a word.

O Time! O tempora, o mores!

Hey, this is getting to read like the Litany of Saints, Sinners, and Everything-in-Between. Does anyone know what a litany literally is anymore? asks the ex-seminarian.

But as I said from my very first post, this is all about solipsism, so how can I claim to be disappointed?

Carry on.

As you were.

Who will the Person of the Year be in 2007?

You? Or you? You? Me?

The Cornflake King? [welcome back, and say hello to Crunchy Durden!]

Just me, The Laughorist?

Laugh. Or....

Else.